Edubloggers: Lunatic fringe or BlogHer's core constituency?

At the BlogHer conference, when Barbara Ganley of Middlebury College mentioned she is an edublogger, someone mistook her as saying she was an "antiblogger."

She at once embraces and brushes off such a label: "I bet some of the people here (and even in my edublogging world) think this loose kind of essay writing I do is anti-blogging. I know that. I'm okay with that."

There's a definite sense of alienation in Ganley's reflections on BlogHer. And she isn't the only edublogger to have what she calls "mixed feelings" about the sessions at BlogHer.

She writes,

But rumbling through the two days was, as Laura points out, a strong whiff of the almighty dollar. People were looking for hints on increasing traffic to their blogs, making money blogging, encouraging advertisers. In sessions I attended, and in the buzz around the pool, there was a whole lot of attention paid to getting people to your blogs. Fascinating.

Okay, so I learned that my world is indeed what I expected to find out--a bit out of touch. But I expected there to be a huge outcry against DOPA--after all, Danah Boyd spoke on Day Two. But no--NOTHING within my earshot. And in fact, as I went around talking about it, I found out that many, many bloggers, including those in academic circles, hadn't even heard of it. How can that be? I was shocked and not a little bothered--we were surrounded by the sponsors giving us everything from zipdrives to condoms, fake flowers to souped up water; but no talk about legislation that will deepen the digital divide by making blogs and other social networking sites out of reach for kids without computers in the home, and force those who do use the sites underground to form their communities. Read Danah Boyd's inspired research on MySpace and adolescents if you don't believe me.

Personally, I enjoyed the conference, and my encounters with the edubloggers convinced me that these women are have embraced BlogHer's mission to effect meaningful change through blogging. While I share the sense of unease the academic bloggers exchanged over wine, soda, and hard liquor, I can see the appeal of driving traffic to one's blog with the hope of profitting from it. I straddle the increasingly apparent divide between those who blog-for-fun-and-profit and those who blog-to-change-the-world. My little salary as an adjunct instructor doesn't pay the bills, so I need to freelance occasionally, and blogging helps me to showcase my knowledge and my mad writin' skillz.

So I ask: Can't we all get along?

Biz bloggers can learn from edubloggers

Business bloggers, you should know that edubloggers aren't eccentrics on the edge of the blogosphere. There are a lot of academic bloghers. Check out the Research and Academia blogroll here at BlogHer for a partial list.

A subset of those blogs includes the edubloggers, those dedicated and hardworking souls who write about the usefulness of blogging and related technologies to education. These bloggers ask the hard questions about how to bridge the "digital divide" that separates the haves from the have-nots.

Edubloggers take the BlogHer conference's motto of "How are your blogs changing your world?" and ask instead, "How can students' blogs change their worlds?" And by "students," they mean anyone who might otherwise lack a voice.

In short, edubloggers show students and others how to democratize knowledge and participate in conversations about issues that are changing their worlds whether they like those changes or not. They are blogging evangelists because they believe in the power of blogs to transform education.

Business bloggers could take a page from edubloggers' insistence that instructors open up a forum for their students rather than trying to control content and message. For edubloggers, blogging is a reflexive practice constantly open to revision. That means transparency, being open to new directions, and for the love of all that is holy, giving up scripted presentations. (Microsoft Live Spaces and their shills, the ridiculously scripted and bubbly Be Janes, who presented prior to one of BlogHer's sessions, should take note. Dear Home Improvement Barbies: Women with the level of technical prowess in that room aren't likely to be cowed by a router. Hugs, Leslie)

Edubloggers can learn from biz bloggers, too

As much as the staunch liberal arts education purist in me would like to believe otherwise, many of our students haven't prioritized polishing their critical thinking skills and developing broader worldviews. Rather, they enrolled in college to prepare for the working world.

We might, then, take a page from the biz bloggers' books and teach our students the tips-n-tricks of business writing on the web. They can still write about Adrienne Rich and Audre Lorde--they'll just be doing it in a concise, conversational tone with pithy yet informative headlines: "Seven Reasons to Sing the Body Electric." Who knows? Maybe they'll end up "selling" such poets to their metrophobic peers.

Of course, there already is a middle ground between the traffic hunger of the biz bloggers and the idealism of the edubloggers: the nonprofit blogosphere, where bloggers sell readers on worthy causes. There's another skill we could teach our students: how to advocate for others as well as for themselves.

What about you? Where do you fit in? How is your blog changing others' worlds?


P.S. Julie Meloni, the lit student and tech geek extraordinaire of No Fancy Name promises to write a series of posts on the conference, including one on "why more than a few bloggers who attended now feel incredibly ambivalent about blogging." Julie, you've piqued my interest, and I wonder if you're referring to any academic bloggers. Please share your thoughts!

Cross-posted at BlogHer.

First illness

We had excellent childcare at BlogHer, but apparently Lucas brought a souvenir home with him: an upper respiratory infection. Woohoo!

His nose started running like a spigot yesterday afternoon, and by 11 p.m. he had a raging fever. So off to the ER we went like good first-time parents. We returned home at 1:30 a.m.

We're all a bit sleep-deprived here, as you might imagine. I feel so sorry for the little guy.

But his illness does give me an excuse to snuggle with him today instead of finishing grading all those papers. Thanks, Luke! :P

BlogHer conference reflections and reports coming soon, I promise. . .

The book meme

Lucky me! I was tagged by Dr. Free-Ride for this meme.

1. One book that changed your life?
This is hard. Let's say The Norton Anthology of Poetry, 3rd edition. I still have the beat-up copy I used in my intro poetry class my freshman year of college. I liked poetry prior to being introduced to the anthology, but my love for poetry really took off that semester. The resulting string of events:

- I studied poetry throughout college
- I went to my current university for my MA in poetry writing
- When it came time to look for grad school program #3, I chose to return here.
- One day, Fantastic Adviser suggested I apply for a Smithsonian graduate research fellowship. I got it, and it was fantastic.
- Since we would be apart, Mr. Trillwing and I decided that I would spend the three months in DC as the recommended time-off-birth-control-pills-prior to conceiving. It was (very!) shortly upon returning from the Smithsonian that we discovered I was pregnant.
- Had we not conceived that month, we wouldn't have had our--the words of the daycare providers at BlogHer--"perfect baby." So, in a tortuous way, that poetry anthology helped provide the impetus and timing that brought Luke into this world.

2. One book you have read more than once?
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

3. One book you would want on a desert island?
The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats (alternately, a book about surviving on a desert island)

4. One book that made you laugh?
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore

5. One book that made you cry?
Only two books have ever made me cry: A Separate Peace, which I read in seventh grade, and The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade, which I began reading earlier this year. It was so sad I couldn't get through more than a couple of chapters. I hope someday to find the strength to read it.

6. One book you wish had been written?
Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell

7. One book you wish had never had been written?
I don't know. I won't go so far as to say I wish they had never been written, but with all the conflict in the Middle East, I'm kind of wishing all those holy texts hadn't been adopted so fervently and accepted as worthy of going to war over.

8. One book you are currently reading?
Specimen Days by Michael Cunningham

9. One book you have been meaning to read?
Our Endangered Values by Jimmy Carter

10. Now tag five people -

It's hard to choose just five! I shall choose six! I tag:

Julie

"Shellie from the Internet" (sorry, inside joke)

ArticulateDad

Jeff

Breena Ronan

Phantom

BlogHer: Cool people, sucky hotel

OMG! I'm at BlogHer!

OMG! The hotel, the Hyatt San Jose, kinda sucks! (Except for the waitstaff in the restaurant and the housekeeping staff. They're great. Room service, front desk staff. . .not so good.)

By coincidence, my friend, the elusive Fang Bastardson, is here with his Missus. Sounds like he's having some trouble with the hotel as well.

Seriously, the Best Western in Dixon (where we spent Tuesday night because of the dead AC in the apartment) was better than this place. The internet connections have been especially unreliable, which is a wee bit frustrating at a conference about blogging.

I've met some great people here. Aren't you jealous?

You might be a cultural studies (almost) Ph.D. if. . .

. . .you see your child's blocks scattered across the room and think of them as "a diaspora."



In other news:

AC is back in the apartment. Yay!

I'm heading to BlogHer in a couple hours. Double yay! E-mail me (trillwing AT gmail.com) if you'll be there and want to meet up.

Triply cursed

To review: No air conditioning at home, crappy internet there.

So I came to campus, only to find out that they've shut down AC in all "nonessential" buildings in order to keep the lab animals happy. So the poor administrative staff and faculty suffer, but the chimps and rats and beagles, they're as happy as lab animals can be (admittedly, probably not very happy).

Exception to above: AC is blowing away in the deans' offices. F*ckers.

Fortunately, part of the library is still air-conditioned. The wireless service here also seems weak, however. And I don't have headphones, so I can't listen to the This American Life piece I assigned for homework. It's been awhile since I listened to it, so my memory is dim and my notes, alas, are dimmer.

Seriously, I don't need much in this life: my little family, decent food, the internet, and air-conditioning. Is that really too much to ask for in a first-world country?

Have I mentioned I'm a hotel snob? So Motel 6 tonight is going to really suck for me? And can you not already see the A/C going out there, too?

Whine, whine. Why isn't it Wednesday? I never seem to have good whines when there are prizes of substance and style to be had!

Doubly cursed

Our air conditioning and the internet connection both went down at the same time yesterday afternoon.

It was 113 degrees.

There are 125 people in line ahead of us for air conditioning service. If the air conditioning is not fixed today, the apartment complex is going to put us and the dog up for the night at Motel 6. Yippee.

It's hot. There's no air conditioning. The internet connection limps along.

*whimper*

(I know there are people with real problems. Honestly, I'm worried more about Lucas and the dog than I am about me or the Internet.)

P.S. Why did the Internet connection die? Because the air conditioning at our ISP stopped working and the servers melted down.

Heat

UPDATE: I was incorrect about the temperature. To borrow from Spinal Tap, this city goes to (one hundred) ELEVEN. Fortunately, today it's only supposed to be 103.

Just a quick post to say that it was 110 degrees here today, and now, at 11 p.m., it's still 92 degrees. Thank goodness for air conditioning.

I hope everyone else has been able to stay cool, too.

Photo meme results (finally!)

Thanks for your patience with me on the photo request meme.

luckybuzz asked to see the object I've owned the longest. Unfortunately, that object--a plush rabbit--is in storage at the moment (I know, I'm not showing her much love), so we'll have to go with objects #2 and #3.


The little green ceramic container came from Knott's Berry Farm when I was a wee bairn. The model horse is Sham from Marguerite Henry's King of the Wind. I believe I received him as a Christmas present when I was 10 or 11 years old. He kicked me into a model horse collecting spree that has stretched (though more off than on) until today. (I should probably write about that sometime. . . The model horse hobby is the topic of my next research project.)

Mon asked for a photo of my favorite kitchen item. That would be these shears. Love 'em! (The food processor is a close second because it's so damn efficient.)


Seeking Solace loves puppy pics. Here's Woody, AKA The Liability. He's 12 years old, going on 2.


Squab wants a photo of what most relaxes me. When the temperature isn't, oh, ONE HUNDRED EIGHT DEGREES, I like to walk down this row of olive trees about half a block from my apartment.


On either side of Olive Tree Lane are some of the university's ag fields.


GrumpyABDAdjunct asked for Luke's favorite toy and my dissertation drink o' choice. The toy is a hand-me-down from Fantastic Adviser. Pretty disgusting on the drink front, I know, but I'm on a diet, and I need the caffeine.





Flossie wanted to see a photo of what I'm most proud of. That would be Mr. Trillwing and Lucas. Here's the latest photo of the little man:


And here's Mr. T:


ScienceWoman wants to know where I sit when I work on the diss.


I'm afraid I'm going to fail Tabitha Grimalkin's request for my favorite drink or dessert. I just don't have those on hand. For the record: a fresh strawberry margarita (blended, with salt) or an amaretto sour (on the sweet side), and just about anything that's dark chocolate, although pear crisp and pineapple upside down cake rate high as well on my Great Desert-o-Meter. (And Tabitha, I already miss your blog! I hope you're recovering from your bronchitis.)

Dr. Brazen Hussy wanted to peek inside my medicine cabinet. Right now, everything's shoved into this funky sliding-door thingy that I can't open all at once, so here's a peek at the entire vanity.


Atop the vanity, l to r: lotions I don't use much, toothpaste, toothbrush, tin o' Carmex, Luke's toothbrush, Luke's diver bath toy, thyroid meds, antidepressants, Flintstones vitamins (a habit continued from prenatal and pregnancy days), birth control pills, UV meter card that came with my new hat, my sunblock (30 SPF).

Inside the cabinet, l to r: antiperspirant (Dove sensitive skin because I'm a delicate flower), floss collection, orthodontic retainer in purple case (I wore braces for EIGHT YEARS, so I'm pretty loyal to the retainer), [other side of mirror now] contact lens case, sample mouthwash from dentist, mint flavored Tums antacid (in bulk, of course), useless wart medicine, generic ibuprofen, nipple salve from early breastfeeding days.

In the cabinet mirror: my cute skirt.

On the sink, l to r: little decorative bas relief bird and tree thingy, pilfered nice hotel soap in cheapo soapdish, lavender-scented hand wash from Cost Plus (mostly for guests, since I don't use antibacterial stuff), plastic cup for taking meds, another contact lens case, Freeman's avocado face stuff I probably should use more often, Simple Green cleaning solution in spray bottle, contact lens solution, baby wash, tissues.

Mr. Trillwing and I have separate bathrooms. It's terrific! :)

Jeff wanted to see Mr. T's superhero collection. Mr. T obliged with this photo, which includes pretty much just this past week's purchases. (FYI, the number is atypical.)


Veronica asked for my most abstruse kitchen utensil. I'm afraid my utensils don't run to the abstruse, so I'll give you this instead. It's a wedding gift, a piece of Tupperware that a friend swears is for onions and tomatoes. I just don't get why it's shaped this way, though, as halved tomatoes and onions keep just fine in flat-bottomed containers. . . Any ideas?

Resolutions for sleep crisis

. . .or, as Mr. Trillwing puts it, "Hardass Time."

Over the past couple of days in dealing with Luke's distressing sleep habits, Mr. Trillwing and I have both come close to breaking down in our own special (but, thank goodness, rare) ways: me through depression and crying, he through displays of anger.

The crux of the problem, besides our obvious sleep deprivation, stems from our parenting philosophies on sleep:

I'm pretty much an attachment-parenting type. I believe that there are times, such as late evening, when Luke is obviously tired, when we should let him fuss and cry himself to sleep. However, during the day, I tend to rush to Lucas's side if he expresses discomfort.

Mr. Trillwing, on the other hand, has become a big fan of the ol' Ferber method of letting the little guy cry it out whenever it appears a nap is nigh.

This afternoon, after some heated "discussion"--we don't argue, and as strange and perhaps unhealthy as that seems, it's worked for us so far--we compromised. Our plan:

1. Mr. Trillwing will continue to rise with Lucas at whatever ungodly hour the boy chooses.

2. Lucas has the opportunity to take a fuss-free morning nap, meaning it's not scheduled and we don't force the issue. If he falls asleep, fine. If he skips this nap (he rarely does), that's fine, too.

3. The afternoon nap, which Luke occasionally skips, becomes mandatory. Around 2:45, Mr. Trillwing will sit down in his comfy office chair with Luke for some quiet reading and soothing music. If Luke falls asleep, Mr. Trillwing puts him in his crib. If Luke doesn't fall asleep, he still goes into his crib. We let him cry it out until he's asleep or until 45-60 minutes have passed. (This is the part of the plan with which I'm least happy, as I hate, hate, HATE hearing the little guy scream during the day, when my nurturing instincts are most powerful.)

4. Mr. Trillwing will continue to go to bed at an early hour (usually 6 p.m.). I'll be better about establishing an evening going-to-bed routine, with the hope of having Luke conk out between 8 and 8:30 p.m. I'll put him down no later than 8:30. If he cries and wakes up Mr. Trillwing, Mr. T will just have to deal with the noise (currently I rock and comfort Luke until Mr. Trillwing wakes up from his evening "nap" around 10-11 p.m.).

5. When Luke wakes up in the middle of the night, there will be no more regular bringing him into bed with us, because once he's in there, he stays for the rest of the night, refusing to go back into the crib. He also tosses and turns, which means Mr. Trillwing can't sleep and ends up on the couch. I'd really like to share a bed with my husband, and that means ending the co-sleeping on the average night.

If Lucas cries in the middle of the night, neighbors be damned. We'll comfort him, but we won't bring him into bed.

We're hoping being strict about this schedule means in we'll have a better sleeper in 2-3 weeks. I'm feeling kind of heartless at the moment (there's much screaming going on as I type), but really, we've reached the end of our rope on this issue. Luke is perfectly easy going about every issue but sleep, and it's time he establishes a human (and humane) sleep schedule.

Comments, advice, and good vibes are welcome!