Twitter, Garbage

According to its website,

"Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?"

It then explains,

"Why? Because even basic updates are meaningful to family members, friends, or colleagues—especially when they’re timely.

* Eating soup? Research shows that moms want to know.
* Running late to a meeting? Your co–workers might find that useful.
* Partying? Your friends may want to join you."

Now excuse the following rant, but ...

Evidently, I am not entirely against new media. I think the idea of broadcasting one's ideas on the web (blogging) can have very meaningful uses. Amongst its many advantages, you can publish thoughts in a modern, accessible way, incorporating all that the web has to offer: links, videos, etc. making for what can often be better-expressed ideas. For example, rather than just reviewing a movie, one can actually link a reader to the clip of discussion. It allows those who might not have the expertise or time for the creation of a real website to contribute in their own way to the web. It also gives people a voice that might not otherwise be heard. Finally, it allows others to quickly and easily respond to what has been said, creating some fragment of a forum, which can be helpful for the purpose of gauging where your thoughts might stand with others.

In essence, a blog provides an opportunity to actually communicate and discuss ideas in a relatively public, profitable and thorough manner.

Blogging has its own downsides. For instance, there are thousands of blogs, and like many things in such vast quantity, their quality varies substantially. There are also issues of copyright and plagiarism that are hard to control throughout the web. (This last, actually, might just be part of a larger problem, relating to the lack of legal foundations with regards to the web...but I won't get into that now.) Yet, in its short lifespan, blogging has really established itself as a reasonable medium for communicating ideas.


Twitter, on the other hand, I see little value in. First, it serves a niche that no one really knew existed. Secondly, it creates what could be described as life spam. Finally, it is the self-sacrificing of one of the last vestiges of privacy (those few moments you have away from CCTV etc.). To no one's surprise, I don't actually really care if someone starts work at 4, just saw the cutest puppy, is craving chocolate cake, has to go to the washroom or is now really relieved that they went go to the washroom. In a society where we are bombarded by 24 hour headlines and snippets, do we really need to create our own? There seems to be more information with less substance than ever before. There are far more important things to concern one's self with than something crammed into 140 characters or less. Technology has facilitated the publishing and dissemination of information; Twitter is a devolution in the advancements in communication this has afforded us.

Rather than force us to enter the trivialities of one's private life, it would be far more fruitful to accumulate those 140 characters and actually write something thoughtful, without abbreviations that someone in their right mind might actually find useful, insightful or remotely interesting. (see other forms of new media to see how - blogging for instance) With the last few ounces of privacy that still remain under our own control, there is no need to give it away using Twitter. I have found that Twitter seems to only emphasized the mundane nature of most people's lives. Next there will be some way for companies to analyze "tweets" so that they might target advertising to individuals. Picture this: you tweet that you are fed up with your phone company. Immediately you receive a phone call from someone trying to sell you a new phone service.

Remember when you had real conversations with people? When you could ask them "What did you do today?" without knowing already every little banal detail? These are questions that Twitter users must answer. The thrill of mystery cannot be understated, nor can the vapidity of the every day lives of the vast majority of people. Keep it to yourself, if you have something real to say, write it articulately and eloquently without character limits. Then, choose your audience purposefully and you will reap the reward of people actually caring about what you have to say.

For now, I will stick to blogging: A medium through which real ideas can be properly communicated.

(Ironically, the guy who helped invent blogspot is the same guy who invented Twitter...I think there is something to be said about lightning not striking twice in the same spot.)

-HG

UPDATE: Total decimation of the Ivory Tower

Okay, so apparently after I write an analytical Renaissance video game in place of a dissertation, I am destined to become an untenured Professor of "Water" who teaches via podcast at the Universities of Glasgow, Miami, and the Moon... while Mark Taylor's NYT op-ed does point out some of the major problems with academia and I do agree with some of his suggestions, I'm pretty sure that shunting expertise in favor of impossibly amorphous zones of inquiry will not solve anything...

Other discussions on trouble in the ivory tower can be found here, here, and if you're particularly adventurous, here!

- JK

Theatre and the Third World

Sierra Leonean students rehearsing Julius Caesar

For the better part of a decade, I've been trying to justify why I think that public theatre can be a valuable investment in developing countries. Although my own focus has been on Sierra Leone, (if you're curious, you can read about my exploits here--complete with fun pictures!) I believe that in most contexts, theatre can serve as an important medium for reflecting, processing, and transforming social norms and can be especially instructive in a society that is undergoing changes.

My strong belief in the power of public theatre stems from more than just my personal affinity for Shakespeare. In fact, I think an important link can be drawn between how the theatre was used in early modern England, and how it might be used in developing countries today. Drama in the Renaissance was more than just passive entertainment; it used a familiar mode of theatrical discourse that extended to many areas of daily social interaction. Early modern society was deeply histrionic at all levels: merchants in the Exchange, prostitutes in Bankside, medical doctors, and royal processions, all employed a performative language for a particular end, whether it was to attract customers, convince the sick that they were convalescent, or display the extent of one's political power. In contrast to the subsequent bourgeois era, which used the printed word more and more to shape public understanding, the Renaissance used spectacle. In a world where print culture has yet to become mainstream, spectacle remains the most accessible way of interpreting society. Of course, public theatre doesn't have to look like Shakespeare's Globe; it can be street theatre, radio plays and readings, anything that invites an audience to listen and think critically.

Obviously I am not suggesting that public theatre will solve all problems, particularly in developing nations. I am merely arguing that it can be an important institution for encouraging critical reflection upon one's environment and this ability is absolutely essential for citizens of developing countries like Sierra Leone, if they are to actively shape the direction that their nation takes, particularly after violent conflict.

For detractors who would argue that there is no money for such enterprises, or that these must be secondary concerns for people who lack even basic necessities, I would argue that I have seen the opposite to be true. A rich cultural life must grow alongside practical development such as infrastructure and education; indeed, cultural enrichment is essential because it helps to bolster tangible growth. It is a myth (part of the western hierarchy of needs that has defined and derailed so many aid missions) that intellectual and artistic endeavours cannot flourish in a society whose food is not as bountiful, whose water is not as clean, or whose democracy is not as mature as ours.

- JK

Inmates of the Ivory Tower

Professor Joseph Nye's op-ed on the growing divide between the Academy and the Real World in the IR field has sparked discussion (or should I say, intergalactic war) amongst bloggers, with a particularly geektastic entry from the Duck of Minerva:



Highlights from Nye's article:

Scholars are paying less attention to questions about how their work relates to the policy world, and in many departments a focus on policy can hurt one's career. Advancement comes faster for those who develop mathematical models, new methodologies or theories expressed in jargon that is unintelligible to policymakers. [...]

Some academics say that while the growing gap between theory and policy may have costs for policy, it has produced better social science theory, and that this is more important than whether such scholarship is relevant. Also, to some extent, the gap is an inevitable result of the growth and specialization of knowledge. Few people can keep up with their subfields, much less all of social science. But the danger is that academic theorizing will say more and more about less and less.

As a solution to this, Nye proposes "a reappraisal within the academy itself", suggesting

Departments should give greater weight to real-world relevance and impact in hiring and promoting young scholars. Journals could place greater weight on relevance in evaluating submissions. Studies of specific regions deserve more attention. Universities could facilitate interest in the world by giving junior faculty members greater incentives to participate in it. That should include greater toleration of unpopular policy positions.

Nye's comments may be true enough with regards to political science, but as a scholar hailing from an even more obscure corner of academia, the discussion makes me wonder whether these solutions might be applied to other disciplines.

Trying to envision a classicist or english scholar attempting to be 'relevant' brings a laughable image to mind. Just as a dalliance with real policymaking can scuttle an IR tenure review, an academic whose work is accessible enough to show up in a newspaper column or, God forbid, Borders, will likely be tossed out to rot with the rest of the tenureless pop-scholars. If academics are becoming less and less relevant, it is a prison largely of their own making and one they occupy somewhat smugly.

Time was, universities were the seedbeds of intellectual innovation. The Oxford and Cambridge University Presses were among first printing houses in England and, throughout periods of authoritarian press control, helped disseminate information that could not be printed in London. The illustrious alumni of these institutions went on to become world leaders, men and, later, women who not only redefined the contexts of their time but shaped new discursive possibilities for society today.

But things have changed. With the myriad means of expression available, people now acquire their information from other sources. The movement toward specialization and abstraction that Nye and Drezner recognize in their faculties is in fact a problem with the very nature of the institution. Rather than reevaluate their function within society, academics increasingly withdraw from it, embracing their irrelevance with self-congratulatory resignation. If Plato knew then that he would be derided for stating that the City would never have rest from its evils "until philosophers are kings" how much more absurd would his claim seem today? Socrates argued that only with the marriage of wisdom and political greatness could "our State behold the light of day", but the species of wisdom produced by modern universities is only tenuously linked to the practical skills needed for effective participation in society.

Why, then, should the Academy change? Why must universities play an active role instead of concentrate on being a self-contained factory of thought? I will refrain from spouting sentimental fluff on the advancement of thought and duty to humankind, but I do believe that one of the most inspiring features of our time is a trend toward greater integration between branches of society. The potential for mutual enrichment is too high to disregard.

For those who would object that academics must be free to frolic in a haven of pure thought if they are expected to generate great scholarship, it is essential to reflect upon what 'great scholarship' has come to mean. Too often in academic communities, 'greatness' is measured in a work's denseness, sophistication and, yes, abstractness of thought. Not only does this scale place disproportionate value on distance from lay knowledge but, all too often, it rewards bad writing. If it is to remain a valuable institution for producing knowledge, academia must give up the pardoning of irrelevance for the sake of maintaining a divide between the layman and the scholar. This is not to say that all academic work must in some way be accessible to the general public but it should be remembered that much of the 'art' that is studied in liberal arts was created for precisely this sort of consumer. Shakespeare wrote for a throng of bellowing, hooting, whistling, weeping spectators--his scholars would do well to keep that in mind.


-JK