Q5: Blogging is a practice that is mundane and yet radical in its potential to transform individual and collective agency and activism. Discuss.
Having a search of the bibliography in the web is not easy as searching in the library. The most important and essential of doing webliography is the keyword. What we are trying to search in the search engine can affect what kind of result for us to collect. For the question that I choose about blogging, when seeing the guiding question, I already have a brief concept in what to search. In the question, it mentioned about the blogging, agency and activism, therefore I followed this track to search what I need. Also, Blogging is also related to the personal identity, therefore searching materials is also can help when I do my essay question.
Ringmar, Erik. 2007. A Blogger's Manifesto: Free Speech and Censorship in the Age of the Internet. <http://ia600401.us.archive.org/12/items/ABloggersManifestoFreeSpeechAndCensorshipInTheAgeOfTheInternet/ErikRingmarABloggersManifesto.pdf> London: Anthem Press. Retrieved on 10th Mar, 2011
First of all, to start with, in the introduction part of the essay, it should be explaining what Blogging is and stating the definition which is essential. There are many books on blogging, not least by legal scholars. Since “Blog” is the subject of the question, therefore I chose this book A Blogger’s Manifesto (Ringmar, 2007) particularly enlightening and which had clearly gives a chapter about “What is a Blog?” on explaining what a blog is in chapter 2. The author had also criticized the definition of defining blog which is an interesting issue while he has another concept of viewing blog. This book is a good introduction for me to explain further and clearer while some good and interesting examples are found in this book. Besides, it also mentioned about the history have having weblog in the Internet, like the first blog site was built on 1999, the history could help us to understand how it developed in such a short years but have became popular and leads to people criticized becoming a mundane practice.
Marlow, C. 2004. Audience, structure and authority in the weblog community. <http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~cameron/cv/pubs/04-01.pdf> Presented at the International Communication Association Conference, May, 2004, New Orleans, LA. Retrieved on 14th Mar, 2011.
In this piece of journal, Bloggers, Beware: What You Write Can Get You Sued (McQueen, 2009). It mentioned about the copyright in blogging. The reason why I found this journal useful is because when answering about the collective agency, it could be explained how blog changes the using of personal blogging lead to illegal consequence. As blogging is no longer personal only but also affect the public issue. For instance, the article has stated a strong evidence arguing that the copyright infringement. Therefore it somehow affect how individual seen blogs and their agency of using blogs to express themselves. The passage have listed some examples of how blogging lead to some social aspect which jeopardize their future, it stated that posting some pictures could be harmful that some people might find themselves are suffering the right of privacy, which endanger the use of bloggers to break the law because of posting something in their blogs. These examples could further develop an argument towards collective agency in weblogging, which help me to understand the possible change of their agency in using blogs when relating to some legal prospects.
Marlow, C. Audience, structure and authority in the weblog community. <http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~cameron/cv/pubs/04-01.pdf> Presented at the International Communication Association Conference, May, 2004, New Orleans, LA. Retrieved on 14th Mar, 2011.
In this paper Audience, structure and authority in the weblog community (Marlow 2004) has explained the community in weblog. As weblog is a form of community in the net world, therefore I think this paper could help the essay to explain how the community formed in weblogs, and it could show how the individuals group together and transform the personal blogs to a community blogs. The content is about how an innovation in personal publishing blogs could engender another form of social interaction in the Internet, which how the people who have the same interest in a particular and specific topic could gather around and formed a community group. Such behavior leads to the collectivism in blogging community. Besides, the paper contained several useful chart and statistics showing of which citation is the most popular among blogs. This could estimate which sites and topic could attract bloggers to browse and search. This information could help me to analyze the popularity and the habit of bloggers in using blogs.
Russell, Adrienne & Nabil Echchaibi. 2009. International blogging: identity, politics, and networked publics. NY: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc. <http://books.google.com.hk/books?id=NY7vM8ZwgPkC&printsec=frontcover&dq=blogging+identity&hl=zh-TW&ei=NACBTdLeAo6ycZbitesG&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false> Retrieved on 14th Mar, 2011.
The forth article that I would search is about identity. As blogging is related to personal identity, this book had use one chapter to talk about the identity in using weblog. It focuses to the identity in some countries like China, Australia, France, Russia, etc. How people communicate in the advance technology in their own national and cultural context. Such International blogging could link people from different world can lead to the global village where people exchanging their own piece of information and share to public. Also, how America democracy affect the politics in changing of other countries which are less democratic. This could explain how great impact could bring to people who saw the American spreading the idea of Democratic Party in their blog. Blogging could be effective as a political tool that such kind of transform could not be neglected and is not mundane anymore but a change from individual to collective, we can revive tradition, explore identity, conduct public relations as in the book mentioned in chapter one. This could provide argument of the bloggers having the activism in political prospects. For instance, the people could have the action of fighting democracy for their country when they realize the importance of having a democratic party.
Langellier,K & Eric E. Peterson. 2004. Storytelling in daily life: performing narrative. USA: Temple University. <http://books.google.com.hk/books?id=UITMWHj967gC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Storytelling+in+daily+life+:+performing+narrative&source=bl&ots=LiaOCFfu21&sig=TA5HIkmMIrM3VhlC9M77IIM8FaE&hl=zh-TW&ei=NK9_TZKzMILRcavj9PQG&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false> Retrieved on 10th Mar, 2011.
The fifth material that I would use is talking about the practice of how bloggers write blogs as their daily activity. In Storytelling in daily life: performing narrative (Langellier & Peterson, 2004) I will focus on Chapter 5 which is regarding “storytelling in a Weblog: Performing Narrative in a Digital Age”. The author of writing the essay was aimed to find out the daily practice of how bloggers type narrative in their blog as a kind of common behavior. By analyzing the content and context of the certain blogs, the writer describes them as telling a story, which normally people like to type something related to daily events such as interaction with their friends, romantic partners, drinking party, foods and drinks, currently hot music, movie or book, etc. I can explain in how bloggers used to act as an individual in a practice of blogging, which can prove bloggers treat blogging is an individual behavior but is actually not. I find this useful to compare and contrast the transformation of individual and move to the collective.
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