Reading and Writing in a Digital Age

I have intermittent power and sketchy Internet access. When I can, I’ll keep up with the blog, posting links to your individual blogs as you send them to me–so, if you have the capacity, please send them on. You can see the links to your classmates’ blogs in the top of the sidebar, under “Links.”

CUNY remains closed through Wednesday. I’m going to wait to hear from Baruch administration regarding how/if they plan to extend the semester/schedule make-up classes. Once I know what the administration mandate will be about recouping lost time, I will update our class schedule.

Until then, keep reading The Shallows (assuming you have an old-fashioned copy and/or power to charge your kindle) and doing The Shallows-related assignments. Try to keep up with the original reading schedule of the book, as indicated on the syllabus. We’ll do our best to get back on track next week!

I can’t imagine I won’t be seeing (most of) you on Monday.  Hoping for the best for all of you.  I haven’t heard back form everyone, but I know many of you are without power. I hope you find warmth and a good meal.  Stay safe!

Please stay tuned for news on Wednesday’s class. We might try to meet if school is in session–we’ll see! (I doubt classes will be on, however, given the power and transportation disruptions.)

In the meantime, if you have power and solid Internet access, would you take a moment to set up your own Blogs at Baruch site for our final project? Here’s how:

Go the Blogs at Baruch main page (the one that comes up when you first sign on).

In the upper right corner, under your name, you’ll see a button that says, “Create a Whole New Site.”

Click that button and proceed to set up your site. For the site URL, you can use your full name, your first name, your name and Eng2150h, “Chaya’sEnglishBlog,” and so on and so on. Anything is possible, assuming it’s not already taken. The URL you choose will be permanent; you can not change it later. Our class blog URL is “eng2150h.”

Your site title should reflect the overall topic of your final project, to the extent that you know it at this time. Your title can be changed later. Our class blog title is “Reading and Writing in the Digital Age.”

You can choose to make your blog public or private. This setting can be changed down the line.  No worries.

Your blog will have a default style theme. If you know how or you want to play, you can adjust your blog’s appearance.  In class, we’ll go over how to adjust your theme, add pages, adjust privacy settings, etc.

Once you set up your blog, please email me a link to your blog address. I will create a link to everyone’s blog from our class blog, so we can visit one another.

If your power is out and your Internet access is limited, don’t worry about this project! But if you happen to have power and things are fairly normal with you, try to take care of it so we can focus on getting our less fortunate classmates up and running when things get back to normal.

CULT OF PERSONALITY

In the cover letter for my first draft, I blasted Ira Glass and dismissed his advice on broadcasting because I wanted to set myself apart and make a statement using my own ideas about broadcasting. But when I discovered that I still had a lot of editing to do with my draft, which my peers and Professor Smith found to be incomplete, I decided that there may indeed be something to what Ira Glass had to say about broadcasting. So I listened to his advice yet again and found two key points of advice that I tried to follow in my audio essay. The first building block of any good story is the anecdote, which follows a linear sequence of events and is told in a way so that no matter how boring it is, its own momentum carries it forward and makes it worth listening to (Ira Glass on Story Telling, Part 1, 0:38). I relied extensively on the stories that my friends told to highlight my message that academics can bring even the fiercest of rivals into a friendship. The progression of their stories mirrored the evolution of our friendships. As they talked about my competitive nature, mental images of my fist shaking were brought up in the listener’s mind. When they proceeded to talk about how we help each other out, the listen could envision me helping out my friends with school or managing stress. The power of the anecdote is indeed very real and really stresses the message that the broadcaster is trying to convey to his / her audience. Ira Glass also stresses the importance of being ruthless (Ira Glass on Story Telling, Part 2, 2:39) in order to have a good story. Many people mistake ruthlessness as being mean or cruel or evil. But ruthlessness is a means to an end; it’s about going directly from Point A to Point B through any means necessary without getting sidetracked. In the case of a radio broadcast, I think that being ruthless in storytelling means that you have to do whatever it takes to convey your message. If you have to use sound effects and music, then use them. If you have to talk in a low tone or shout in a high pitch, then you must do so. You shouldn’t have to worry too much about what or how the audience will feel as long as the listeners receive the message loud and clear. I was ruthless in my attempts to compile this audio essay. I got my music and sound effects, I got the interviews, and I combined them together in a manner that made sense to me. I wasn’t worried about what my listeners would think of my organization of the interviews or the sounds that I inserted in between segments as long as they understood that my friendships with Daniel, Anahit, and Sandra came about because of my competitive nature and evolved and mature  thanks to it.

Same basic audio but with major cutting and pasting, plus some additional recordings of moi. I did my best!

http://soundcloud.com/joseph-maugeri/final-draft-5/s-bGq1Z

I tried my best guys. Re-recorded the whole thing. Hopefully it works.

Not sure why I cant embed the video but here it is. 

Radio really isn’t for me…

After many hours and tough decisions, the final is done!

http://soundcloud.com/ben97chatham/songstory-a-home-away-from

I’m really happy with how this turned out. Got it under 5 minutes too!