The WAC-e Thoughts blog has a very thorough post recapping our workshop "Beyond the ‘Pedia: Wikis as Collaborative Writing Tools" from a couple of weeks ago. Lots of theoretical, practical, and pedagogical goodies scattered throughout.
Seeing as how I'm knee-deep in reading job applications for a Vic Lit position we're trying to fill, here's a tasty sampling of linky-poos to keep the kiddies sated:
>>: The Cornfield Review: Online is finally out there and taking up space on the cyber-frontier, a digital insert of sorts to our venerable literary magazine. Check it out, and if you do any sort of new media work, we'll be happy to accept submissions (email me).
>>: Pertaining to the item above, we got a write-up in the Marion Star. I'll be sure to add that to my press kit as I pursue my dreams of becoming an academic celebrity.
>>: Two new apps you need to watch out for: one is Songbird, a Mozilla-based iTunes competitor that scrapes mp3s and video data off the web and has a robust search feature. It's still in beta, but it addresses the huge frustrating gap that exists between iTunes Music Store and the rest of the web. Also, looking for a free, web-based alternative to Flash? Check out Toufee, a java-based animation environment that, while not as full-featured as Flash, offers a lot of the same functionality in a slightly more intuitive interface (imho). For those of you who have had problems teaching Flass in your digital media classes, or felt that it was too much trouble to incorporate into lower-level courses, this may be an option for you...
>>: For the nineteenth-century rhetorical tradition fans in the hizzy, there's a new anthology of American political oratory out, edited by former Clinton Speechwriter Ted Widmer. Go here to hear an NPR interview on the making of the book.
>>: I'm not one to split hares, but this has to be one of the most fascinating, disturbing bits of animation I've seen in some time. But the moral is clear: clean bisections of small animals will get you nowhere in life. Must share with students...
>>: Finally, in my never-ending quest to chart examples of the new, embodied paradigm of human-computer interface design (HCI for those in the biz), I should direct you to this TED demo by Jeff Han on the "interface free" touch-sensitive screen. This lecture needs to make its way into my manuscript, methinks, because it perfectly illustrates how the myth of invisibility operates. There is an interface there, after all, and pretending otherwise invites all sorts of naturalizing impulses that could lead us to ignore how the interface influences the content.
A quick note for those in earshot: I'll be part of a roundtable later today, and it would be ever so swell if you could make it. Details:
The Writing Across the Curriculum program will be sponsoring a roundtable for instructors and faculty on using wikis as a collaborative writing tool. A wiki is a type of website that allows visitors to easily add, remove, or edit content, and offers exciting possibilities for the teaching of writing, particularly for collaborative writing assignments inside or outside the classroom.The workshop will be held on November 2nd, from 3:30 p.m. to 4:45 p.m. in 145 Hagerty Hall and will feature several scholars and teachers who have used wikis in their work or in their classes.
>>Isaac Jones, a software engineer for Galois Connections, Inc. in Portland, Oregon, will be discussing his use of wikis in software development.
>>Dr. Doug Dangler, Coordinator of the Writing Center and Dr. Ben McCorkle, Assistant Professor of English at OSU Marion, will be talking about their use of Google's new "Docs & Spreadsheets" service to compose an article collaboratively for the online journal Kairos.
>>Vera Dukaj will share her use of a wiki in her English 110 class this quarter.
This roundtable is open to all faculty, staff and graduate students. No registration is required. For more information, contact Chris Manion, Ph.D., Coordinator, Writing Across the Curriculum, Center for the Study and Teaching of Writing, 292-9650, http://cstw.osu.edu/wac/
