Readings (1)

I read most of the article by Henry Jenkins (“Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century”), because I read the book Textual Poaching: Television Fans and Participatory Culture (also by Henry Jenkins) last summer. The book was about the ways in which communities of fans create (or, transform, I guess) meanings from different texts, and, about the shift from passive consumption of texts to interaction with them—through discussion with other fans to reconstructions of the texts themselves.

The book was published in 1992, so some of the ways in which fans were participating are dated (in other words: not so internet-based). Jenkins’ use of the term “participatory culture” builds on this, I think, even if he’s not specifically addressing reacting to a text so much as creating (or recreating) it.

This is very similar, I think, to the straightforward definition that John Blyberg provides for Library 2.0: “library 2.0 simply means making your library’s space (virtual and physical) more interactive, collaborative, and driven by community needs.” It did make me a little sad to read his reference to “a post-Google world”. But if the shift that Jenkins and Blyberg are describing is a shift from passive consumption to active participation, then this seems a fairly accurate parallel.

I also read the wikipedia entry for social software. I was pleasantly surprised by how many of the categories I recognized, or had participated in (instant messaging, text chat, internet forums, blogs, wikis, even the “Massively Multiplayer Online Games”.) It was a little difficult to imagine the connections between some of these technologies—like MMOGs— to libraries. On the other hand the application of peer-to-peer social networks seems easy and useful, especially between libraries.