Closing the Digital Divide
With new media come new challenges. In just under two decades, the media landscape has expanded from a world with no Internet and limited media choices, to a world in which the Internet has come to dominate our time with media. The Internet has revolutionized how we search for information, learn about world events, entertain ourselves, and connect with others. Clearly, the Internet has delivered on the promise of bringing the world into our homes.
However, the world that most of us enjoy – a world in which information of all kinds is available at our fingertips – is not the world we all live in. In the United States alone, 21% of the population lacks regular Internet access at home or work. And of those who do have regular access, most do not full understand the messages being delivered. Therefore, people without regular Internet access have a different, perhaps more limited and distorted view of the world.
This concept is known as the digital divide – the inequality that occurs between those who have access to the Internet and who can think critically about its messages, and those who cannot. This disparity has an effect on every aspect of people’s lives – income level, upward mobility, job prospects, relationships, political power, race relations and equality, lifespan, and status in society, just to name a few.
Below are some resources for those researching the digital divide and its effects.
http://www.slideshare.net/newdigitaldivide/the-new-digital-divide-2707247
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/1017/1/MEDIALITERACY.pdf
http://www.understandmedia.com/journals-a-publications/44-scholarly-articles/141-the-ubiquity-myth
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/2768/1/Gradations_in_digital_inclusion_(LSERO).pdf
Comm 2 Student Blogs – Fall 2011
Each semester, my Comm 2 students are required to have diversity media blogs, among other assignments. This blogging assignment requires students to make an entry each week about their media consumption. The entry can be about anything interesting they have experienced in the media. Their observations are based on their own opinions, and are judged only by their level of analysis.
Comm 10 Student Blogs – Fall 2011
Comm 10 Student Blogs – Summer 2011
Each semester, my communications students must write about their media experiences on their own blogs. The students try to think critically about the media they consume, and write short critical analyses about those experiences. Below are the blogs for my summer 2011 Communication 10 course. … Continue Reading
Comm 2 Student Blogs – Spring 2011
Each semester, my Comm 2 students are required to have diversity media blogs. This assignment requires students to make a blog entry each week about their media consumption. … Continue Reading
Comm 10 Student Blogs – Spring 2011
Each semester, my communications students must write about their media experiences on their own blogs. The students try to think critically about the media they consume, and write short critical analyses about those experiences. Below are the blogs for my 8:00am Communications 10 course. … Continue Reading
Comm 10 Student Blogs – Fall 2010 (Regular)
Comm 10 Student Blogs – Fall 2010 (AAPIA)
Each semester, my communications students must write about their media experiences on their own blogs. The students try to think critically about the media they consume, and write short critical analyses about those experoences. Below are the blogs for my 8am Communications 10 course, a part of the AAPIA grant program, and taught in Santa Monica College’s new DLS.
Dropbox – My favorite new app
I work on the road a lot, and I’m constantly creating and editing all types of files. But between creating files on the desktop, the laptop, the iPad, and my Android phone, things were getting messy.
Enter Dropbox. You sign up for service (you can get a free 2gb account), then download the Dropbox software on all of your devices. You instantly get a shared folder that you can store any file in. I often write TO DO lists on my Macbook, then access the list on my phone through the Dropbox app. I can also access my files on any computer by going to their website and logging in. If my laptop ever dies on me, I buy a new one, install Dropbox, and all of my files are there… I’d be up and running in 5 minutes.
Dropbox has helped make my mobile lifestyle a lot easier, and I highly recommend it.
Link to Dropbox using the links in this post and get an extra 250mb of storage for free.
Comm 10 Student Blogs – Summer 2010
Each semester, my Comm 10 students are required to have diversity media blogs. This assignment requires students to make a blog entry each week about their media consumption. The are supposed to analyze media that they encounter, especially media related to race or gender stereotypes and biases. For summer courses, students write two blog posts per week.
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