Have you ever wondered the educational value of academic publishing? Wondered how the research we do filters into the classroom? Maybe not! This is not something often discussed and debated in business academia, where the ethos and culture is driven to publish in top-tier academic peer-review (?) journals. However, for some of us, behind closed doors, in secret we are also engage in another publishing activity. An activity not often discussed with high esteem or value by research-driven colleagues, where the words “I’m writing a textbook” seem like sinister words. However, if we really think about the educational value of academic publishing, it is textbooks and the educational resources we develop where a real contribution to knowledge and wider value in education is most certainly felt, not just through journal articles. Here in this blog post I share part of my experience and the view that “writing of good textbooks should be central – not marginal to our HE mission as researchers and teachers”.

OUP Sales Conference 2010

This week on Wednesday, 25th August 2010, I attended the Sales Conference for my textbook publisher – Oxford University Press (OUP) in Warwick (UK). Not a sales representative, nor a member of the publishing industry, I’m an author and an academic so I attended to reconnect with the sales team I met 2 years ago who are responsible for a book title I’ve coauthored titled, Marketing. In this I participated in a session about how our 1st edition has gone and to discuss the launch of the 2nd edition due out in December 2010.

This experience was invaluable. Sat in the room was the hearts and minds of over 30 people who are in direct contact with lecturers, universities and book stores from across the UK and Europe. They are deeply embedded in the publishing industry and the dynamics with which it is changing, both due to economic constraints, changes in technology and market preferences. In brief, students are not using books like they used to, it’s about differing formats, differing resources from a variety of locations! And these people know their business and are some of the most humble about their value in the publishing process. In awe of their knowledge and commitment to distributing good educational resources and how they could help educators, I most certainly was. One thing I love about Oxford University Press (OUP) as a publisher, and their team … is they also have heart! They care about the books/resources they develop, the people they work with and the people who they are developing for. Yes they have to generate revenue, but maybe this cultural ethos is because they have a charity status and so are not as commercially driven like most publishing houses.

Why Write a Textbook on Marketing

The above is why I really engaged with this project over 2 years ago in 2008, not just because I wanted to write a book, actually at the time I didn’t want to as academic textbooks are not as valued by business academia like a journal article is (a view I am opposed to!). But with OUP’s ethos, and our coauthor and editorial team, not only did we have a vision for what students in marketing today should be learning in and out of the class room, but the team also saw the importance in not just writing a book, but in developing an overall suite of resources for all in marketing education – lecturer and student alike.

So myself and two colleagues, Paul Baines from Cranfield and Chris Fill from Portmouth, came together on this project through differing routes and bringing differing skills, knowledge and experience to the table. I was the publishing novice, and in some ways still am, still trying to juggle personal and professional deadlines with publishing ones. But one thing connects us, our vision on the value of coupling a deep knowledge of learning and education with marketing theory and practice in business management academia. Our focus has been on developing a resource – not just a book – that helps both students and lecturers in learning and educating about marketing in the many differing spaces it occupies, in the many differing formats it comes, in how it is evolving and the differing ways in which we can learn and experience it. Essentially we spent three years prior to 2008, creating an ‘educational resource’ that brings practice into the classroom, brings not just theory, but also critical debate around marketing theory into the class room and most importantly, engages with the many differing ways and styles with which we both learn and can educate about marketing – online, offline and through experience. Marketing is going through not just an evolution given changes in society, but also a digital revolution.

The Value of Textbooks in Academic Publishing

However, along this journey I must say I’ve been saddened by the lack of value academia, especially business academia appears to place on the value of textbooks in academic publishing, an ethos which has filtered throughout our institutions, governance structures and our education system. Spurned by a ‘publish or perish’ ethos around peer-review (?) journal articles and a governance system – the Research Assessment Exercise or Framework (RAE 2008, REF ?), that propagates this view. I’m not saying these are not important, they are, we couldn’t write books, develop educational resources or educate without them. But our myopic focus on the importance of a journal article above everything else and thus their production at cost to everything else (e.g., teaching quality, educational innovation, staff morale) is harming the inherent basis on which university and business academia exist – “to contribute to knowledge through research, education and community engagement” (this is what I signed up for when I joined academia at the completion of my PhD in 2003). I didn’t sign up to an ethos of “to write just journal articles”.

Yesterday I sat and listened. I knew how well our book at done in its first edition,  but I didn’t realise just how well. Our book – Marketing, the first edition released in 2008, is 2nd in the UK academic market for 1st year marketing textbooks with 30% marketshare, 2% behind the leading textbook, and beating Kotler … “the god of marketing” … who is third. Whoop! Whoop! Our title is apparently OUP most successful business title and purchased by thousands of students across the UK and Europe. This was well above our expectations, in the begining we just wanted to challenge the status quo in 1st year marketing education. Challenge what we were teaching and how! So, a celebration yes! But a personal one! We don’t get huge royalty cheques, and these books don’t really count towards promotion as they are not as valued as much as a journal articles (REF/RAE), despite how much time, work and resources goes into their creation and how well regarded they are outside the academy (e.g., in business). So it’s not about the money and nor drive for a tenured track Professoriate position.

Its about an educational ethos, and contributing to the knowledge of tomorrows marketing industry. In this, for our title, we have reached the minds of 100′s of lecturers and thousands of 1st year marketing students in the UK and Europe and contributed to their knowledge of marketing theory, marketing practice and importantly challenged the status quo in marketing education. That is worth more than any promotion or 4* journal article.

A Manifesto for Textbook Writing

But this journey over the last 4-5 years has made me really question how business academia, across the UK, Europe and in wider international communities really value the academic textbooks and educational resources in business academia and their contribution to business knowledge, theory and practice. I cam across this great blog post on “The Higher Education Academy” websites about “Writing Textbooks in a Cold But Changing? Climate. This post has some interesting insights about “To Write or Not to Write a Textbook?” In short the author Rob Pop concludes with a Manifesto for Textbook Writing, for all educators, researchers and authors.

A Manifesto for Textbook Writing (Rob Pope, 2003)

• Textbook writing is a central, sensitive and symptomatic indicator of all that we do.
• Textbooks come into being and operate precisely on the cusp of teaching with research, of education with economics, and of a vision of knowledge as personal empowerment and satisfaction with one of knowledge as public commodity and techno-political power.
• Textbooks are the main interface where the notion of the subject in general is embodied in the particular heterogeneity of all the subjects who study it; it is therefore the major tool whereby subjects in every sense have lasting effects.
• Textbooks are also the main site where the fundamental structure and significance of the discipline is communicated and debated. It is therefore not only the place where the existing territories are consolidated and boundaries reinforced; but where the work of inter- and cross-disciplinary re-definition and re-negotiation goes on — publicly and accountably, amongst ones peers as well as students and, sometimes, a more general public.
• Textbooks are thus where specialist knowledge and skills are accumulated and made generally accountable as well as accessible. Thats why a good textbook is precious — and a bad one pernicious.
• In sum, the writing of good textbooks should be central — not marginal — to our higher educational mission as teachers and researchers.

So with this Manifesto in mind, I have continued with my co-author team to develop our title, Marketing, with the launch of our 2nd edition in December, 2010. Why? Because like Pope (2003), I too believe that writing good textbooks and developing good educational resources should be central, not marginal to our HE mission as teachers and researchers, and our governance structures.

Smiles

Kelly

For those that don’t know, the Academy of Marketing (AM) is our national body of marketing academics and it’s core purpose is the advancement in marketing knowledge through research, education and scholarly activities. It tries to foster links with practitioners, research councils, funding bodies, professional associations and offer guidance to marketing academe in the pursuit of our activities. For example, the AM has a research committee, shared by Dr. Nina Reynolds, with the mission to inform and be part of the debate of developing professional research practice in marketing academe. This is becoming incredibly more difficult in current times. As an academic, your life is often torn in many differing directions, undertaking many numerous, complicated and sometimes very mundane tasks – in education, research and administration. Would I say that the AM Conference is our annual highlight? Well, it’s not like a Christmas or birthday party or your annual holiday (Yes, academics in HE only get 3-4 weeks a year). But it is most certainly a time when marketing academics come together to present their work to each other, catch up and network.

So each year we meet somewhere across the country to exchange ideas, present work we are currently working on and network with fellow academics in our respective fields. I’d like to say that we get into heated debates about the work we are presenting and end up drawing numerous equations or thematic maps on a white board. However, like most areas of modern life, we too are heavily scheduled and squeezed into short time silos with usually only 15 minutes allocated to each presentation, with probably enough time afterward for 1 or 2 questions. Most discussion about research occurs during the coffee breaks, in the evenings at social events and in the taxi on the way back to the conference hotel. So, in essence this is more of a networking event for the young and eager early career researcher (what we call a ECR); a time to catch-up with old friends (for those more established who are vying for promotion); and a chance to offer advice or mentor others coming through (for those well known names who grace the inside covers of some of our leading journals).

A number of things to note about marketing academics, we are many and varied. Some come from practitioner backgrounds, others from academic and education. Some are good, some are great and some are like most industries, still trying to figure it all out. One thing that does define us, we have diverse research interests – no two are ever the same! The conference this year had over 400 delegates presenting in the fields of consumer behaviour, business to business, marketing education, electronic and interactive marketing, sales and key account management, retailing and channel management to name a few. Reflective of not just the scope of our marketing field, but also how marketing has increasingly fragmented so incredibly over the last 20-30 years.

As in most years the papers and presentations are of varying quality, with some of more interest than others. Two in particular I paid attention too was the work of Dr. Paul Harrigan and James Seligman from Southhampton Management School, on the new DNA of Marketing Education; and Dr. Bev Hulbert from the same institution on the Evolution of Technology and Marketing. In brief, I was fortunate to listen to and meet this group of colleagues, who like myself, think marketing education in the HE sector needs to evolve beyond the current education curriculum focused on tired and out-dated frameworks and models of the 60′s, 70′s and 80′s … curriculum that doesn’t take into account the the impact Digital and Electronic resources have had on not just marketing practice over the past 20 or so years, but also on markets and the individuals who make up these markets.

This means what we educate and how we deliver it in HE requires not just to evolve … but a total new way of thinking about higher education in management and business disciplines like Marketing.

So after 4 days of networking, attendance at the AM research committee meeting, sitting in on fellow colleagues presentations, drinks at the Herbert Art gallery, a visit to Warwick Castle and a black-tie dinner in a motor muesum … the Academy of Marketing conference for 2010 came to an end and I made my way back to Cardiff Business School. A little tired, but also a little more inspired by my fellow colleagues at Southhampton whom recognise the impact digital media has had on not just marketing or marketing education, but individuals and their everyday lives.

Developing our understanding of Digital Media Literacy in marketing through critical research embedded in methods such as observation of the development of digital media strategies, community participation and netnography, discourse analysis of what our professional bodies (e.g., CIM, IDM, FEDMA, WAA) are certifying as digital professional practices is critical to understanding this New DNA of Marketing that Southhamptom presented.

Just like Darwin observing the species was critical to mapping his evolutionary theory … so too is it critical for marketing academe to observe and record marketing’s digital evolution.

Smiles

Kelly

The afternoon inspired me to reflect on the very same questions for what I do, the reason I started CASE Insights and found myself leaving the commercial marketing research sector for academic research and teaching. Reflection I haven’t done for a couple of years and given how difficult it can be juggling teaching, research, administration, marking, supervision and life … I thought it was increasingly important to revisit these questions!

The Beginning …

When I get asked what I do, I usually say I teach Digital Media & Marketing at Cardiff Business School. If I get asked what I research and why, a few years ago I would have told you the following:

“Since the inception of my PhD, I have been reading about and researching the psychology behind technology usage and exploring the role of human knowledge. Namely the differences in perceptions, behaviours and social-cultural contexts of usage of differing users of technologies: from the expert to the less expert, from the web desginer to the non-designer; from the highly engaged to those that see digital technologies as not that relevant to their lives.”

However, over the last few years this has evolved (as all things evolve) as I’ve been witnessing the evolution in marketing theory, practice and marketing philosophy because of digital media and electronic technologies. And in all honesty, it’s really hard trying to keep up!

The initial aim of this earlier commercial and academic research was to develop our understanding in how and why people adopt and use digital technologies and inform how and why we use digital media in business management and marketing. I’m still interested in this, but increasingly as I tranverse along this academic, research and philosophical journey about digital media in business and society, and how marketing is evolving, it is the conception of ‘knowledge’, ‘learning’ and ‘literacy’ about and with digital media in business that is resonating in my work most.

“As our environment evolves, so too do we: our knowledge, our skills, our learning and like it or not, business management and marketing is evolving.”

Knowledge, Learning & Literacy …

The interesting thing, is if we use the words ‘digital media learning’ or ‘digital media literacy’ business and management schools and the marketing profession don’t appear to have a deep rich investment in the discourse. The discourse on learning and literacy of digital media is heavily focused on the social context of high school education, and university departments in the disciplines of education, the arts, anthropology or digital media (amongst others) with specific focus on researching (or teaching) learning and literacy. Coupled with this is the support of industry and government partners interested in the policy debate about digital media literacy – in youth, in schools and in certain areas of higher education.

Don’t get me wrong, business schools are interested in education, they are higher education providers afterall and education is a core part of their product offering with student fees from undergraduate and postgraduate programs the main revenue source of their business models.

However, much management research on digital marketing (and some of mine can be included in this) is focused on how we use digital technologies to improve firm performance, increase marketing efficiency and effectiveness and most signficantly improve click through, satisfaction or sales (e.g., website), increase loyalty (e.g., loyalty cards and scanner technologies); or improve data acquisition for competitive advantage (e.g., RFID).

Although interesting and relevant, these inherently focus on outputs from the use of digital media and technologies – the effect they have. But not  on the knowledge, skills, and learning contexts required in business and management to facilitate their usage or design OR more importantly to ensure that actors in the process can not just use them effectively, but also responsibly, ethically and in tune with their socio-cultural evolution. In short:

• If ever there was a field who’s activities and processes have been fundamentally changed by digital media – it would be business and marketing management!
• If ever there was a field undergoing dramatic change in skills, language and philosophy – it would be business and marketing management!
• If ever there was a field who’s impact is so great (good and bad) on society, youth, education and culture – it would be business and marketing management?

And NO – it’s not just about selling more stuff through digital media or building a better website. It’s about education, ongoing professional development and instilling tomorrow’s [and today’s] business and marketing professionals with the knowledge, skills and key insights so they can participate, engage, be informed and most importantly act responsibly in the digital media space. Long gone is the focus on the model T-Ford through mass production or a business case about a Fortune 100 company. It’s about digital learning, literacy, participation and engagement.

Why is it important?

Digital media literacy for marketers and management education is increasingly important:

• For Community Participation: Business management and marketing professions are increasingly expected to adopt and use digital media technologies to reach, communicate and interact with the communities within which they coexist.

• For Digital Community Engagement: Business management and marketing professions have to actively engage – “be involved, interested, interact, converse with and share information with” those more socially and technically digitally literate than themselves on a daily, weekly and monthly basis – from web designers, social media [web] consultants, programmers, engineers and expert users – as they adopt and use digital media technologies in their marketing and business activities?

• Because of Community Impact: It is the marketing and related business professions who develop, design, produce and make the decisions on the use of digital media in marketing, customer service, PR, promotional, product development and community engagement activities. And it is these that can (and do!) have a profound impact on society, youth, culture, and education. Be it for the marketing of a charity like Oxfam, an arts organization like NTW, a government initiative like Safe Sex, a new music or literary star like J. K. Rowling, or a product offering like Skittles, Cadbury, Orange or the Toyota Lexus. Marketing has an impact! Good and bad!

Digital Media Literacy in Business, Management and Marketing is about exploring the digital knowledge and skills that are evolving in business, management and the marketing profession.

The aim is contribute to the discourse about the core digital knowledge, learning and literacy  ‘learners’ in Business Management and Marketing require so they can participate not just effectively, but also appropriately and responsibly.

So! Now when people ask me:

• What: “I research & teach Digital Media [Literacy] & Marketing at Cardiff Business School“.
  How: “Through practice-led and research led teaching: I work with practitioners and researchers to develop insights from cases and research projects, to inform how and what we educate and do in digital media & marketing”
  Why: “Because I want to help students, business and the community develop the skills to learn, participate and engage in the digital space – effectively, appropriately and responsibly”.  
  

To learn more, here is a talk I gave at Chapter Arts Centre (UK) in March 2010 entitled: Marketing’s Digital Media Evolution: Do you see what I see?.

Smiles
Kelly

Martin Evans

“A contributor to knowledge”; “a creator of impact”;  ”a giving citizen in the academic research community”: all are most certainly terms that describe Martin Evans. Martin Evans was not just a teacher, or a lecturer. He was also an inspiring research scholar whose research interest and research integrity was grounded first and foremost in making a contribution to knowledge in the fields of Direct and Interactive Marketing, Consumer Behaviour and Marketing Research.

He published over 180 publications, in national and international journals, case studies and reports and 8 books. Many of his works are nationally recognised for their contribution, and their author was a multiple academic prize winner from the Academy of Marketing (AM), the Institute of Direct Marketing (IDM) and the International Conference of Marketing Communications.

Martin also served on the editorial board of some of the UK’s leading national marketing journals: Journal of Marketing Management, Journal of Marketing Communications, Journal of Strategic Marketing, International Journal of Advertising, Journal of Targeting, Measurement and Analysis for Marketing and Journal of Database Marketing and was full editor of the Journal of Consumer Behaviour: An International Review.

His expertise, support and years of research experience contributed to the knowledge and learning of numerous colleagues, co-authors and doctoral students, hundreds of masters students and thousands of undergraduate students, both in and outside the class room, the office and traditional publication channels.

Martin’s research contribution though was not just limited to the academic community. He also engaged actively with the wider business and social community to share and co-create knowledge through research partnerships, committees and informing industry policy and regulation, especially in Direct and Interactive Marketing. He was a fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) and Institute of Direct Marketing (IDM) and full members of the Marketing Research Society (MRS), the Federation of Direct and Electronic Marketing (FEDMA) and the Academy of Marketing (AM).

He was an inspiring research scholar, mentor, colleague, teacher and friend.

Dr. Kelly Page
Lecturer in Marketing & Strategy
Cardiff Business School.

I thought very hard about this question, and reflected on the last 5-8 years of my academic career. I looked at who has inspired me in exploring knowledge, adoption and use of electronic technologies. The works I’ve read and reviewed range from the work of Charles Darwin on Evolutionary Science, the writings of Plato and Sir Francis Bacon on Form and Knowledge, Marshall McLuhan in his media philosophy of the 1960′s,  to more recent work of Innovation Theory by Everett Rogers and Technology Adoption by Fred Davis.

But if I think back to the early days of my research career, as an Honours research student in the mid 1990′s embarking on research about the impact of technology on Marketing philosophy, it would be the work of Prof. Donna Hoffman that really inspired and changed the way I viewed at not just technology, but also the socio-cultural implications/influences of technological developments.

Prof. Donna Hoffman

In the early stages of the research component of my honours degree at Griffith University Australia, I was given a article to read by my Professor of Internet Marketing, Prof. Ed Forrest. Ed was a visiting Academic in Australia from Florida, and established a programme on our schools graduate programme on Internet Marketing and Internet Marketing Research. A programme that for the mid-1990′s was cutting in edge in the critical discussions we had in the classroom about the role of technology in business and wider society. As a research student on the undergraduate programme, I took part in these discussions of Toffler, Media Determinism and Network Complexity.

However the article from these discussions that has remained integral to both my academic and commerical work since that day was an article published by Prof. Donna Hoffman in the highest ranked marketing journal – Journal of Marketing. It was co-authored with Prof. Thomas Novak and was entitled: Marketing in Hypermedia Computer Mediated Environments (HCME’s): Conceptual Foundations. It was this article that raised the critical enquiry in marketing about technology-mediated communications and for me, the acqusition and creation of knowledge about technology – given their complexity in technical design, and situational context of application and use.

Prof. Donna Hoffman award winning and Internationally recognised research set the tone for marketing enquiry into internet marketing and digital media management and as the founder of eLab, an online laboratory for consumer behavior research and the Co-Director of the Sloan Center for Internet Retailing, her work not only informs academic enquiry through publication in top marketing and management journals, but informs policy for commercialization and use of the Internet.

So my pledge for Ada Lovelace Day, is the work and approach to technology science of Prof. Donna Hoffman.

Twitter: @profhoff
Web: Sloan Centre of Internet Retailing

Smiles

Kelly

1. Do we know what we mean by Digital Media learning and participation and do we agree?

No, we don’t, and probably given the many number of disciplines from which DML is informed (be it education, literacy, languages, arts, digital communications, political science, psychology, anthropology etc), we probably never will.

• There are many sides to digital media and specifically, digital media learning in that we can learn a) about digital media (as in skills and knowledge of the technologies); b) from digital media (as in its impact on society); c) through digital media (in that it is a channel to share information); and/or d) with digital media in that it is participatory learning we do everyday as we use digital media and as through emersion in simulations of real-world situations.

• Digital media participation is another concept for interpretation. At DML 2010 we referred to participation with others and participation with digital media and in this raises the differentiation – is it just about behaviour and usage  OR a bigger idea of being ‘part’ of something, part of the digital media space. OR as raised by Sonia Livingstone, is it actually not about participation at all – but engagement with digital media?

In this can we actually have a concise definition or really should we define participation, engagement and learning … for fear it might constrain us?

2. What do youth struggle with, with respect to Digital Media?

I’d say a lot more than we actually know or can dream of ever knowing.

A number of issues were raised relative to race, access and resources – such as time and money accessibility and availability. But this was only on the surface of the issues of what youth struggles. What about their feelings as to what is expected of them in this space, to be more responsible and mature, to have the skills of what as been labeled a ‘digital native’. Rising societal concerns about digital access, digital divide, digital literacy, time, money and resources all paint an all but dark and confusing space of youth digital media participation.

Yet more often than not we see reports of how a great many youth are online? How their skills are more advanced than other cohorts given their emersion in digital media based on year of birth. And in this we ignore the socio-cultural conditions within which youth learn, use, talk about and engage with digital media.

I wonder, can we really look through their eyes, and paint a picture of how they see the world … or are we forever misinterpreting it with labels, themes, and our interpretation of their words and behaviour in talks and presentations based on our world view … and in this where is the child’s voice! Why are they not part of this discourse …

That actually was another notable omission from the conference – youth, as where teachers, parents … perhaps by being more inclusive next year we can see more of the picture as others paint it … through MORE video, audio, and their active participation in the DML2011!

3. What does the Internet add to everything in a childs life?

In this I think is an important question not just relative to traditional learning or educational formats, but what does it add in all facets of a childs life – be it socially, emotionally, education, fun and creativity, learning and social bonds …. It is possible it can add so much but in as much as it adds, it also detracts … but in this I don’t just think of children or youth. I think we should think of the many members in our communities … parents, teachers, researchers … for they too play a critical role in youth education, learning and digital media engagement.

But like the wide adoption of the many innovations, be it technological or not, often the benefits and negatives of innovation are often only realized in hindsight, through adoption, usage and reflection of societal, community and system evolution because of these technologies.

4. What does youth digital engagement [not participation] look like?

One view. In psychology the notion of involvement is discussed, wherein individuals have a differing propensity to being interested (or engaged) with a domain (e.g., football). With this individuals may be more or less enduring or situationally involved.

• Enduring: In that they love an area and thus talk about it, read about it, and participate in it often and with great intensity and attention. A professional football player or avid gamer might be an example.

• Situational: Where as others are influenced by a situation or context that may not be ongoing, but in arising influences the level of attention, interest and activity of that individual toward the domain. For example, a college student who only occasionally plays football when the summer tournament arises or the father who takes his son to football every Saturday not because he ‘loves’ football but his son does, or the friend who doesn’t really like a video game but plays it because his/her friend wants to.

In this the motives for interaction and participation differ with intensity and duration, but stem beyond  simple considerations of behaviour e.g., ‘how frequently they play football’ or ‘play a game’ to include a more wholestic view of an individuals involvement, feelings, perceptions, view and use of the domain – such as digital media.

In essence though this is but one view. Engagement is a much deeper and richer and in that more complex than participation, and in that more important to learning and the exploration as to what fosters digital media engagement in youth.

5. What is it we want youth to learn?

In this it is dependent on the perspective taken, the world view adopted and the domain of specific interest. In brief:

• Perspective: How is digital media positioned within the notion of learning? In this, they can learn from many differing perspectives – such as learning from, through, with or about digital media.

• Discipline/Field: From which disciplines could their learning be situated in (be it one or many): sociology, education, learning, literacy, psychology, arts, literacy, communications, anthropology, digital media, information technology … and I’m sure I’ve missed many more

• Domain: What is it we want them to learn about – privacy, security, social networks and social intelligence, emotional intelligence, behavioural skills, technical design, communication skills, creativity and innovation etc ….

6. Are we overestimating a child’s digital skills?

Perhaps we are overestimating a child’s digital skills and in many spaces not even considering the digital skills (as much) for other members of our community – such as young adults, teachers, parents, lecturers, researchers, business and wider community … we all being influenced and expected to use/interact or learn about digital media and therefore we all have digital media literacy needs and we are all connected …

7. Are we as academics in this space and digital media professionals advocate DM too much? Do we not have a responsibility and a need to be more critical?

Perhaps in this (similar to the doc com crash of the 90’s) we are focusing too much on the hype and promised opportunity of a technological innovation; our access to the plethora of data and subjects; and driven by the endless need to publish – due to institutional expectations – and stay informed and up-to-date.

With this comes normative behaviour to conform and to agree in order to survive and NOT to be left behind. These questions above and more critical questions we most certainly should be asking, not just of ourselves, but of the designers and engineers of the digital media space, and the markets/communities that adopt, use and ESPECIALLY promote them (i.e., the marketing and business profession), not just us that research and study them.

It is with this that the next post refers to why as a marketing academic in a business school I made the trek to DML 2010, to explore differing approaches and meet like mind colleagues, who although see the world through a different lense, can afford me the questions to help explore further why Digital Media Learning – and specifically knowledge, skills and literacy is critical for not just youth, but also for the business and marketing community of the 21st century!

Smiles
Kelly

The conference itself opened my eyes to a number of things, one important thing is that we need to always remember the interdisciplinary nature of this field. Without an open mind and participation in conversation and sharing, often the perspective from which we approach digital media learning can cloud and sometimes blind us from anothers view of this space. As adults researching this space, our view of the world is very different from those we research and observe – be it child, young adult in HE or those engaged in lifelong learning. But from each other we can certainly share and learn.

Prof. Sonia Livingstone provided one of the best talks I’ve been fortunate to listen to in this space, and like Henry Jenkins and S.Craig Watkins, made me think. From her talk, it was evident Prof. Livingstone was unafraid or blinded by the opportunities digital technologies can provide us, opportunities and benefit we often talk about, but asked some of the more difficult but incredibly important questions, esp. when it comes to digital media learning and literacy.

It is with this notion, that I don’t feel I could justly summarise her talk, as I have and as such, I’ve provided the list of tweets and retweets I posted during her talk. Note, it was only 12 tweet, as I found myself listening to her words and for the first time in a long time … not wanting to tweet too much unless really important for the world not in that room … so I could listen.

Sonia Livingstone on “Youthful Participation in Digital Media”

1. 2010-02-21 01:28:02 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone starting her talk on ‘youthful participation’ in digital media … all the way from LSE in UK! #Dml2010
2. 2010-02-21 01:33:15 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “Life without digital media would not be life as we know it” #Dml2010
3. 2010-02-21 01:34:42 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “Do we know what we mean by learning and participation and do we agree?” #Dml2010
4. 2010-02-21 01:36:02 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “Struggles with what youth find with technology and not heard as much as what is exciting?” #Dml2010
5. 2010-02-21 01:38:40 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “2 in 3 teenagers check the reliability of what is on the Internet“ leave a large majority who don’t check” #Dml2010
6. 2010-02-21 01:44:58 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “What does the Internet add to everything in a childs life … the Internet can detract from creativity” #Dml2010
7. 2010-02-21 01:57:37 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “Digital we adults have given kids the space to play in and in this also comes playing with fire? #Dml2010
8. 2010-02-21 02:04:57 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “Digital participation is not the same as engagement” -KP like connections not same as connectedness #Dml2010
9. 2010-02-21 02:10:09 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “what is it we want youth to learn? Not what is it we want them to participate in? #Dml2010
10. 2010-02-21 02:15:54 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “Ofcom (2004) def. of media literacy is not about creativity & learning is about protection” #Dml2010
11. 2010-02-21 02:17:56 drkellypage: RT @triches: Livingstone – overestimating child’s digital skills leads to underestimate their need for digital literacy education #Dml2010
12. 2010-02-21 02:23:22 drkellypage: Sonia Livingstone: “We [academe] must be tougher on ourselves in our projects, more critical stop being nice to each other” #Dml2010

Best blog I’ve seen of Prof. Livingstone’s talk by Sheryl Grant
All @drkellypage conference tweets: drkellypage #DML2010
All conference tweets: #DML2010

Smiles

Kelly

Following the chair’s introduction by Dr. Henry Jenkins, the opening keynote talk was delivered by S. Craig Watkins. Highly regarded for his research about race, youth and digital media usage and his books, The Young and the Digital and Hip Hop Matters. He was invited to join the MacArthur Foundation Series on Youth, Digital Media and Learning.

With this in mind and with no experience in this area I was looking forward to hearing the perspective from which he considers this space. Below is provided a few key insights I took out of his keynote talk:

• SCW Insight: The conversation around youth use of digital media and the digital divide as a racial ravine has changed. Black and latino youth are using technology and the degree of engagement has evolved considerably since 1998?

Here he poses the audience to reflect on what this conference might have looked like in 1998, over ten years ago in terms of race and usage?

• SCW Insight: If we ask them [youth] if they use and access – it assumes they are not connected for a certain period of the day? They are in fact using social media ‘more’ than heir white counterparts.

He presents to the audience a number of emergent patterns about black and latino youth usage, which challenged historical views about black and latino participation in the digital media space:

1. Usage is mobile: Mobile phones are merging as the preferred platform. 92% own a mobile phone …
2. Usage is peer and Interest driven: They are ‘Living and learning’ with new media …  engaging their peers … peer interaction … peer informed spaces that drive their usage and interest driven genres (e.g., hip hop)…
3. Use digital media is the new town square: ‘Back in the day’ .. hip hop … youth always writing stories, carrying pens and papers, documenting  their stories about their life in poems and hip hop … today, the digital landscape is the new town square about hip hop … they go online to engage with their community, and engage in a ‘stunning’ critique about the world around them ….
4. Use digital media as a space of opportunity: Messaging & hanging around in digital media is NOT just wasting time, but they are creating gateways for them to create opportunities and engage with what they are love and passionate about … e.g., a young girl who used hip hop to connect with hip hop artists, but also to connect with her friends and record/tweet about her own hip hop …

He goes on to discuss the affinity between social media and hip hop (e.g., mobility, DIY, peer-based learning, participatory, view of them in their world) and summarises some key tenants of what they have learnt so far about black and latino youth in the digital media space:

1. Black youth capital is about – ‘keepin it real in the digital age’
2. Black cultural capital wherein “soft skills” and code switching in/between digital and real world is important. Soft skills he defines as the ways people interact with others, esp. how they talk … black and latino youth profiles in digital space, how they present themselves, their linguistic practices, these styles of behaviour suit their peers, but not perhaps the wider/formal view of the world (e.g., getting a job).
3. Creating and critiquing expression and peer-group connection: Digital media is the space where they grapple with their own fears and their own concerns and peer-group connection. He gives an example of New Orleans and Katrina and how a young boys digital media practices changed before (i.e., didn’t use/value Myspace) and after Katrina (e.g., place to express and reconnect with his peers, post evacuation.
4. Creating and critiquing the politics of race and place … public memorials, grieving and engagement with social issues… are engaging with differing skills and life experiences and these life experiences are shaping their interaction and participation in the digital world.
5. Creating and critiquing in any place through digital space … Black/Latino … more likely than white via handheld … more reliable than home access and in these places they feel ‘policed’, not so with mobile technologies … mobile becomes an empowered space in any place …

In summary, S. Craig Watkins poses some interesting insights into not just the usage of black and latino youth with digital  media, disposing the historical view of the 1990’s of the synergy between race and digital divide .. but also sharing his learning on black and latino youth in the digital space … their experiences, values and in his words ‘how they are in this world’ (S. Craig Watkins, DML-2010).

From this delivery I felt an additional area worth exploring:

1. In addition to how black and latino youth use, are, see, interact and participate in the digital media space, how does digital media make black and latino youth feel as part of this experience? This question comes from an exploratory study with MedisSnackers in the UK that I was fortunate to be part of entitled: The Web Makes Me Feel!

Smiles
Kelly

Tonight in the Chair’s introduction to the DML 2010 conference, Dr. Henry Jenkins posed some interesting insights into what is emerging and what we are facing when it comes to Digital Media Learning …asking the delegates to consider more widely diversifying participation in learning communities …

From this introduction I tried to capture a number of key insights … a colleague and friend of mine, DK from MediaSnackers, a social media organisation specialising in engaging youth-based organisations, once spoke that he endeavours to make people either ‘think’ or ‘smile’ from his talks, meetings or conversations. Well tonight Henry Jenkins … most certainly made me think …

Below are a number of the key insights I took out of Henry Jenkins talk …

• HJ Insight: John Fiske noted in the 80’s and 90’s that we don’t control the cultural foundations of civilisation, we participate in them, but we don’t control them.

John Fiske published Media Matters, one of his most important work, were he examined a series of political/media events to show how America was struggling with –- and against — becoming a multiracial and multicultural society.

• HJ Insight: We are participating today more than ever! Enabling people to grow and learn in many distinctive ways.

• HJ Insight: Participatory culture – Jenkins notes that a participatory culture and web 2.0 are often terms used interchangeably but that they are not one in the same. Web 2.0 is important but it ignores a culture older than the Internet

Particpatory culture is defined by Jenkins, et al, (2006) as:

1. With relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement
2. With strong support for creating and sharing one’s creations with others
3. With some type of informal mentorship whereby what is known by the most experienced is passed along to novices
4. Where members believe that their contributions matter
5. Where members feel some degree of social connection with one another (at the least they care what other people think about what they have created).

Jenkins, et al, (2006) notes, that not every member must contribute, but all must believe they are free to contribute when ready and that what they contribute will be appropriately valued. A great quote: “Participatory culture shifts the focus of literacy from one of individual expression to community involvement.” (Jenkins, et al, 2006)

• HJ Insight: Digital divide is not just about access, it is about social and cultural skills in human networks to enable proper participation …

Jenkins quotes Fiske who observed that ‘we now have new opportunities to struggle’ … noting that struggle has gone on for centuries … but with evolution in society and culture comes new opportunities to struggle …

• HJ Insight: Henry Jenkins concludes by calling the DML 2010 conference to be about .. asking questions, challenging approaches and viewpoints and in that the conference is inclusive .. including people not included before … from diverse cultures to challenge together … where digital media can go … and the future landscape of digital media learning ….

This last comment I welcome. I don’t come from specifically a media or education background, I’m based within a business school … but I research knowledge and perceptions (psychology) of digital media relative to adult users. The remit to explore how the knowledge and learning between more technically knowledgeable users/creators (e.g., designers) differs/informs a wider (and perhaps less technical) community of users in which they both co-exist with each other …

This last insight made me both think and smile:

• HJ Insight: The origin of LOL!?! Henry Jenkins also informed the delegates of the true origin of LOL – espousing it’s origin lies not in the Internet-based technologies … but in the evolution of a country-wide social network in the late 1860′s that became known as the Amateur Press Association … Food for thought!

In summary, an engaging introduction to what poses to be an interesting conference …

Dr David Theo Goldberg & Dr Heather Horst from UCHRI opened the conference outlining the digital media and learning initiative Digital Media and Learning Research Hub that was launched over 4 years ago with the idea to bring together scholars, practioners and society with a focus on ‘education and learning’ through, with and about digital media technologies.

With this they pose a number of questions for consideration over the new few days:

1. Are young people learning differently because of digital media?
2. What does learning or what will it look like over the next 5, 10 15, years?
3. How will/does education  prepare our children for the 21^st century?

Interesting questions to reflect on, which I’ll no doubt revisit on Sunday, when the conference has come to a close, but the conversation will surely continue. But here I raise perhaps another question to ponder about when thinking of participation and inclusivity in learning communities to include ‘ALL’ learners:

4. How will/does education (about, with and through digital media) prepare us (adults, teachers, educators, parents) for the 21st century and esp. for (youth) community engagement and learning?

Learning and education does not stop when we move beyond a youth classification. I’m excited by this focus of the conference, but also will reflect in the context of all communities – youth, younger adults, formal, informal for ‘life-long’ learning. Developing skills, knowledge and dare I say it ‘expertise’ for participation in these diverse learning communities about, through and with digital media.

Why? So we can ALL participate in this emerging socio-technical culture that is influencing learning and education, esp. with youth and younger adults who are more deeply emersed and participating.

Be it from an education, government, public policy or business community – developing skills and understanding learning and knowledge of digital media in ‘adult education’ (e.g., higher education, ongoing professional development), also calls for consideration. For can these communities of learning practice be separated? Should they? Or in effect … what can we learn from each other?

This is the very nature of participation in learning communities … we are all learning and educating …  and sometimes we (adults) are the student, sometimes the teacher … esp. when it comes to digital media!