There’s an interesting phenomenon which has been unfolding in the ELT world in the past few months, perhaps since the end of last year, and that is the rush of ‘bigger names’ (and you can measure that in any way you want) to enagage with their audiences by setting up websites, starting blogs and getting into wilder things such as Twitter and Second Life.
Now as a technologist I thoroughly applaud this, of course – I’m pleased that they’ve finally come to realise that part of their lives revolves around technology and that technology can be useful to them, and helpful for engaging with a more extensive audience, sharing their ideas and initiating dialogue. I await, of course, with baited breath for some of them to show the same courtesy and care to their learners by recognising that this is also the case for them, and consequently taking some of these technologies into class with them, where appropriate.
In the same vein I look forward to the moment when those who speak of the uselessness or unreliability or danger of technologies in the classroom (usually on their own blogs – or in Yahoo Groups – rather than on slate tablet or by carrier pigeon) realise the absurdity of their views and take a step back for some self-examination and de-hypocriticisation (you shall permit me this word…).
But there is always the question of where this desire to communicate using new-fangled technologies comes from, and what the attendant problems and challenges are for the new user…
In terms of desire, this seems pretty obvious to me. Experts using traditional diffusion methods (plenary, talk or workshop at a conference, article in a journal or newsletter, book) have a severely limited audience: small readership for printed materials (generally), and a limited anount of opportunities to speak at conferences, if for no other than logistical reasons. Clearly then, in the face of much more visible ‘amateurs’ who have been blogging and the like for some time, those not using technologies in this way face becoming less well-know and less discussed in certain circles – and, perhaps, ultimately less bankable…
Equally clearly to me is that there are brilliant teachers and trainers out there without publishing deals who are as prolific, creative and popular as some of the more visible (at least at conferences and in bookstores) names in the profession. This is a threat, I suspect, for many parts of the profession – not simply ‘expert speakers’, but also publishers, who run the risk of losing control of the primary knowledge distribution channel, and therefore the content and the income.
So, in many ways there is no choice – if you wish to expand your potential audience and engage with the ‘common man/woman/person’ you really have no option but to seek them out where they are – and that’s often online, and that’s often because most of them can afford an Internet connection on a monthly basis, but most cannot afford a large conference or a regular supply of books.
There is also – at least in the case of the plenary, talk, article and book communication approach – no room for discussion or debate. One does one’s thing and people either mutely listen or read and move on. The expert there is very much the expert – no questions asked. And so ‘new’ forms of communication not only keep you up there in the public eye with lots of others (both ‘big’ and ‘amateur’) but also allow you to engage more fully with everyone else in the profession. It’s a step towards democratisation.
But there are other attendant issues involved here – time, challenge, dispute… How do you find the time to engage sufficiently with everyone on a blog, Twitter, etc., without everyone thinking that you’re either rude or not interested? How many replies and direct messages can you send on an average day? Because if you’re a ‘big name’ chances are people have questions for you. Are you committed enough to answer them thoughtfully? Because clearly you can’t have one without the other, or your cake and eat it, as it were.
And the challenge – write an article and it’s unlikely anyone’s going to be so het up that they’ll write back and wait two months for it to be published. We don’t work like that these days – as an advert I saw for a mobile phone company in Pakistan said ‘impatience is the new life’ (for good or bad). So you’re generally pretty safe with articles, and plenaries, and books because there’s very little chance of a comeback.
But a blog posting? Or a tweet? Totally different – everyone’s watching everyone else, we’re all reading each other and if you post something I don’t like or agree with, you’ll find out pretty quickly. Equally, if you annoy me by Twitter you’ll know it soon enough. And so there’s that to contend with too – if you engage, you really have to engage, and that means thoughtful responses and time, and lots of people will claim to have very little of the second.
But, as I say, it’s not a cake and eat it choice… Some people are doing it very well, engaging in all sorts of places and really becoming fully paid-up members of these new fora (I’m not going to name them because you’ll know who they are if you follow them, and they’ll know due to the amount of time they’re spending on it, and the lack of time they now have for other things!) and many are doing it badly (again, I won’t name them because it’s obvious).
It’s a good thing, mostly – but there’s no resting on laurels to be done anymore, and I for one think that’s a good thing – bring on the discussions…
Gavin I agree that technology is really equalising in that respect and that is its biggest pull for me i.e. like a “real” conversation in its immediacy and the chance to express views in discussions that would be more ‘exclusive’ in the real world (i.e not everyone invited) or hampered by time. The right to reply to books/articles is not only delayed but also is at the discretion of the editor – and these days, sadly, we live in times where a very narrow range of critique is tolerated before it is considered better to duck out. Most discussion just chugs along safely within a predictable range of opinion and then quickly moves towards concensus. I don’t get it really as surely that is how we all learn, develop, improve? Perhaps there is more pressure on well-known people to be ‘right’ all the time? Bit like an exacerbated teacher complex
But just as in a real conversation someone can say “gotta see a person about a dog…I’m off” – this can reveal a multitude of reasons from I’m bored/I’ve got better things to do with my time/Your opinion is not *that* important to me/I don’t want to continue as I don’t have anything developed enough to say/I don’t want to show the holes in my own thinking my continuing/I only talk to people who bolster up the view that I am right and more – this exists in the virtual world too I guess.
I am in agreement that hopefully those who are dipping their toes into the techy waters just to jump on the proverbial will soon be found out as the time they devote to the task will soon be obvious to others. By contrast, those who really engage will be memorable for that. We are all busy people, but technology seems to me to offer the chance to elongate discussions that would be cut short in real life conference situs for ex. People usually sniff out superficiality eventually wouldn’t you say?
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Well Sara just went ahead and said all my thoughts, humph.
As one of the amateurs, am not so concerned about the ELT bigwiggies getting their toes wet – they will very soon find out how much time, effort, commitment and energy all this web2.0 takes and due to the fact they actually do have better things to do then search the web for the perfect photo for an hour, roll eyes, will go right back to writing books, and we-in-it-for-the-democratization… shall continue to surf youtube.
BTW, your blog postings are really getting so much better over the last few weeks – I keep coming back (and I’m a blog flitterer (you’re got away with de-hyprocriatisation)).
I must say am really enjoying the newer ever-so-slightly-controversial pieces much, much more than the here was my gorgeous holiday villa and reports on conferences.
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Karenne,
Nice of you to say so. I think I’m just going through a militant phase at the moment, quite simply because I’m bored with the ‘luddite-esque’ approach of many of the professionals in our trade, and find it somewhat hypocritical of them to gaily use technology every day in their *personal* professional lives whilst denying their students that pleasure and that right.
I know it’s born of fear, of losing control, of not being the ‘master’ in class, a lack of any idea of how to use it for teaching and so many other fears – but it’s so, so annoying to hear technology attacked all the time, particularly when those attacks are hosted on technology platforms.
Annoying to hear the same tired old arguments of ‘my learners don’t want it’, ‘it’s not interactive’, ‘there’s no research to support XXX’ (which means I can’t find any with my terrible search skills, and I’m certainly not reading a book about technology and education), etc., etc.
So yes, whilst I shall continue to post pictures of gorgeous holiday villas and information about new SL tools I’ve developed and all that, I shall very often work at unmasking the people who use technology for their own gain whilst denying that right to the people who – or so they would claim – are the most important in the classroom… the people whose needs we must listen to, whose interests we must cater to.
It’s put up or shut up time, I think…
Gavin
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I assume that in the entertainment industry, it’s pretty unlikely that big stars write (or are allowed to write) their tweets or blog postings.
Perhaps the ‘big names’ in ELT will go the same way, with the publishers these big names are under contract to hiring ghost writers to interact with the rest of us. If I worked in publishing, it’s certainly what I would do.
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Pete,
Not the case in entertainment for many people. Stephen Fry is a good example of a man who writes all his own blog posts and all his own tweets – and, at least on his blog, these postings are interesting and as controversial as he wishes them to be.
I suspect, however, that his income and bankability are slightly more robust than most people in our profession, who may be dropped when the next big movement or approach or method comes along, or when some whippersnapper is assigned to write the next twenty-level coursebook series instead of them. It’s a fickle profession, at best.
Certainly Fry, Paulo Coelho, Maya Angelou etc., do tweet themselves and they can be interesting. In fact a lot of them (like Bill Bailey, as one example) have to have accounts called things like @RealBillBailey because other people were pretending to be them before they got to Twitter. I’m not sure that’s happebed to an ELT grandee yet (though I do know at least three of them who don’t own their names as domain names because they didn’t get round to registering them soon enough!)
I do assume that obviously if you’re blogging on a publisher blog you’re not going to shoot yourself or your income in the foot, so some towing of the party line is going to be in order, but presume Twitter is free of that kind of thing thus far. I hate to think I may be wasting my time with people who aren’t who I think they are…
Gavin
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The way things are at the moment in my favourite big publisher, even if they had the inclination nobody would have the time to handle an author’s public communication. As far as I can see they are all run off their feet trying to keep up with each other and producing the next wave of praaaduct. It is largely in a name though and they are certainly happy if authors can raise their profiles. An editor once urged me to ‘go to the watering holes’ but (apart from many trips to a very fine watering hole just up the road) I have so far resisted the urge to see my fellow teachers as gnus…wildebeest perhaps. What?s the difference? I digress.
Have all authors felt the tension between serving the community of teachers and students while being proactive enough to satisfy the needs of their publishers? Do all authors yearn to keep their publishers interested in them, whatever about selling some books and paying the lekky bill? It?s really tough on the lower rungs of the ladder and them be slippery rungs. The harder you work for the publisher, particularly by doing unpaid author presentations (OK, OK I know your books sell more if you do these events), the more likely you are to get asked to be involved in further projects. That’s the hook. Not to say it isn’t a delicious hook and an author tour has to be the world’s biggest ego-massage; you get to go to interesting places, meet wonderful teachers, charming reps, stay in good hotels and everyone is terribly, terribly nice to you. That’s before you get to blog about it or share tantalising tasty tweets with your ‘followers’ (great word).
If you don’t play the game, that’s fine, but chances are you?re not going to get a second chance and you’ll not make it to the land of milk and honey where a writer can actually choose never to take off their dressing-gown. There are a few people who have leap-frogged to the top. Fair play to them but I have heard publishers and other authors being really dismissive of them. Imagine! The outrage! They’re sitting at home making loads of money but don’t present. They don’t play the game, they just get their royalties. I mean do you know how much they get? Yah, Booh, Sucks!
At presentations we all know that inevitable pseudo-nervous gag every author makes when they hold up their own book and says something like “I’m really not here to make you buy my books” accompanied by a “Yeah, right” giggle in the audience who are thinking “We’ll listen to you and if you’re lucky take a flick-through of your books but don’t you dare turn this into a commercial. We do this on OUR terms”. From what I can see, the highways and byways of the web work in pretty much the same way. Authors should be seen and heard if they so choose but maintain a lofty distance from the lolly. I remember the buckets of scorn immediately poured on me when I referred to my own (brilliant) books on a SIG mailing list. I was perplexed. I mean, the contents of the books WERE the manifestation of how I wanted to teach and just because they were published, should that exclude me from mentioning them in the discussion? For goodness sake, there?s nothing to stop anyone else saying they?re a load of old cobblers on the very same lists.
There’s the rub. Your friendly author is simultaneously a poor starved puppy begging for scraps in the form of your love and your money and the next contract. Your friendly author deeply wants you to know how amazing their books are but God-forbid they say it straight out. Your friendly author really, really, really wants you to go out and adopt their series. To tell your friends. To go viral! Hell, why not adopt them while you?re at it. They want to be patted.
So next time you meet your friendly author, give them what they want, why don?t you? Tell them you love their books, but even better, tell their editors. It?s all in a good cause. And if you think they look like the lucky ones remember that when you?re tucked up in bed dreaming of great activities or whatever you dream of, they?re going to be grey-faced, poring over manuscript with a deadline to meet the next day, catching up on all that time they spent enjoying your praises.
At the end of the day, maybe it is just all about love.
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At the end of the day, maybe it is just all about love.
Patrick – ya hit the nail on the head… however as the song goes…
“the greatest thing is to love and be loved in return.”
The return part is the part that’s er, faltering a bit when it comes to the big wigs and why people like Case, McManus, Keddie, Peachey and top blogger Ferlazzo will always have a following.
Blogging and Twittering’s all good but is it for the love of self or the love of sharing? If it’s to bray then it’s not a conversation and the audience will go to sleep.
We buy products, read books, when we love the person, even when/if the book’s a miss… the sad thing is that if we don’t feel like the blogger or the tweeter is authentic or really there…
zippidity-zaap – that’s democratization.
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A new order is coming in (The Young Twurks???)They are leaders because they are using the new technologies to share their skills. AND their skills are all about the new technologies…a new range of skills that most teachers are aware they will have to master sooner or later. It will be hard for the old guard to keep up, not just because most of them aren’t as tech-savvy themselves (who could be?) but also because their message isn’t so hot. I suppose there will be a general scrabbling but, as in any field, the new will sweep out the old.
As you point out, it’s all in the sharing and the people you mention have managed through incredible dedication and skill to share their own skills and knowledge far and wide. What uncountable hours of hard work! What sore eyes they must get!
I suppose the equivalent until recently would have been a big name coming to town and everyone gathering around. That still works for a lot of teachers but that will only continue to work for publishers if the name of the author is a draw. Those big names don’t hold the same Gandulf-like status as they did because nowadays we can enjoy a new proximity. If I write a half sensible message to any of the people you mention above, chances are I will have a reply before bedtime. As they say, “How cool is that?”.
All the publishers are looking carefully at ways to capitalise on all this. They want to enhance their existing products with technology. They want to build a richer, more immediate, relationship with their customers. They want to use technology to understand their customers needs better and they certainly do not want to be side-stepped or have their big stars look like faltering, braying, boors (great image!).
A simplified view as the relationship between the old and the new is a great deal more complex with the people you mention above working with publishers in various ways.
One thing’s for sure though. It’s all absolutely scrummy!
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