Students, the Net Generation and Digital Natives:Accounting for Educational Change

This chapter examines a number of different terms and popularized accounts of young people who are now at the stage in their lives of engaging in university education across the world. Three of the more common terms that have been used to describe this cohort of young people are the Net generation (Tapscott 1998, 2009), Digital Natives (Prensky 2001; 2001a: 2009) and Millennials (Howe and Strauss 2000; Oblinger & Oblinger 2005). This chapter critically examines the argument, common to writers using both terms: that the existence of an environment infused with digital and networked technologies, combined with an active engagement in these new technologies, leads directly to a sharp generational break. The chapter goes on to examine the determinist nature of the argument and the way this has been related to one particular pedagogical approach; collaborative learning. It examines the wider social and technological context and in particular the ideas of networked individualism and networked sociality. Finally the chapter concludes by examining which aspects of the Digital Native and Net Generation arguments are worth taking forward and by identifying those aspects of the arguments that need to be abandoned

e-Governance: Supporting pragmatic direct deliberative action through online communities of interest

Authors often report on the limited success of e-Government initiatives in developing nations. Top down, national strategies are developed to target improved government services, but maintain hierarchical, citizen-state conceptions of governance through representative democracy. An alternative conception, direct deliberative democracy, frames the potential role of the internet in governance differently. Web based platforms might support locally animated deliberations, which target pragmatic outcomes, while the resulting social networks afford collective learning through connections across traditional boundaries. This paper presents an investigation of direct deliberative governance as it occurs in online 'communities of interest', and is based on research with such a community in southern Africa. We investigate contributions to the online governance process and develop an action typology distinguishing between degrees of 'agency freedom'. Network analytic techniques are then used to understand how acts of varying degree are expressed in terms of the structure of a social network. The aim, more broadly, is to understand how the environment shapes acts of direct deliberative governance, and, in turn, how the acts shape the evolution and effectiveness of the community. The preliminary results suggest design considerations for online governance communities, and highlight their role to not only provide deliberative space, but to mediate social network connections

A relational, indirect, meso-level approach to CSCL design in the next decade

This paper reviews some foundational issues that we believe will affect the progress of CSCL over the next ten years. In particular, we examine the terms technology, affordance, and infrastructure and we propose a relational approach to their use in CSCL. Following a consideration of networks, space, and trust as conditions of productive learning, we propose an indirect approach to design in CSCL. The work supporting this theoretical paper is based on the outcomes of two European networks: E-QUEL, a network investigating e-quality in e-learning; and Kaleidoscope, a European Union Framework 6 Network of Excellence. In arguing for a relational understanding of affordance, infrastructure, and technology we also argue for a focus on what we describe as meso-level activity. Overall this paper does not aim to be comprehensive or summative in its review of the state of the art in CSCL, but rather to provide a view of the issues currently facing CSCL from a European perspective

Pioneers, subcultures and cooperatives: The grassroots augmentation of urban places

About the book: There have been numerous possible scenarios depicted on the impact of the internet on urban spaces. Considering ubiquitous/pervasive computing, mobile, wireless connectivity and the acceptance of the Internet as a non extraordinary part of our everyday lives mean that physical urban space is augmented, and digital in itself. This poses new problems as well as opportunities to those who have to deal with it. This book explores the intersection and articulation of physical and digital environments and the ways they can extend and reshape a spirit of place. It considers this from three main perspectives: the implications for the public sphere and urban public or semi-public spaces; the implications for community regeneration and empowerment; and the dilemmas and challenges which the augmentation of space implies for urbanists. Grounded with international real -life case studies, this is an up-to-date, interdisciplinary and holistic overview of the relationships between cities, communities and high technologies

Internet use among urban Malaysians: Network diversity effects

This study examines social network diversity in urban areas relative to residents’ usage of information and communication technologies (ICTs). Individual-level variation in social network diversity was measured using position generator data collected as part of a survey conducted in Malaysia’s Klang Valley (N = 808). Regression analyses were performed to assess the extent to which network diversity is related to ICTs. We find that most ICTs have a negative effect on diversity. Only frequent use of the Internet at work, mobile access to the Internet, and reading online news or blogs contribute positively to diversity. Findings support both a tendency toward ‘networked individualism’ and the more recent ‘glocalization’ thesis that some ICTs may also afford participation within local space rather than only across distant space

E-democracy as the frame of networked public discourse : information, consensus and complexity

The quest for democracy and the political reflection about its future are to be understood nowadays in the horizon of the networked information revolution. Hence, it seems difficult to speak of democracy without speaking of e-democracy, the key issue of which is the re-configuration of models of information production and concentration of attention, which are to be investigated both from a political and an epistemological standpoint. In this perspective, our paper aims at analyzing the multi-agent dimension of networked public discourse, by envisaging two competing models of structuring this discourse (those of dialogue and of claim) and by suggesting to endorse the epistemic idea of complementarity as a guidance principle for elaborating a form of partnership between traditional and electronic media

Networked Individualism of Urban Residents: Discovering the Communicative Ecology in Inner-City Apartment Buildings

Certain patterns of interaction between people point to networks as an adequate conceptual model to characterise some aspects of social relationships mediated or facilitated by information and communication technology. Wellman proposes a shift from groups to networks and describes the ambivalent nature inherent in an ego-centric yet still well-connected portfolio of sociability with the term ‘networked individualism’. In this paper we use qualitative data from an action research study of social networks of residents in three inner-city apartment buildings in Australia to provide empirical grounding for the theoretical concept of networked individualism. However, this model focuses on network interaction rather than collective interaction. We propose ‘communicative ecology’ as a concept which integrates the three dimensions of "online and offline", "global and local" as well as "collective and networked". We present our research on three layers of interpretation (technical, social and discursive) to deliver a rich description of the communicative ecology we found, that is, the way residents negotiate membership, trust, privacy, reciprocity, permeability and social roles in person-to-person mediated and direct relationships. We find that residents seamlessly traverse between online and offline communication; local communication and interaction maintains a more prominent position than global or geographically dispersed communication; and residents follow a dual approach which allows them to switch between collective and networked interaction depending on purpose and context

Glocalizing the Composition Classroom with Google Apps for Education

Composing practices in a digitally networked world are inherently intercultural, and situate local needs and constraints within global opportunities and concerns. Global technologies like Google Apps for Education (GAFE) allow students to compose collaboratively across place and time; to do so, students and teachers must navigate a complex local network of institutional policy, learning outcomes, situational needs, and composing practices while also being aware of the global implications of using the interface to compose, review, edit, and share with others. The chapter describes using GAFE in locally situated composition classes. Using such technologies requires a focus on glocalization and an understanding of how networked composing activity affects the communication process, and the institutions, faculty, and students who are interconnected within it

Exploring young Saudi women's engagement with social media : feminine identities, culture and national image

PhD ThesisWith the rising popularity of social media in the last decade and a half, young women in Saudi Arabia have been utilising these platforms to negotiate values and norms in relation to issues such as veiling, work, their place within the private sphere, and their relationships with the opposite-sex. The aim of this thesis is to understand how the rise of social media engagement is impacting long-held traditions and values about Saudi women, and how their social media use is impacting on their public national image. The research addresses the interplay between Saudi conservative nationalists, who wish to preserve a traditional image of femininity that is highly tied to notions of piety and deference, and the Saudi women who, through social media, are actively challenging these longstanding views on how women should behave in society. Drawing on Nancy Fraser’s notion of counterpublics (Fraser 1991), this research argues that the democratic potential of social media platforms, independent of cultural and state laws that serve to direct, control and determine the attitudes and behaviour of young Saudi women, has facilitated the emergence of a counterpublic in which alternate contemporary identities are expressed and represented. By employing a triangulation approach for collecting data within a constructivist research paradigm, this research draws on four sets of data. Firstly, it uses netnography to observe the public accounts of seven female social media influencers. Secondly, it observes the personal accounts of nine Saudi women. A third set of data consists of six one-to-one interviews. Finally, a fourth set of data entails seven focus groups involving an overall sample of 36 participants. Using thematic analysis, this research argues that Saudi women, particularly younger women, using social media are adopting a more critical view of traditional customs surrounding femininity and women’s place in a society constructed through a collectivist ideology towards more individualistic values, norms and social ties that emphasise agency and autonomy (Giddens, 1991). I also argue that Saudi women active on social media are modernising the national public image of Saudi women. By engaging with Dobson’s (2015) study of post-feminist digital culture, I explore the contemporary ideals of Saudi femininity that are portrayed on social media by the young Saudi women I observe in this research and I document the complex and many ways these women can now be in the world. I find that women’s engagement with social media is challenging traditional values and norms and performing a vanguard role in reimagining the public national image of Saudi women today

Private message me s'il vous plait : Preferences for personal and masspersonal communications on Facebook among American and French students

Facebook, a social networking tool used worldwide, provides affordances for public/masspersonal and private/personal communication. Based on previous cross-cultural research demonstrating that masspersonal communication is adaptive in individualistic cultural contexts, we hypothesized that using Facebook to broadcast messages to one's entire network would be relatively more common and appealing to people in countries with greater individualistic values. To test this hypothesis, data were collected in two Western countries differing in levels of individualism, France (204 women, 47 men) and the U.S. (75 women, 89 men), through questionnaires measuring their Facebook use. Results indicated that American college students had larger Facebook networks and used both more masspersonal and personal communication with acquaintances compared to French college students. Masspersonal communication was mediated by network size. French students used more personal communication with friends than American students, but this association was not mediated by network size. These findings suggest that the appeal of masspersonal communication increases as a function of social network size, however, level of engagement in personal communication on Facebook is a function of other cultural differences between the U.S. and France, such as differences in individualistic values