Digital Literacy Exercises Our Willingness to Participate

How Can Participation Be An Expression of Digital Literacy?

    Few can say they fondly recall being asked to volunteer or subjected to involuntary participation in activities or events whether in school as a youth or at a demanding (toxic?) job as an adult. Yet, the digital era has unlocked an accessible means of participating from the comfort of our internet connection. Through this portal, we are granted access to communities and special interests we may not have otherwise been able to find much less involve ourselves. These newly established social connections made in the digital format require that we participate in terms of our attention and our time. Participation by reposting, tweeting, liking, or even searching online can translate to real power in the real world, especially when angled toward a social or political activist organizing purpose. Participation is a pillar of digital literacy, which asks us to engage mindfully and ethically with an eye for deception. 

        The comforts of the internet require that we not be too comfortable so as to let our guard down. 

What is Participation?

    This week’s considered material in the Old Dominion University Digital Writing course focused on participation as an aspect of digital literacy. Starting with the chapter three reading of “Net Smart: How to Thrive Online” by Howard Rheingold, participation was identified as a sustaining force for online communities in digital writing. This aspect of digital literacy teaches us how to establish social connections online while identifying and pursuing an intentional goal and impact. Participation is the ultimate expression and fruit of applying our attention, a crucial commodity to be employed as a tool. The previous chapters and related opening module readings elaborated on how attention can be misused or misplaced. It can also be put to a noble personal purpose and in doing so potentially help build a world that is more diverse and democratic in culture. 

    Being always aware of the inaccuracies abundant on the interwebs, netizens can begin to find their own voice on the internet through various platforms, including blogging. Rheingold identified the blogger as capturing four typical roles: filter, connector, critic, and advocate. Each role is a way to find a personal perspective among the many internet opinions that can be authentically and properly supported by other peer-reviewed and accepted resources. An expression of participation as digital literacy is properly and effectively citing these sources through the current digital era citations of links and tags (in addition to the classic, standard reference list). 

Participation's Technicalities:

    The chapter reading “Read the Room” by Sarah Seely, Kelly Xu, and Matthew Chen used personal anecdotes and a TikTok case study to delve into what participation as an aspect of digital literacy technically means. Focusing on the discourse community, the authors outlined the social process of identifying the values and circumstances in any social dynamic. This leads to awareness of community needs and requirements through goals, genres, and language. 

Elevating and Evolving Participation Beyond the Basic

    The PowerPoint delineated ways our attention that has become participation can evolve from lighter levels of commitment to a greater degree of participation until it can authentically progress from just cooperating to fully collaborating. This is the difference between a less impactful yet united social network and a viable, impactful virtual community. Only with the evolved option can a group effect change. This presentation also provided insight into how the Media Richness and Social Presence theories apply. 

What Dangers Threaten Our Participation's Best Intentions

    The journal article on ChatGPT researched by Shannon Tan, Samson Tan, and Jurgen Rudolph discussed the many ways that participation can be ethically and authentically engaged within the progressive context of this ever-evolving digital era that presents state-of-the-art convenience tools like ChatGPT. Adaption with careful attention to fraudulent participation is the solution to navigating the newly commodified digital space. 

    This week’s lesson highlights the importance of authenticity in the digital world. As artificial as the current digital era’s intelligence can feel, we must fight just as hard for what is real and right. There are simple ways to accomplish this, like properly tagging an artist who inspired a post to pass along accurate credit where it is due. Another and arguably more important way we individually ensure authenticity in our participation is by showing up as our genuine selves in communication.

See @mirriam_tinny's TikTok video exploring how digital maps are only as helpful as the existing knowledge of its user. Pictured is a screenshot of the TikTok account post of the video and a sampling of comments.

    To foster the curated community we are learning about in real-time, I invite you to consider the following questions based on this week's topic: Do you ever find yourself operating from behind a mask? Maybe at work? Maybe around family? What difference do you think it would make to share your true self with others? Please share your experiences of creating and connecting your digital identity with your real-world self. 

#literacy #digitalliteracy #netizenship #digitaldenizen #digitalcommunication #tiktok #socialmedia

References

Rheingold, H. (2012). Net smart: How to thrive online. The MIT Press. 

Samson, T., Samson, S., & Rudolph, J. (2023). Chat GPT: Bullshit spewer or the end of traditional assessments in higher education?. Journal of Applied Learning and Teaching. 6(1), 1-15. https://doi.org/10.37074/jalt.2023.6.1.9

Seeley, S., Xu, K., & Chen, M., (2022). Read the Room! Navigating Social Contexts and Written Texts. In Driscoll, D.L., Heise, M. Stewart, M.K., & Vetter, M. (Eds.), Writing spaces: Readings on writing. (pp. 188-300). Parlor Press. 

Tucker, V., (2024). Social networks and virtual communities. [Powerpoint Presentation]. https://canvas.odu.edu/courses/149053/files/35175200?wrap=1.