6 billion Others: An Avant-garde Ethnographic Project

6 billion Others is a project by Yann-Arthus Bertrand 'aiming to create a sensitive and human portrait of the planet's inhabitants', which I think is an avant-garde ethnographic project with aiming 'the enlargement of the universe of human discourse' (Geertz, 1973, The Interpretation of Cultures).

The project team conducted 6,000 interviews in 65 countries and shot 4,500 hours of film, asking participants about meaning of life, happiness, love, anger, tears, discrimination, dreams, their parents, and other topics related to their 'felt life'.

Listening to testimonials is listening to History on an individual scale. Feeling is what we experience from the inside, our emotional perception, an irrational element that moves us all. An individual process, it is also a universal language....

website: www.6billionothers.com

Immediacy & Hypermediacy of Windows

Windows, as an operating system has been very successful that the rivals of it, still are using the similar designs in their systems. The design of the interfaces, menus, toolbars, dialog boxes, buttons, etc, everything is based upon the shape of windows, very simple and no place for multiple interpretations. I think the immediacy of the medium comes from this simple idea.

First, in the epistemological sense, we are so used to rectangular shaped opening and closing windows that the shape of the interfaces are transparent to us. Paintings, photographs, televisions, cinemas, computers, etc; almost everything we see around us are in the shape of rectangles. Secondly, in the psychological sense, we love the act of watching."Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognizes before it can speak" says John Berger (Ways of Seeing, 1972). However, what we see is brought within our reach. Therefore, living in the socially constructed worlds, we learn watching: we watch the outside through the windows, we watch TV, we watch the vitrines of the shops, we watch the cinema, we watch people, we watch people fighting and on and on; and in many times just the act of watching. So, offering so many screens for us to watch, windows of Windows disappear and the objects inside them become present to us.

What about the hypermediacy? I think, in its epistemological sense, the knowledge of the world -maybe just the social world for some, political world for another or the business and so many different worlds at the same time for most- comes us through the Windows. We learn the new ways of communication with our friends (windows messenger), we learn the new ways of listening to music (windows media player), we learn the new ways of researching (windows explorer), we learn the new ways of shopping (windows marketplace), and lots of other features that we have to spend lots of hours to learn all. Also we learn about the mediation itself. The menus and toolbars are always there within the broader window surrounding another one. But in the psychological sense, some parts are falling away from the experience of the 'real'.

Of course the notion of 'real' is socially constructed and it can vary according to different people. However, taking the word 'window' in the meaning of "wind's eye" (vindauga -where the word originates from) or in the meaning of "eye-hole" we see that the sharp rectangular shape of the windows falls behind the 'real life' ones'. Also the orderliness of the windows with all the menus and buttons attached, and the precise timing and falling into the screen while opening the windows is another feature which is an 'unrealistic' experience too.

I don't mean a non-geometrical shaped window, like the real shape of an eye would be much more realistic; but according to me, rounded shapes feels much more gentle, natural and humane -like the ones in the wii interface.

Creating choices in our multiple choice lives

We are living in an age of multiple choices. We can choose our schools, our cars, our computers, our igoogle or blog skins, background colors, etc. But we always choose from the given ones, and our choice is influenced by our ideology/life-worlds.

In his book 'Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses', Althusser writes "Ideology represents the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence". He explains this with a simple metaphor. Althusser says that we can think ideology as the water in an aquarium; and, a fish living in this aquarium understands an external object not with its real dimensions but within an imaginary size because of the water in the aquarium.

As fishes in an aquarium we are supposed to choose what is offered to us; but what if we don't want and pass to the other side of the aquarium? Althusser (1970) argues that, it is impossible to live out of an aquarium; whether that one or another you are surrounded by some water. Or from a phenomenological and hermeneutic point of view ‘nobody has a true access to external reality’.

So why do we care about reality? As Dilthey (1976) says ‘what should come first is experience’. Maybe it is impossible for us to pass to the other side of the aquarium and perceive the the objects with their real sizes (i.e. access to reality); but it is still very exciting to travel to the sea, like once Nemo ‘did’. But in order to this, first of all, we should suppress our sweet life-world and cultivate it in order to survive in the other.

M-learners in the Zoo!

Oley! We are going to the Indianapolis Zoo this weekend. Before starting our journey let's search the website of the zoo. You can find lots of things: in addition to information about the zoo, you can register for online classes, watch the webcams of the animals or take the distance learning program. Great!

However, I still want to go and see the animals in real life. How will we go there? Oh, let's get the directions from my mobile phone: all the roads and directions are clear now -even the distances and times are specified. Then let's start our journey! We are all happy; but is it possible for someone to change the radio station? Ok, I have some music with me, of course in my mobile phone: we are listening to Gnarls Barkley (everyone is happier now). At last we arrived at the zoo. Wow, it's fantastic! I should take some pictures (with my mobile phone of course):

There are various animals here! What does this 'invertebrate' mean written in the explanation card of the seahorses? Nobody knows? Ok, let's look up in the dictionary. Of course I am not carrying a thesaurus or a dictionary with me; I have just downloaded one to my mobile phone. Alright, it means 'without a backbone'.

Here are the penguins! How smart they are standing together! Does anyone know why they are black&white? Ok, I know I'm asking a lot, I should better connect to the internet with my mobile phone? Everything is more clear now: for camouflage of course, like most of the animals in nature. In wikipedia it says that: a predator looking up from below has difficulty distinguishing between a white penguin belly and the reflective water surface. The dark plumage on their backs camouflages them from above. I smile with the satisfaction of learning just in time, and so the others owing to not hearing my endless questions.

Wow, look how big this polar bears are! We are really amazed of this scene. Of course we have seen polar bears in TV and internet but we have understood that we didn't perceived the real size of a polar bear. Oh, is this a dilemma of neomillenial learners?


Let's continue our trip in the zoo with the dolphin show! Well, actually I don't feel good, I'm a bit uneasy while watching. I am stuck into deep thoughts: 'instead of greeting the people from a small pool for rewards of dead fish, should not the dolphins deserve to swim in the boundless oceans'. And is not this a dilemma of a real zoo?

Okay, it's time to go back to our home now. And now we are rather fussy! Help God, it is Monday tomorrow! I have still one more reading left. But thanks God there is this WHD with me now! I can valuate my time in the car. I can 'navigate my own self-defined learning paths, engage with multiple modalities with varying degrees of complexity, make new contextually relevant connections, reformulate ideas and preconceived notions, and create my own conclusions.' (Dieterle, Dede, and Schrier, 2006).

Also I don't need to carry a map, a dictionary, an animal encyclopedia, a camera and my readings which in total makes nearly 6 lbs; but just my mobile phone which weighs only 0.272 lbs. Isn't this so smart? Unconnectedness to the things but connectedness to the information and jollification of life!

Magical Journey

After reading Dr. Bonk's post about 'teachers as online concierges', I have prepared this slide. Dr Bonk stated that "Life, and hence, learning, is a journey. And in this magical journey, our tour guides are important. We are living in an age of interest rather than age of information. So, I think, we as future tour guides, should work hard to arouse interest for students to enter right ways in this matrix.

Releasing From Your Chains!

"In order to have a large number of values in common, all members of the group must have an equable opportunity to receive and to take from others. There must be a large variety of shared undertakings and experiences. Otherwise, the influences which educate some into masters, [also] educate others into slaves." says John Dewey in 1916. After 87 years, in 2003, Swan notes that students perceive online discussion as more equitable and more democratic than traditional classroom discourse. First of all, all students have a voice and no student can dominate the conversation. The unique nature of asynchronous discussion makes it impossible for even an instructor to control.

Moreover this ensures the quality, since you don't just say the ideas which come to your mind. You think twice. When you write, you have the chance to see your mind on 'paper', so check it and correct it; then of course distribute it in order to share with the others! So, release from your chains! Do not become a slave of a traditional discourse or web 1.0!

Voice Thread: a web 2.0 tool

You can also view this voicethread by clicking here.