My web-site

I have just launched my web-site. Check it out: https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/yjshin/website/shin.html

2008 NCA Urban Communication Pre-Conference Seminar

The Urban Communication Foundation (www.urbancomm.org) will held its annual seminar at the National Communication Assocation's annaul convention in San Diego this year.

The Unconventional Urban Landscape: Studies, Cases, Explorations
Thursday, November 20, 2008, 9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Manchester Grand Hyatt, Cunningham B.

http://www.urbancomm.org/seminars.php

A poem of Kahlil Gibran

On Children

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, "Speak to us of Children."
And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Source: http://www.columbia.edu/~gm84/gibtable.html

once again, virtual space as a battle filed

From the viewpoint of politcal economy, it is evident that the contemporary technology developments are largely driven by global, trans-national, advanced capitalism. The structure of this post-industrial capitalism and the media environment of telecommunication derived from the rationale of the advanced capitalism seem to be dominant and unavoidable. However, this is not the end. Based on the understanding of our reality, we need to develop some strategies to overcome the dominance of capitalism. At least, we need to claim the possibility of redeeming our will to overcome the dominance. In this sense, the social constructive approach provides us with the rationale to stimulate us to think about the strategy. As I posted before, I think that the virtual space is like a battle field. Before we become pessimistic of our future, we have a mission of constructing our virtual space to democratic and emancipatory place.

What really makes virtual community to be “community?”

Even though information-oriented activities seem to be dominant in cyberspace, virtual communities are not likely to succeed without emotional and peer-group supports. Therefore, communication in virtual community becomes more than exchanging factual information. It brings up identity-building, empathy, and social support among the members. So, it is tempting to conclude that communication makes virtual community to be “community.” However, as they show from a variety of virtual community studies, trust is the most important factor to make people increase willingness to communicate and build sense of community even in the virtual space. In sum, I think that how to build trust in virtual community must be an important topic in the discussion of virtual community.

a battle on the net

For me, the Internet is like ocean. It is very hard to contour what is happening and to predict what will be occur in the ocean. In reverse, I think that this fact gives us a cue to approach to this area. The Internet is like a battle field that all sorts of political, cultural, economic and social networks, groups, or persons struggle to occupy. It is a virtual but real world to affect our life to a great extent. Therefore, we need to define the Internet world normatively and seek for potential to contribute to public life as we struggle to realize public life in non-virtual world.

Metamorphosis Project at USC Annenberg School of Communication

This is a good example of current studies on communication and urban issue:
http://www.metamorph.org/

Torsten Hägerstrand: Time Geography

http://www.csiss.org/classics/content/29