“The Man Barbie” experience…

I felt that this term was more challenging than the previous ones because of the amount of group work and constant assignments with strict deadlines that had to be met. It was difficult for us to work as a group because of our different and clashing timetables. We did not get to work on the blog itself, but rather we concentrated on our own, individual work for the course. On a personal note, I felt motivated at first to make this blog look awesome but I found it difficult to achieve, seeming as I am not much of a ‘computer whiz’, nor very competent when it comes to web-page building. Another challenge that resulted from this was that I lost my entire Internet quota, which was a bit of a problem to upload my assignments onto the blog. Also, the workload from other subjects discouraged me to write extra blog posts as my time became severely limited.
I think that what really motivated our story ideas was the nature of our blog, which was quite light-hearted, and the nature of the overall assignments which was limited to first-year experiences. For example, for our comic strip, we chose to stick with the theme of our blog. We used models with Barbie faces, and we scripted a story that relates to first-year issues while using a humourous tone. However, the theme of our blog also restricted me in my choice of stories, because I felt the need to relate them to our blog’s light-hearted and tongue-in-cheek humour. Thus, I decided to write about Karin, a party animal, for my profile article, instead of someone who had more serious issues. I felt sometimes that I would have liked to have dealt with more serious issues such as rape, drug abuse or other such problems at Rhodes, but it would have seemed out of place. This was also a decision by the group not to write too much on over-written issues such as rape. We wanted to offer something different, but this was to the detriment of the quality of our blog, when compared to other blogs.
Furthermore, the theme of the course “Surviving First Year” gave us the advantage of being able to talk about our personal experiences, which made it easier sometimes, but it also limited us with story ideas and our own interests. For example, there were political issues I would liked to have explored, such as American politics or the treatment of women in the Middle East, however these topics would have been out of context with the theme of the course, as well as our blog. Finally, I hesitated when deciding on what to write for my opinion piece. I was afraid to write about the ‘black awards’, an issue I really wanted to explore, but I was concerned that people would misinterpret it within the context of the blog and this could have had serious repercussions. I was not wrong to be afraid, as even the piece I did, which seemed pretty straightforward to me, confused others.
Outside of the tutorial times, we rarely had meetings as a group, because, as explained before, timetables were an issue. The one meeting that everyone could make was for the comic strip. We worked well as a team and everyone put in their bit of effort, whether it was with the props or dialogue, or even ideas for scenes; which made it a success. I did not think that the tutorials were much help regarding the blog and the assignments themselves. I think it would have been more helpful and time-saving if we were given more practical experience in applying what was seen in the lectures and what we had to do for our blog. I was also a bit confused about the style of language we were supposed to use, because blogging is quite informal yet we are still students and this work is for marks, thus the language used is still important. Another thing that bothered me was the mixed signals that we got from the lecturers in terms of their expectations. They told us that it does not necessarily have to be political but then students were criticized for not talking enough about serious issues; as Sim said, “tell it to your grand-mother.” However, this course did allow me to try new genres that I had not really previously explored. It gave me a better understanding of what the expectations and conventions of the different genres are. It allowed me to write on more diverse topics, while exploring outside of my ‘Oppidan Press comfort zone’. Also, I found blogging to be a more personal way of writing, and more opinionated, as opposed to newspaper writing where objectivity is stressed. Thus, I would say that this course allowed me to grow on a scale of 7.
Regarding the research entailed in this blogging course, I did not do any for the more personal pieces such as the letter to my younger self or the photo comic. For my profile article, I found that interviewing a friend for this piece made it easier because I knew her and thus I could talk to her with ease, which also made the writing process easier. I think though that knowing the person you are interviewing could make you more subjective in your description as well as make you question on where to draw the line between an outsider’s relatively objective position – that a journalist is supposed to have - and an insider’s knowledge. Thus, to overcome this dilemma, I interviewed some people in relation to my profiled individual. For my opinion piece, wanting to make sure I was not basing my story merely on my own personal beliefs, I researched some additional information on the Rhodes website and interviewed a few people in order to back up my argument. This was even more important since I knew that other Journalism students might be reading and critiquing my piece; thus I had to make sure that my facts were straight.
I think that blogging’s main flaw is that it is too opinionated and you cannot rely on the information that is given in them as much as in a newspaper, for example. Bloggers do not have to give out their source list, nor do they have to be held accountable to an editor or are checked by sub-editors. Thus, in some way I do not think it is such a reliable form of journalism because of its non-accountability. However, I do believe that this course was important because blogging is becoming an important source of information and debate on current issues, national and international. With the development of computer and online technology, I do believe that blogging and online forums will become more essential, more prominent and respected form of journalism. Furthermore, the advantage of blogging is its immediacy: one can easily keep up to date and discuss directly with the writer through his or her comments; something that is not possible in other media forms such as television and newspaper. Even in radio, where one can phone in, it is restricted and limited to what the radio station wants to hear and the time available. Thus, blogging allows more freedom of speech to not only the writer, but the reader too. Also, through connecting with other blogs, one can establish a global network, linking many diverse opinions and perspectives from different parts of the world; this means one can also reach a wider audience.