UO Folklore presents a lecture by Robert Glenn Howard:
Back to the Newly-Digital Networked Normal
Tuesday, May 14th, 4:00 pm
Knight Library Browsing Room
From the beginning of recorded history, human beings appear to have been devising ever more complex ways to interact with each other, from physical mimicry, oral narration and musical instruments to books, movies, TV, and now so-called “new” media. Termed the “new folk culture” and “participatory culture,” media scholars are celebrating the new normal of network communication. But is it really new? Or has the age of durable media and commercial broadcasts only been an awkward silence in the long chatter of human history? If so, that silence has been broken by a digital roar. We can hear it in everything from homemade videos of ourselves playing guitar licks on YouTube to advice about how to treat sick kids in network forums. From protestors tweeting on the streets of Tunisia to Oregon teenagers sharing their videos on Facebook, all of us can again place the highest value on spinning our own vernacular webs of signification. In the process, maybe we will discover ourselves more tightly bound together; a global web that both tolerates the diversity of individuals and values the connections that weave us into a single human community.
Robert Glenn Howard (UO PhD, English, 2001) is Professor of Communication Arts and Director of the Folklore Program and the Digital Studies Program at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. His teaching and publications span the fields of Communication, Folklore Studies, Journalism, Rhetoric, and Religious Studies. Dr. Howard is the author of more than thirty academic articles and has published three books: Digital Jesus (2011), Network Apocalypse (2011), and Tradition in the 21st Century (2013).
