Getting a Twitter account and a blog account on the WordPress associated blog was interesting simply because it was related to an academic course. I have never had a twitter before but I understood the format and how to use it since websites that use personal publishing interfaces are mostly similar.
I avoided twitter because I felt that it was an extra internet tool that I did not need because of my facebook, blogspot, deviantart, (soon to come) linkedin, etc… that I’ve already had. But I have wondered about it simply because of the way professionals use it. I like the fact that it promotes quick, casual interaction without knowing someone’s hometown or seeing last night’s party pictures. I know lots of professionals from the animation industry and from film in general who take great advantage of Twitter. For example, for the making of the live action film, The Last Airbender (2010) (and it was terrible, I know), I followed the producer’s feed and his updates on the progress of the film which was a great way to follow the progression of such a project. Thus I was not really bothered by the idea of signing up although I had never sought to do it on my own. I know I’ll definitely keep mine and will likely continue posting with the CHST404 hashtag (if Dr. Perez doesn’t mind!) to interact with future Chicano Studies enthusiasts and bring up related articles, images, etc.
Blogging on the Cited at the Crossroads site was nothing new since I have my own blog (Stef-a-Sketch). As soon as I knew that we would be given the chance to do blogs for the semester, I knew this is what I would want to do. I am a fan of researching, especially when I get to research topics that interest me, so this was the perfect combination of self teaching with the purpose of teaching others. I know when the time comes I’d like to do something similar on my own, e.g. a blog where I post researched info on multiple subjects, including Chicano Studies!
The only drawbacks I saw were my own, in which I deprived myself of enough time to dive in a little more into each subject I posted about. I also would have liked to tie it in to specific readings since most of the ones we read were very inspirational.
The chance to put our class on the internet really excited me. Although I’ve never been good physically in front of an audience, I love going all out behind the scenes. So again, this was an excellent way to do it. And I believe displaying a high level college class to the world wide web was very appropriate, especially since it is a class about culture, and people. The narrow focus on women I think is something that is also necessary. Like we have seen before, people want to know about this stuff, but sometimes the access of it is lacking. Bringing it down to the personal level of a blog instead of a professional website allows those looking into this subject to enter it more comfortably, and leave with legitimate resources as given by our links. All in all, I’d have to say the use of social media made this class and the experience in general, a very pleasant one that I hope to have in future classes.