ALT-C 2009 Opening and Keynote presentation

Frances Bell from Salford University welcomed all 600+ delegates to ALT-C 2009 with some context about Manchester and its industrial past.

Tom Boyle, co-chair of ALT-C and professor at London Metropolitan University, introduced the theme In Dreams Begins Responsobility. His wish is for delegates to realise dreams and find the evidence of respondisility.

Gilly Salmon, the other co-chair, and professor at Leicester University, reflected about collective dreams and creating new ways of dreaming realistically. THe future can be viewed as building on trends from the past - an incremental innovation, but also to reclaim some radical, new thinking of our own. Implementation plans need to be written up and shared collectively. A huge challenge to address as we enter the second deacde of 21st century.

Keynote speaker:
Michael Wesch - Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University, USA

Mediated Culture/Mediated Education
Changing the lecture theatre/campus with wifi -> connecting students to the an mammoth archive. Viewing things from outside the box - Michael descirbed his visit Papua New Guinea - no running water, electricity, etc. He lost his identity whilst he was out there because the things that were important to him in his life were no longer available or meaningful out there.

Media are not just tools or means on communication; he proposes that media mediate relationships; as media change so do our relationships and culture.

Rethinking ourselves - rethinking education
High drop-out rates in High School in the US; psychological drop-outs where students dont really want to be in university. Disengaged, not into uni - but VERY engaged in American Idol!
Examining the history of insignificance - theories are that is started with the industrial revolution, growth of surburbia, television (i.e. to be significant you need to be on TV)
Media saturation -> the MTV generation. Michael examined a brief history of the use of the word"Whatever"
With so much media available to us, it makes us feel important - and flattered. And relates to a higher feelings of narcissism and rise of individualism.

Generation Me, Jean Twenge (Why Today's young Americans are more confident, assertive and miserable than ever before
The search for identity and recognition in a culture where those things are not given; the search for the authentic self; Disengagement and fragmentation.

What does the world of Web 2.0 lend ?
not controlled by the few, not one-way, created by, for and around networks not masses, transforms individual pursuits into collective actions, makes "group" formation "ridiculously easy".
Why this matters deeply - we know ourselves through our relations with others; new media create new ways of relating to others; new media creates new ways of knowing ourselves.
Examination of You Tube and the use of personal webcams.
The medium shapes the possibilities of how we communicate but also how we know about ourselves
The platform we choose shapes the message we deliver to students. So the message of the lecture theatre conveys a message that the instructor is correct, you can discuss, you're there to learn specific information. But the world is changing:
From students being knowledgeable to knowledge-able
The point is the purpose not the platform... leading to new possibilities for the word "Whatever"

mediatedcultures.net