Blog 2

The three articles that were assigned to the class to read had many similarities between the authors or people featured in them.  Each one of the articles that we read are written or discussed by strong minded individuals that have found something that they are either passionate or feel is necessary to discuss with others like them.  Each one of these people had their messages shared and based off of social medias. In this case twitter and Facebook were the two main social medias used.  The articles that focused on poetry focused on using twitter to get their poetry out to the public and to help find their community.  It is noted heavily in the beginning of the article that poets of color are now using social media to get their works out there to their intended audience because they are not required to white wash their poetry and have it be intended more so for white readers.  The second article that I read was about the mother from the northeast not posting a picture of the young children next to their impressive snowman.  In this article she talks about how she debated if she should have or shouldn’t have posted the photo. The photo is a great picture of the three kids and it looks to be an enjoyable memory for them but it was made apparent that that was not the case at all.  She decided against not posting the photo to share with her Facebook friends because she would think she was lying about the occasion.  The last article was about a twitter user that started a hashtag that dealt with domestic abuse.  By her using the hashtag she was able to find her audience because the audience was women that had been through similar situations like her. 

            “We write not as isolated individuals but as members of communities whose beliefs, concerns, and practices both instigate and constrain, at least in part, the sorts of things we can say.”-Harris.  The quote that you just read was perfect to describe the people in these three articles along with everyone else that uses social media as a way to interact with their communities.  When I read that quote I think about people posting on twitter with hashtags or wherever they would be posting about topics.  These people have opinions that they likely share with their friends or other people they are associated with and writing helps spread their beliefs to other people that may or may not agree with them. 

            “Recent social views of writing have also often presented university discourse as almost wholly foreign to many of our students, raising questions not only about their chances of ever learning to use such an alien tongue, but of why they should want to do so in the first place.”-Harris.  This is a quote about the language that is used by instructors at universities and their students.  Students tend to use a different language outside of the classroom than they would inside when they are working on schoolwork or just having a casual chat with their instructors.  College students today have grown up always having a computer around by the time they attended school for the first time.  Along with having computers many probably have had some sort of messenger or means of communication to other computer users at a young age.  With having had computers for so long, the current college students have evolved their languages which people from older generations do not necessarily speak or know all too well.