“With Apologies to Virginia Woolf,”
I began idly reading the headlines on Feminist blogs, I found some very interesting posts. I was thinking that back in the sixteen hundreds, women did not have a room of her own to write. Woman had few rights back then, therefore they might have felt like they have been getting criticized by men. As I reviewed a post about Hilary Clinton’s trip to Bosnia, it is shown that she might have slightly stretched the truth. I have seen her being judged by people many times but mostly from men. Because she is a women it is perceived that she is still not on the same level as the male candidate are.
Many years ago there weren’t many shelves filled with books written by females, there were more novels written by men. They had that time to sit down and write, privacy, and a room of one’s own. Women would never be able to write Shakespeare, is what everyone thought. But as time went on, and women struggles to write, those shelves began to see the covers of women’s novels.
After reading the second chapter of Virginia Woolf’s A Blog of One’s Own, I have noticed that there is some irony incorporate in her writing. She says, “but I should need to be a herd of elephants, and a wilderness of spiders…” (Woolf 26) She is saying this because she believes that these animals are the ones who live the longest and believing this will help her cope with thinks. Another ironic quote is when she says, ”how shall I ever find the grains of truth embedded in all this mass of paper…” (Woolf 27). This is saying that there is so much information in front of her that it will be much too hard for her to find what she needs. A third quote containing irony is, “one might as well leave their books unopened.” I believe that she is saying that when med are talking about women, they think that since they are more dominant, that there is no need for women to express anything. The men think they know it all. After reading this chapter and recognizing all the irony that Woolf uses in her writing, I have realized that she has a very imaginative mind. Many good writers are the same way and I think that is what makes writing more interesting.
An interview with Daniel W. Drezner and Henry Farrell in Kline and Bursteins book, “Blog!”, is discussing the dynamics between international blogs and media coverage. Blog is a shortened word for Weblog. According to Drezner and Farrell, blogs are mostly focused on the mainstream media, with some exceptions. Blogs can create debates and this can sometimes create controversy. But this is a way of communication whether people want to accept it or not. Some people would rather use blogs as a way of finding information instead of a newspaper or magazine. They might feel as if it is better because they can have a chance to respond back to what they read. They might have a question and the blogger or someone else can answer it. There are blogs for everyone. If you share a certain interest or you are just looking for a certain topic to read and maybe respond on, then you can find a blog about it. In the interview they are specifically pertaining to international relations. In other words, blogs are a good way to share your opinions about anything.
I think that this material is important because it shows that blogs are so universal. There is a blog for anyone. Drezner and Farrell are talking about international blogs versus media coverage. They are very different because media coverage isn’t always the important stuff. Sometimes we need a more professional way of getting our information to make sure that we get all the information needed and that it is all true.
After reading the interviews in Kline and Burstein about the elections, it is obvious to me that the interview with Ana Marie Cox would influence me the most. Cox calls herself a “failure” of a journalist but now she has become and outstanding blogger and she has a huge impact on on the blog world. She speaks about the more personal yet funny events that goes on in politics. Stuff that people want to hear about for entertainment. She was asked to cover the Democratic Convention for MTV and she was told that she had what it takes to be a television interviewer of such. She has a great sense of humor and she demonstrates that on her blogs and also in the interview in Kline and Burstein. She shares with u s that “Wonkette is her after too many margaritas.” That its not really her but people think it is and they think they know her. She also mentions that the quality of writing on blogs is not very good. This is because there is freedom, no need to edit and the fact that it can be done quick and people will know and understand what someone its saying on their blog. Hearing Cox’s humor in this interview and looking at Wonkette, I would say that she is more likely to influence my decision in an election for the simple fact that she states the truth and I can relate more to her then to Markos Zuniga.
I have looked at a blog from Jezebel and for this blog I decided to use a serious blog post from Jezebel. This blog is called “Evil Gyno Graeme Reeves Brutalized 800 Women Before He Got Caught”, and it is posted by Moe. This post is talking about how Moe believes that the media is obsessed with talking about the bad news about women with genital mutilation. She shares information that she read, about a former OB-GYN who genitally mutilated women while they were under anesthesia. They have found out that he would sometimes even remove actual parts of their vagina’s. There have been several hundred complaints from women, some more serious then others. Graeme Reeves got away with brutalizing about 800 women before he was caught.
There are several of Scoble’s 20 principles in this blog that I recognize. Principle number one, Tell the Truth. Moe shared all the information that she knew about this story. Principle number two, Post Fast on Good News or Bad, was also shown in this post. It was posted around 2:30pm on Wednesday February 27. This is a recent story and she is posting right after the story has been released. She also uses principle number three. Using her human voice. She doesn’t try to sound smart in this post. She writes the same way that she would speak. This makes it more personal and easier to read. She also used some other principles from Scoble, maybe even all of them. I think that Scoble’s principles are accurate in this blog.
Joi Ito is a blogger who blogs for several different functions. Furthermore, he blogs and waits for people to comment so he can learn things that he didn’t already know. Hence getting feedback is a way to learn new things and maybe pass those things on to other people. Likewise he sometimes only uses a question as his blog to begin a dialogue and this focusses on the community. In fact, Ito is trying to say that blogs are a contribution to a community and this shown when we see some bloggers spending money to operate their blogs for the community, but many of then dont get paid when people read those blogs. Reguerdless of what some other people might say about blogs, Ito believes that blogs can be an alternative of the mass media. For example, he says that it can allow some people to find certain groups, niches and communities in specific to their likings. In addition, Ito says that blogs might be able to help people participate in culture, participate in politics, and might increase diversity.
Some people believe that the impact blogs have on businesses is more improtant then the impact that blogs have on communication and social or political ideas. I disagree with that, because although I do think that blogs impact some businesses greatly, I think that using blogs to communicate is more popular then using it for business. There are many people who blog but it is only about 27% of the internet users who do it. “But you cannot afford to close your eyes to them, because they are simply the most explosive outbreak in the information world since the Internet itself.” This is a quote made by Stephen Baker and Heather Green and they say that blogs can shake up any business. This makes me think that they believe that blogging for business in more important then for communication. I disagree to an extent because I think that blogging for business is still a way to communicate either through a company or maybe to advertise the business.
Jezebel had a lot of interesting blogs but one stood out more then others. “Amy Winehouse Performes Live, Seems A Little…Odd” was the name of the blog and I was curious as to why it was odd. When I went to read the blog, there was a clip of Amy Winehouse performing at the Grammys. I watched it and I didnt see anything odd, but after I read the blog, I watched it again and I had different thoughts. People were wondering if the celeb who was currently in rehab, was actually sober on the night of the Grammys. Watching her persormance the second time I did notice some odd things that she had done and I am also wondering whether or not she was sober that evening. This blog was writted by SLut Machine and that also had me interested in this blog. After reading this and watching the clip, I have decided that Jezebel is my favorite site that I have seen so far because it has some thing on it that I am very interested in and some are funny and some can be serious. There is a wide range of different topics so the is always something that I am interested in. http://jezebel.com/354965/amy-winehouse-performs-live-seems-a-littleodd
I chose to view Global Voices. The reason I chose this one was because i checked out some of the others and this one was most appealing at first glance. It had “Global Voices” written big on the top with a little logo. Underneath that there were a bunch of different blogs to read and they all had green or blue colored font on the headings. Underneath each of the headings, there was a piece of each blog so the reader can see a little portion of what they might want to read. There was alos a small map on the side representing the “global” part. There are many different people from all over the world blogging on this site. Some are Neha Viswanathan, Lova Rakotomalala and Eduardo Avila. Some of these posts are talking about politics, and the election and the weather has come up in some. As I read “Making Global Voices Heard: An interview with Rebecca MacKinnon”, I can see that after I veiwed the Global Voices site, it is very much what she described it as. She said that they want to point out the most interesting and important information that is comming off the international blogosphere, and this site did just that. There were people from all over the world blogging about important issues all over the world.
After reading “A Weblog Saved My Life Last Night” (an Ayelet Waldman interview), I have noticed things in the reading that I can agree with and some things that I disagree with. Although I agree with Waldman up to a certain point, I cannot accept the conclusion that she believes that if she blogs something thats on her mind or an event that happend in her life, her husband cannot write a short story or novel on the same issue. She says that it is taking away from his writing but I believe that it is not. She feel like maybe if she blogged that event then her husban wrote about it, then it might be like he is copying her. I think that is rediculous because blogging is a way for her to say what she feels and get support for it and writing short stories and novels is a way for her husband to say whats on his mind and get support for it. Everyone has their different ways of doing things and nothing should come between things like that. Blogs versus novels….? Do what you like better.
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