We will use a series of different digital tools in this seminar. No prior knowledge of these tools is required, you will receive help in setting up accounts. We will only use tools that are available for free and you are not required to use your real names. By practicing the use of twitter, google+, and other social media apps in an academic research environment we will also address their pros and cons: how they can facilitate collaboration; how they make it possible to share our research; but also how they make us vulnerable and challenge us to remain responsible and alert guardians of our privacy and the privacy and rights of others.
Tweeting is a great way to collaborate with others, share information, or publicize your work. Some of you might already be tweeting, so you know about the constraints: 140 characters is all you have, which can be frustrating but also very powerful in terms of focusing your writing! In our course, we will use twitter for a variety of things: to tweet impressions while reading our primary text; to share preliminary research questions; to develop “tweesis” statements; and more.
How do we get started? If you already have an account, all you need to do is share your twitter handle with us. All others, please go to twitter.com and create an account. The process is straightforward, all you need is an e-mail address. Choose any twitter handle (that’s your user name) but make sure to share it with use on this google spreadsheet so that we all can find and follow each other! (This spreadsheet cannot be viewed by or shared with anyone outside of ASC.) My twitter handle is @gundolfgraml, but I’m also tweeting German-related topics under @ascgerman and @asczwitschert (‘zwitschern’ is the literal German term for tweeting, although nobody uses that.)
