Dr. Douglas Walls, Assistant Professor of English, NCSU, “The Networked Space: Expanding Writing Activity into the Extracurriculum”
In this talk, Douglas Walls will explore ways of hacking the virtual space of classrooms. Walls considers how digital objects such as web browser plugins and microblogging can allow students and their work to shift and move through the physical walls of their assigned classrooms to compete in students attention economies by making class participation writing as “spreadable” as other types of media. Through the lens of actor network theory, Walls argues that digital tools can act as activity-generating objects, but only if—and when—networks of people and activities around those objects exist in a way that invite opportunities for meaningful writing work.
