Literacy and Sharing
Scholarship has continued to consider why some populations or individuals are less likely to participate in socially networked online cultures in ways that are both individualistically and collectively beneficial. The answers lead to further questions of what it means to be literate in a digital society. For the sake of my research, the literacy approach is particularly useful because it clearly ties into Lessig’s conceptualization of a read/write society; just as we simultaneously teach young children to read and write (i.e., we do not ask them to master reading before putting a pencil in their hand), we have an obligation to teach young people to both read and write in a (digital) media ecology. Society has a responsibility to invest in the advancement of digitally literate citizens.
Jenkins et al. (2009) have been influential in helping map out the challenges of a participatory culture in terms of the necessary digital literacies that online participatory culture requires. They identify eleven literacies that young people need to meaningfully and fully take part in a participatory culture: play, performance, simulation, appropriation, multitasking, distributed cognition, collective intelligence, judgment, transmedia navigation, networking, and negotiation. They demonstrate how these literacies move beyond mere skills, and they demonstrate rather persuasively that in the 21st century “new media literacies should be seen as social skills, as ways of interacting within a larger community, and not simply as individualized skills to be used for personal expression” (ibid., p. 32). Sociality and collaboration are embedded in each of the literacies Jenkins et al. set forth. Literacies are more than just access and skillsets; they are a way to close equity gaps and empower students to more fully participate in the formation of their learning and media ecologies, which is why this chapter addresses the question of why some students participate by sharing their creative content and why others do not. We must remember that participation is more complicated than individual motivation and choice, but rather it is indicative of structural and organizational differences.
We must interrogate the systems that produce and reproduce curricula, educational discourses, and norms. Digital and network literacies are an important aspect of participatory culture, but unfortunately schools are often barred from playing a more direct role in shaping students’ online participation because of historically rooted understandings of risk anxiety and the harm-driven regulations that were addressed in the first half of this book.
Beneficial Visibility
Young people’s online participation must be contextualized within discourses of visibility. As will be discussed further in the next chapter, discourses of visibility are often couched in expectations of harm. Risk discourse leads to concerns about the extent to which young people’s voices, bodies, and experiences are made visible online. There are of course risks associated with increased visibility, such as bullying, predators, the creation of sexually explicit images, and so forth (as addressed in chapter 2). However, if we shift our expectations away from risk and instead consider opportunities, we find many beneficial, educational, and empowering aspects of intentional online visibility. A consideration of visibility as part of participatory culture requires a move away from expectations of harm, and instead implores us to consider the opportunities of deliberate visibility within networked publics.
Part of the value of participatory cultures lies in the potential for marginalized populations to produce and share creative media that privileges their unique experiences, identities, and communities. Yet, in a society that consistently and persuasively constructs the visibility of young people as a risk, we risk further rendering invisible the lived experiences of the very populations we ought to strive to empower via online participatory media. The effects of silence and invisibility are consequential on both individual and collective levels of society and deserve our critical attention. We need to consider how deliberate visibility can benefit teens on the margins of society, how we can support the pursuit of more equitable opportunities, and the expansion of social networks via intentional public participation.
There is a growing body of research that demonstrates the benefits of intentional and deliberate visibility. The key words are intentional and deliberate. Here I am not talking about the ways platforms and peer networks render private interactions public (as I will in chapter 6); rather, I am talking about the ways teens intentionally and deliberately make their identities, networks, and creative media content visible via participation in networked publics. It is not uncommon for some young people to share their own media content with the explicit goal of receiving feedback and to experience the benefits of finding an appropriate audience for their creativity. Lange and Ito (2010, p. 280) claim that communication and feedback in online communities “is one of the primary mechanisms through which creators improve their craft after entry into a creative practice.” This feedback loop allows young artists and media makers to connect their practices with other like-minded individuals and find collaborative peer support.
Patricia Lange (2014) explores how young people use YouTube to construct what she calls “technical identities” as an avenue for developing productive digital literacies. She demonstrates that identity development is not only about the media production, but is also about their participation in online communities. In an examination of girls who express “geek” identities via the creation of YouTube videos, Lange (2014, p. 95) explains that
Girls perform being a geek not only through the media they create but through interactive and participatory practices such as joining a popular site early, crafting one’s channel page to showcase technical ability, exercising command over interactive aspects of online spaces, espousing techno-cultural values such as being self-taught, and displaying self-perceptions of technical identities in words and images. Each performance is a proposal of identity expression that may be ratified or challenged by viewers, commenters, and other video makers.
Girls participated in visible online communities as part of their public identity construction. While their experiences were by no means always positive, they participated in ways that were beneficial to the construction of their identities and also developed valuable technical and social literacies. Further, Lange and Ito claim, “the ability of digital networked media to create new publics and audiences for amateur work is one of the most transformative dimensions of contemporary new media” (2010, p. 284).
The benefits of online sharing and participation have been well documented through studies such as those reported in Lange 2014, Jenkins 2006, Burgess and Green 2009, and Ito et al. 2010. As Lange writes (2014, p. 9), “[On YouTube] kids are exhibiting an awareness that they must have the skills to use new technical tools in order to self-actualize and achieve visible personhood among heterogeneous, networked publics.” Scholars espouse the benefits of participating in networked publics which include fostering and leveraging civic identities (Bennett, Freelon, and Wells 2011; Raynes-Goldie and Walker 2008), collaborative peer learning (Ito et al. 2010), networking with others who share a common interest (Burgess and Green 2009), spaces for creative production (Lange 2014; Light, Griffiths, and Lincoln 2012), and the acquisition of cultural capital (Brader and Luke 2013). And participatory amateur culture and commercialized corporate culture are increasingly functioning alongside one another, insofar as amateur creators can capitalize on their participation as part of a hybrid participatory and commercial system (Burgess and Green 2009; Jenkins, Ford, and Green 2013). One example is YouTube Partners, which pays amateurs to incorporate advertising into their videos. The potential benefits of uploading creative media to YouTube are personal, educational, and economic.
In all the examples cited above, young people are actively learning, creating, and investing time in spaces that are structured around their vested interest in a particular form of media and popular culture. They are not merely creating media; they are doing so in collaborative, supportive, and visible spaces. Creating media and playing with popular texts h
ave value in and of itself, but there is additional value in learning how to publicly participate in creative online spaces such as YouTube, Flickr, and Tumblr. Analyses of these modes of participation often include a description of the literacies young people develop through such practices. Yet there tends to be less focus on the literacies and dispositions that are necessary for participation in the first place. Notably, all of the aforementioned scholars pay attention to the discrepancies of participation and are concerned with unequal modes of engagement and the inequity of opportunity (i.e., the participation gap). What I am exploring is not a departure from earlier research, but rather echoes the concerns of other media scholars. However, I expand the lens of analysis from what students learn via participation in an online media culture, to a more explicit exploration of the literacies (or lack thereof) and dispositions that preclude some young people from participating in meaningful and visible ways.
An important caveat: I want to be cautious not to imply that all young people and all media makers must visibly share their creative productions online, nor do I want to reify a hierarchy of participation. Online participation is sometimes visually represented as a pyramid of different levels of engagement. At the bottom are the lurkers or observers who are constructed as passive consumers of information. In the middle are the collaborators, those who share, critique, and curate information. At the top are media creators, who are viewed as the most valuable participants (Horowitz 2006). This hierarchical model leads to statements that suggest that majority of the web is comprised of lurkers and only a small percentage of people are active creators (Khuffash 2014). There are several problems with this model. First, Ito et al. (2010) specifically describe “genres of participation” as a way to draw attention to individuals’ practices rather than categories of people. A genres approach acknowledges that participation varies across different platforms and that at different times individuals move in and out of these different forms of engagement. It also takes into consideration the motivations for practices, including peripheral participation. Someone may actively contribute to Wikipedia during a presidential-election year, and then stop after the election. Likewise, someone may leave a lot of comments on a private Facebook account, but not do so on a publicly accessible Instagram account. These two simple examples highlight how practices fluctuate. Accounting for differentiations of practices disrupts the static hierarchal categorizations and instead emphasizes the “ecology of interactions between different participants” (Jenkins, Ford, and Green 2013, p. 157). Additionally, Jenkins, Ford, and Green challenge the normative assumption that lurking is passive or inconsequential:
A “lurker” provides value to people sharing commentary or producing multimedia content by expanding the audience and potentially motivating their work, while critics and curators generate value for those who are creating material and perhaps for one another. … Research suggests that people initially learn through “lurking” or observing the margins, certain basic activities may represent stepping-stones toward greater engagement, and that key individuals help motivate others’ advancement. (ibid., pp. 157–158)
Here Jenkins et al. draw from Lave and Wenger’s (1991) influential argument that “legitimate peripheral participation” is a significant aspect of learning, questioning, and self-reflectivity. Peripheral forms of participation provide newcomers with an opportunity to familiarize themselves with the social norms of a particular space. Rheingold (2012) reasons that one crucial aspect of digital literacy is “netiquette”—that is, learning how to pay attention to and understand the norms of online communities. This involves lurking (observing) in order to get a better sense of how a particular online community interacts. Rheingold advises that newcomers jump in when they are able to add value; this benefits the community and the reputation of the newcomer.
This chapter is based on a normative evidenced-based assumption that intentional and visible participation in online communities is valuable, and in it I make a case that young people miss out on opportunities when they do not share their media creations in safe networked publics. Yet I am specifically addressing this question within the context of creative media makers who have expressed a desire to pursue a career in the creative media industries. I do not want to dismiss the ways teens participate peripherally, but during my time at Freeway High I was struck by students’ reluctance to share their own creative media content. The question of why thousands of young people choose to perform and express identities online in visible ways while other students—with similar creative interest-driven mediated passions—choose not to do so warrants further investigation. As this chapter demonstrates, the answers are complex, and there probably are many factors that influence decisions and practices; however, I focus on the barriers that hinder the development of literacies. Young people must develop the appropriate digital literacies to safely navigate online networks and positively join online participatory media cultures. Furthermore, schools have unique opportunities and an obligation to help young people navigate networks and online participatory spaces. Yet, as was addressed in chapters 1 and 2, historical fears and harm-driven policies that reinforced expectations of risk limited Freeway High from playing a more active role in the development of students’ digital literacies. The remainder of this chapter explores the contours of the participation gap in order to understand the barriers that prevent some students from sharing their creative media projects in socially networked publics and the conditions that would enable them to do so.
Barriers to Sharing Creative Media in Networked Publics
Some students at the school shared their projects online, and some even hosted their own YouTube and Vimeo channels, yet most of the club participants had never thought about sharing their creative content or were afraid to share it online. Explanations varied, but there was a common theme running throughout many of the reasons: that of fear and disempowerment. More specifically, the three barriers that predominantly inhibited students from sharing their creative media in socially networked publics can be summed up as fear that their content or ideas would be stolen, fear of unwanted criticism or fear that their production was not professional enough to share, and lack of time and payoff. The three barriers are reflective of harm-driven expectations and fears that overlook the benefits of taking risks. Their concerns were legitimate and valid, yet all three fears can be countered with the development of more nuanced digital literacies—literacies that empower young people to exercise agency while safely navigating safe learning communities.
“What if someone steals it?”
Selena—an artist, a writer, and a musician—kept several notepads full of her sketches and writings, and enjoyed playing the keyboard at home. She also enjoyed hanging out with friends in the Digital Media Club after school, because her family did not have access to the Internet at home. She had a pay-as-you go mobile plan that was not a reliable source of Internet access. Her favorite websites were Tumblr and DeviantArt2; she spent hours perusing those sites to find inspiration for her own art. Through participation in the club, she had recently started playing with Photoshop as a way to edit her photos and “make them weird”—something she had seen on Tumblr and had discovered she really liked. Despite the fact that she took a lot of pride in her art, which she often shared with me during our meetings, she had never shared anything on Tumblr or DeviantArt. When I asked her why she had not done so, she explained that she was afraid that people would steal her creations and claim them as their own.
Gabriela expressed her creativity in many ways, including writing, photography, and graphic design. She spent hours every week finding inspiration for her photography online. Tumblr was her favorite site because she liked the way people edited and “played with” images. She also liked browsing Flickr and Google Images for ideas and inspiration. She kept a collection of digital photos in a folder on her personal laptop, which her parents had bought her to aid in homework and school projects. At the time of the study, Gabriela was learning how
to use the new camera that her photographer uncle had given her as a birthday present. In her Tech Apps course at Freeway High, she was learning how to use Photoshop to edit and manipulate her photos. Occasionally she printed out some of her favorite shots and added them to the collection on the wall beside her bed. Gabriela was an active and regular Facebook user, and from time to time she created photo albums of her projects on Facebook. However, she kept these private and used them more as a personal archive and repository for her photos than as a way to share her photos with peers or family members. Every now and then Gabriela shared them with a few close friends or her uncle, but expressed an overall desire to primarily keep them private.
Q:
Would you ever share your photos or anything like that?
Gabriela:
No.
Q:
No. How come?
Worried About the Wrong Things Page 24