ASSIGNMENT DETAILS

Create a “mind map” (using whatever tool you please) for the concept of ‘media convergence’ that sets out, with examples, the 5 processes of convergence that Jenkins distinguishes. Then, in a <5-minute MAX video (try to go beyond the ‘talking head’ format) explain your mapping of these aspects of media convergence, and conclude with a thoughtful and well-justified account of what you think are some key educational implications of media convergence.

Production format

A (digital) mind map and a <5-minute video walkthrough explaining your mind map.

Click on the video below to view my assignment (see text below for full transcript).

Final Mind Map for Media Convergence

Transcript for the video:

ETEC 511 – Module 4 Notes: Media Convergence 

In this video, I will walk you through the mind map I created for my IP#4 on Media Convergence.

I’ll outline what media convergence is, how Henry Jenkins categorizes media convergence into 5 different processes, and its educational implications.

SO, WHAT IS MEDIA CONVERGENCE?

• Media convergence is where all media are blending into one.

• It is not a hypothetical black box, but instead an ongoing process that changes how media is both consumed and produced.

• But what’s happening is that we’re living in this diverse media world, where media consumption is making users participants that engage with different forms of media, often at the same time.

• Media is all around us and we’re developing new skills to manage all this information.

• There is the coming together of these previously separate technologies that are now sharing tasks and created this place where media, industries, content, and audiences intersect.

 
JENKINS’ 5 PROCESSES OF MEDIA CONVERGENCE

• Jenkins states that when we talk about media convergence, we’re usually referring to 5 processes

1. Technological Convergence

   • Technological convergence is the digitization and integration of many forms of media into one ecosystem

   • We expand these relationships between digital media and enable them to flow across platforms allowing different kinds of technology to merge.

   • EXAMPLES ARE

     • Smartphones, IoT, smart home technology, wearable devices, AR/VR, cloud computing, autonomous vehicles, e-books, gaming consoles

   • So phones are no longer just for making phone calls, and video game consoles aren’t just for playing video games – we can use smartphones to play video games, and also watch shows, access the internet, text friends, and more; and we can use video game consoles for gaming, social media, or streaming services.

2. Economic Convergence

   • Economic convergence is when companies control entertainment franchises across multiple forms of media; or, as Jenkins describes, the horizontal integration of the entertainment industry

   • It involves the financial and business aspects of integrating different media types.

   • EXAMPLES

     • Broadcast tv (Fox), cable tv (Nat Geo), digital advertising, subscription models, news papers now online news companies  (NYP, WSJ)

3. Social or Organic Convergence

   • Social or organic convergence is when people multitask and integrate technology across many platforms.

   • It reflects how individuals blend and share media content in everyday communication.

   • EXAMPLES

     • Watching netflix on a tv, texting friends on an iphone, writing a paper on a laptop

4. Cultural Convergence

   • Cultural convergence is where culture is merged with many forms of media through participatory culture and storytelling.

   • Anyone with access to the internet can use the affordances of different types of media to tell stories or engage with other people’s content by commenting, sharing, etc

   • EXAMPLES

     • Books becoming TV shows or movies; fan communities creating fan fiction, art, videos; remix culture where existing content is recombined and repurposed; globalization or pop culture through the spread of music, movies, and TV across borders; interactive museum exhibits combining traditional artifacts with digital technology for immersive experiences (ChatGPT)

5. Global Convergence 

   • How media is interconnected around the world and when geographically distant cultures are able to influence one another

   • Can have its advantages but could also just perpetuate the dominating structures at the centre of the system

   • EXAMPLES

     • Social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok), streaming services (Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+; access content anytime, anywhere, any device with internet access)), global news networks (CNN, BBC, Al Jazeera English – 24 hour worldwide news coverage), digital journalism (Huffington post, Buzzfeed, The Guardian), Global advertising campaigns (Google ads, Facebook ads – allows advertisers to target specific demographic groups and geographic regions with personalized ads), viral content and memes (transcending language and geographic barriers – on TikTok, Reddit, other social media platforms), cultural influences and trends (Hollywood movies, K-pop, etc)

So, Let the DIGITAL RENAISSANCE begin…

• Jenkins argues that these forms of media convergence are leading us toward a digital renaissance – a period of transformation that will affect all aspects of our lives.

• And that a new cultural order is going to emerge, for better or worse.

• We’re still unsure how these different types of convergence will affect society and individuals, including the educational impacts.

• The POSITIVE educational implications include

  • Having better access to information (there are no longer gatekeepers of information);

  • Being more cost effective to access information (no more expensive university tuition);

  • We are likely to see more innovation and diversification of content;

  • And that this content can be personalized to the learner.

• However, there are NEGATIVE implications to education that may happen such as

  • Having information overload;

  • It creating an even further digital divide with learners;

  • And the homogenization of information as powerful companies have monopolized media platforms

I guess we’ll see how it all unfolds as media convergence as we experience this digital renaissance together.

Thanks for watching!
/ end of transcript

References:

Jenkins, H. (2001, June 1). Convergence? I diverge. MIT Technology Review.

OpenAI. (2023). ChatGPT (Mar 14 version) [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com/chat

University of Minnesota. (2016). Understanding Media and Culture: 1.4 Convergence. https://open.lib.umn.edu/mediaandculture/chapter/1-4-convergence/

Disclaimer: Some of the formatting is not standard for APA formatting due to the restorations of the webpage format.

Global Health and Its Impact on Education

The COVID-19 global pandemic was a reminder that global health directly affects global education. When we refer to global health, we should ensure we include humans, as well as animals, plants, and the environment and the interrelationship of all of these elements.

Investing in education can contribute to improved overall global health because they are both interconnected in several ways. Education can impact global health positively as advancements in research, new treatments, vaccines, and health care can help improve the health quality of our communities. Education can be useful to prevent people contracting infectious diseases, expand their knowledge of nutrition, and provide resources to access adequate health care. Education, including but not limited to educational institutions, can be used to prevent some diseases or expand our knowledge of health issues such as nutrition, hygiene, and reproductive health. Global economics are affected because of the increased health care costs around illnesses, sometimes causing families to suffer financially or make sacrifices such as school or job absenteeism, or dropping out of school to contribute financially or to care for sick family members. Global health affects the quality of education because it impacts the cognitive development and academic performance of students; if basic nutritional and health needs are not being met, students will struggle to learn. It can also affect students and teachers who do not want to return to in-person learning as they would be putting themselves at risk for infections. Global health also disproportionately affects marginalized communities, including Indigenous communities and women causing even more detrimental health disparities (OpenAI, 2023).

It is undeniable that the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted education, at least our traditional view of what education is. Children were at home with caregivers while educators attempted to adapt to provide continuity of learning. Interestingly, the COVID-19 pandemic brought to light assumptions and biases about what “education” actually is, exposed those who were unwilling to adapt, and highlighted “many pre-existing poor teaching practices (Czerniewicz et al. 2020, as cited in Boys, 2021, p. 17).

Prior to the pandemic, an assumption about effective education was that learning could only happen in-person, face-to-face, even when there was research that concluded otherwise (Boys, 2021, p. 19). It also highlighted what constitutes evidence of learning, who gets noticed, who has “preferred character traits”, and who is “invisible” (Boys, 2021, p. 19). It also highlighted assumptions on who is valued and deserving of education, leaving certain genders, race, classes, abilities, or sexualities seen as inferior and therefore excluded or “misfitting” for education (Boys, 2021, p. 18). Examples of this would be children of different abilities excluded from the traditional classroom setting or if a school is an unsafe space for students who are gender expansive. This highlighted the need for developing new, innovative, and equitable learning for all as we lived through a global pandemic together. Researchers and educators realized that there were problems with how education has been traditionally carried out and alliances such as COVIDEA have been created post-pandemic because they believe digital tools and resources should be easily accessed by all to help transform our education system. We have moved beyond seeing education as an intellectual process and are moving towards a holistic, interconnected view between humans, non-humans, and the global environment around us as well as elements that promote collective well-being such as character education, judgement, resilience, social awareness, responsible and active citizenship (COVIDEA, 2020; Ewart, 2024).

Lessons we learned from the pandemic included how education children received when they were at home was inadequate, math achievement scores suffered, educators were not held accountable for their students’ learning outcomes, and the mental and physical health of educators and students suffered since people were working in isolation (Kuhfeld et al., 2020; Bennette, 2020). Unfortunately, since administrators had not been through his before, there was no unified plan on what the expectations from either students or educators were and therefore students were not incentivized to continue learning when marking practices were removed. The most disheartening issue illuminated was that the “digital divide” was more obvious than in the past and it was the lower income communities without access to internet, technology, or the means to help children at home struggled most (Burgess et al., 2020; Bennette, 2020). Additionally, it challenged underlying assumptions that that online education is “inherently inferior to face to face” (Boys, 2021, p. 16).

The COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2020 is still affecting our health and education systems and probably will for years to come and is providing a “new foundation” on which educational technology is being built. The pandemic highlighted the interconnectedness of global health and how a pandemic affects and influences our education systems at all levels – from early to higher education. It shone a light on what was already happening in education – for better or worse. It challenged assumptions of what “education” is and that it does not have to be in-person. Some programs and universities, such as the UBC MET program, were already effectively using technology as a tool for education pre-pandemic and utilized the affordances of technology for learning. With more research being done post-pandemic and realizing where education can be reformed and improved, we can make changes using an evidence-based approach and “suitable learning design” to teaching and learning (Boys, 2021, p. 27).

References

Bennette, P. W. (2020, July 20). The educational experience has been substandard for students during COVID-19. Policy Options.

Boys, J. (2021). Exploring inequalities in the social, spatial and material practices of teaching and learning in pandemic times. Postdigital Science and Education, 4(1), 13-32.

Burgess, S., & Sievertsen, H. H. (2020, April 1). Schools, skills, and learning: The impact of COVID-19 on education. Vox.

COVID Education Alliance (COVIDEA). (2020, October). COVID EDUCATION ALLIANCE (COVIDEA) Adapting education systems to a fast changing and increasingly digital world using relevant technologies and online resources. COVIDEA Primer.

Ewart, K. (2024). Global Health [Class handout]. WebCampus. https://canvas.ubc.ca/courses/130938/pages/global-health?module_item_id=6328308

Koplan, J. P., Bond, T. C., Merson, M. H., Reddy, K. S., Rodriguez, M. H., Sewankambo, N. K., Wasserheit, J. N., & Consortium of Universities for Global Health Executive Board. (2009). Towards a common definition of global health. The Lancet, 373(9679), 1993–1995.

Kuhfeld, M., Soland, J., Tarasawa, B., Johnson, A., Ruzek, E., & Lewis, K. (2020, December 3). How is COVID-19 affecting student learning? Question 2. Brown Center Chalkboard, Brookings.

OpenAI. (2023). ChatGPT (Mar 14 version) [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com/chat