I've really enjoyed the blog space approach in this course. Completing a weekly task is only half the fun. The rest comes from browsing through and engaging with other people's posts. The variety in our approaches and thoughts on the same assignment never fails to amaze and intrigue me, and I always close each window with my mind spinning with new ideas. For my linking assignment, I have selected posts that I found myself thinking about long after reading and commenting on them.
Link 1
For my first link, I went back to Laura Ulrich’s Week 2 post on the contents of our bag. The original can be viewed below.
Post Summary
Laura posted an enjoyably concise description of the items in her backpack for this one. The post begins with a wonderfully animated picture, and is followed by a point form breakdown of the items in her bag. Following that, she wrote a section on the text technologies in her bag, covering both digital and analogue technologies. A short reflection on what her bag represents about her with provided, with a picture of her from instagram to consider. Finally, she closed with a beautiful history of her bags over her lifetime with some musings on what an archaeologist may think about her and this current moment in history based on her current bag.
Reflection
Laura mentioned both multiliteracies and self-representation in her post in a way that really sparked ideas (and made me think of things I wish I had mentioned in my post). She wrote about her various literacies, and how they are displayed in her bag. What I really appreciated is that she reached beyond the traditional definition of literacy (the ability to read and write) into literacies of interest as well. By mentioning game literacies, she subtly nods at the fact that different hobbies/activites/social groups all have internal systems and cultures that one does in fact need to be literate in in order to be able to participate well.
“My inventory paints a picture of someone who [is] multiliterate: there is evidence of digital, visual, and game literacies. “
I loved the use of the word literacy in this context, and it also reminded me to use academic terminology more broadly to encapsulate the nuance and network of ideas we often come across within this MET program. Looking at her post, I would also conclude that her experiences and opinions were quite similar to mine. We both reflected on how the contents of our bag showed the range in our interests and abilities and how the collection of items strongly represented both our lives and the essence of our personality in some way. This is why the sentence below is something I resonated with deeply, and wished I had written in my own post for the week:
This all fits with how I present myself to the world. I like things to be aesthetic and functional, but even more I love it when everyday objects have a bit of character.
This aspect of literacies and self-representation in text and belongings then threaded through into some of the more creative aspects of Laura’s post. These artistic underpinnings were part of what made her posts one of the most memorable for me. She animated the image of her backpack contents in a way that made it feel alive, or as if she was guiding us through it. It made it interesting to look at for a longer period of time, as it cycled through the different groups of items that were highlighted, making it much more interactive than just a still image. It also gave insight into how she sees her bag, and what items she considers to belong together or stand apart. This literacy and knowledge of media was put to great use and really went a long way to enhance her post.
The second is that I just fell in love with the vinyl decals she had in her bag, and I enjoyed that she spoke about them in her description. Their bespoke nature and the fact she made them herself tied back to her comments about the bag being a reflection of who she was, and it was the type of creative self-expression I could relate to. I commented on this at the end of the post, and Laura replied with a link to a YouTube video she made in a previous course which teaches you how to make this type of vinyl decal on your own!
Inspired, I went along and made the two images below. They’re not vinyl decals, but they are sticker designs! I made these for the WhatsApp group profile picture for the 29 of us that got stranded during repatriation. We’ve become somewhat close-knit, with the WhatsApp group serving as our tool for socialisation whilst all “stuck” in quarantine rooms we’re not allowed to leave. They’re a bit too complex for the vinyl printing process Laura was so kind to share, but maybe I’ll have them printed into stickers one day anyway 🙂
