The Velveteen Rabbi has posted on the Bloggercon religion on the internet session.
Jeff Sharlett of The Revealer asked some thought-provoking questions that appear to get lost in weighty answers.
Most of us will never get near Harvard.
Nor will we dialogue with heavy hitters. Would we want to if they talk this way?
These participants are the epitome of linguistic fussiness.
(They talk fancy)
If you get that opportunity to go that’s great. And if you do, it’s decent of you to blog about it for the rest of us. Thanks.
We talked about blogging as essentially anti-authoritarian, and asked whether there’s a disjunction between hierarchical religious traditions and this anti-authoritarian online spirit. We talked about Hasidic Rebel, the only Hasidic blogger we knew of, and wondered aloud whether he stopped blogging because he got outed within his community. There was also some talk of Catholicism, which is also pretty authoritarian, and how/whether that fits with the rebellious spirit of the blogosphere.
(We bloggers are rebellious.
Church leaders don’t get that because they like structure.
So we don’t connect very well.
An Hasidic Jew -very observant sect got caught blogging by his peers. Hey, now, he and I could talk shunned!)
“The plural of anecdote is not data.” was tossed in by someone.
Okkaaayyy.
I have no idea what the heck that means.
When people start talking that way it would be time for me to shut up and let them.
I’m going to have to look up all those words and figure out how they fit together. I find the blogosphere facinating, and how we navigate our way in it, but this is a bit much.
What can religious blogs teach secular bloggers? Jay Rosen pointed out that we tend to assume the binarism of verified fact vs. opinion, and that secularism triumphs when we think hard facts trump lived experience/faith/opinion; maybe religion blogs, he suggested, will teach us not to categorize everything by that simple either/or. Dave Weinberger said he’s seen AKMA’s blog have a pacifying effect on flame wars. Do religious blogs have a particular tone? Are they necessarily pacifying? I said they might be, though so many Jewish blogs focus on Israel that they become fractious fast.
These guys sound like they put machines together and make social structures and don’t read many religious blogs. (Peace-makers within the god-blogs?)
Some of these dudes are paid to answer questions so it gives important.
This one is tougher to translate.
(blah blah
Maybe religious blogs can help us from categorizing things as either/or.
blah blah
Are we god-bloggers the type that can pour oil on the waters?
Nope.)
One commenter at the Velveteen Rabbi says:
…that a possible taxonomy of religious blogs (including conviction blogs, questioning or questing blogs, interpretive blogs, practice blogs, and boundary-exploring blogs…
Okkkaaay.
(we want cool new categories for god-blogs)
Do people actually talk this way in real life?
It is Harvard after all…. binarism of verified fact vs. opinion….taxonomy of religious blogs…(this is painful)
Those words are in the dictionary.
I guess the bigger the words, the smarter people look and the more you impress other people that use big words.
What cracks me up is that I don’t know real people or bloggers that talk this way.
Heck.
I’m just being essentially anti-authoritarian, too interpretive and boundary exploring.
I’ll stop now with the hope Jeff Sharlett will put this session into english for the rest of us.:^)
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Aw, c’mon, Bene Diction. You’re playing dumb. “The plural of anecdote is not data.” You know what that means. Plural: many. Anecdote: stories told by grandpas and bloggers, as in “There was this one time…” Data: hard facts. So whoever said that was saying that you can’t draw big conclusions about religion by reading a bunch of personal stories.
That’s just one example. The discussion took place at Harvard because that’s where Dave Winer got space. Included were professional thinkers like Jay Rosen, and brilliant bloggers who never went to college, and folks who like to write about their kitty cats.
The comment on “taxonomy” (which is a good word, and if you need to look it up — which I’m betting you actually don’t — then it’s time well-spent) was important. I think meant more than “cool” new names. What we learned is that there isn’t a whole lotta common ground between a blog maintained by someone who is VERY secure within a given faith and one that exists as a means for the blogger to just kind of roam around other faiths. The first kind espouses the truth; the second kind suggests that there is no “Truth.”
So if someone wants to think about religion blogs and what they do (and some people do want to think about those things, so let ‘em), it might help to reframe the question.
Lastly — anti-authoritarian? Gimme a break. You know what Velveteen is talking about.
I live and work next to academia, not inside it. I see the abuse of language all the time. I understand the foolishness of jargon. At the same time, I recognize that there is a use for “big words” sometimes, and that not all statements are made simpler by using simple words.
Take the example “blogging as essentially anti-authoritarian,” which you translate as “we bloggers are rebellious.” Both statements may be true, but they don’t mean the same thing. The distinction is small but important, and it’s hard to understand (for me, at least), which is why words DO matter. (I’d hope a blogger, of all people, would agree that words matter.) The first statement argues that there is something in the medium of blogging that is anti-authoritarian. That doesn’t mean the blogger is. What’s interesting, to me, is that so many aren’t anti-authoritarian or rebellious, that so many love and long for more authority, more tradition, more discipline. And yet by blogging, they keep challenging the powers that be, whether they want to or not.
Hope I haven’t further muddied the waters. I’m writing only because I’m a longtime fan of Bene Diction, and in big part because I know you as a good writer who doesn’t go for the easiest joke.
Hi Jeff:
taxomony:
1 : the study of the general principles of scientific classification : SYSTEMATICS
2 : CLASSIFICATION; especially : orderly classification of plants and animals according to their presumed natural relationships:^)
I liked Velveteen Rabbi’s post very much. Academic language to wade through or not, what did come though well was how interesting and diverse the session was and how much he took from it.
Realistically Jeff, I’m not knocking Harvard at all (yes, I am knocking academic language).
I think Bloggercon could be fun, millions of bloggers simply couldn’t afford the opportunity to sit face to face. Many are budgeting just to keep their computers running.:^)
I also think your session is timely and interesting to thousands of bloggers and readers.
A lot of bloggers who ‘write about their kitty cats’ have higher EQ’s than a lot of people with high IQ’s.
Blogs aren’t about brillance.
They are about passing information on to others, as you say, telling our stories, giving testimony to our lives.
If statements can’t be understood by the average reader or blogger,then what good are they?
We run the danger in blogging of using our own sub-language derived from the social-techical-mechanical of the net. That’s fine, but like academic language, internet/blogging language doesn’t need to be or remain inclusive or elusive.
Yes, I stand corrected on my translation of anti-authoritarian. Had just gotten off a discussion of sorts about obedience and aqueicence, I was a tad cranky and defensive.
Thanks for clarifying.
Blogs do challenge the powers that be, albeit different powers,and yes Jeff, words do matter.
I’m a human being that goes for the easiest joke sometimes. I can be quite dumb.
I was wrong. My apology.:^(
What I took from Velveteen Rabbi was something that needs to be celebrated - the diversity, the awareness that god-blogs speak to deep need, and do so in ways authority cannot.
I’d have enjoyed being in your discussion with those of different faiths, different stages of seeking.
We are more than ready for realistic ways to classify religious blogs. I happen to think re-classification from current portal categories is cool. “Cool” is reductionist, puerile and cheap, but works for me.
You didn’t muddy the waters, I’m pleased you came over and cleared them. I’m looking forward to seeing others observations and conclusions as well as yours. Thanks Jeff. Blog on!
I was there but my notes got trashed and I am trying to reconstruct it in my head. I’ve posted the raw notes from the library session which were the only ones that didn’t get lost. My laptop was misbehaving big time.
I hope that somewhere there is a transcript of the IRC of the sessions - this is where those of you all who couldn’t travel had a chance to attempt to interact. If I find said transcript I will attempt to reconstruct what I planned to say.
I will say that I noticed a very different set of paradigms on display from the various groups represented. That alone was worth the hassle to get there (and it was a hassle, believe me - even though it is only 80 miles from my home, I don’t do city driving/parking at all well).
I will say that bloggercon was definitely an ADD event.
I will try to get more stuff up about it.
Hi Alicia:
I’ve been over a few times to see what you had to say. Looking forward to it.Your truth with a capital T statement intrigued me, and it would be interesting to hear it contextualized. Blog on!