The challenges of the New Participatory Culture

When we spoke with teachers and after school programs, it was clear that they recognized that their students were interested in new forms of cultural production that are enabled by new media technologies and new forms of cultural distribution supported by the web. They knew that their students were fans, bloggers, and gamers. But they faced a number of issues: they had no standards by which to evaluate work produced in these new and emerging media; they didn’t know enough themselves to give good advice to student media makers; the students lacked role models to help them understand future opportunities in this space; and the students were facing ethical issues that their teachers and parents didn’t really understand.

Does this reminds anyone of teaching parents how to use the VCR? Except that learning how to tape something is a whole lot less significant for matters such as civic engagement or even entertainment, than learning how to use digital media, especially to produce culture. The awful state of academic education in its ability to teach us skills (social, technical, digital literacy) that will enable us to grow and develop in the new media, participatory culture environment is highlighted by Henry Jenkins, and he suggests what to do about it as well!