Final Reflections - Jason Peterson

My self-directed learning

The learning section of this semester occasionally felt like trying to drink from a fire hose; whatever happened to stick really well were generally the things that I felt were most significant. The activities/research I embarked upon that held the most import as far as understanding the historical periods better were watching the Nazi propaganda film Triumph of the Will, and studying Wealth of Nations & the Communist Manifesto.

Triumph of the Will was critical, as everything I see and hear about WW2 has always been from an American/Allies point of view. It is often easy to dehumanize or devalue the experience of the "others," especially in this situation when they are universally condemned as being morally wrong along with having lost the war. This film opened my eyes to how a whole other side of human experience is often hiding behind the schemas of my ethnocentric mind.

Final Reflections: Spencer Marks

My self-directed learning:
I loved the format of this part of the class. I enjoyed being able to learn in whatever way we pleased, and felt this greatly enhanced the learning experience. By far, my favorite activity that I did was looking at and handling the Wycliffe Bible in the Special Collections section of the library. I felt like I was turning history in my hands! I also enjoyed being able to look through different, more modern books on the subjects, as well as a movie I watched about Martin Luther. I really appreciate the Luther movie because it made Luther seem so much more real. It used a real quote from him in the beginning and ending scenes, where he is an old man at the end of his life, and where he talks about how the world hates him for doing what is right. He seems very tired and broken down, and I never really thought of him being like that, but it makes sense! He spends his life fighting an institution that controls most of the known world, and which was once an integral part of his life, of course it's going to take a toll! To me, it helped cement his heroic role in my mind, because he really did give everything for God.

My Evolving Project:
My project definitely changed over the course of the semester. I started by looking at critical information consumption, but when I looked at the class, I found that between Jordan Argyle and Eli Hainsworth, everything I'd said was basically covered, so I switched to crowd-funding. The collaboration group that I was part of then had some issues trying to lay down exactly what our central claim was, but then we realized that in a world where many people focus on the disadvantages and the problems which arise from the digital age, we were talking about the great new opportunities and abilities which it gives us. We had this realization as we were watching one of the prototype group movies of the group that was arguing on all the negative effects technology is having on our society. Besides giving us a claim to work with, this actually helped me be a lot more positive in my outlook on technology, and gave me a new paradigm to view it with, not just as something to be watched and guarded against, but as a tool to be used to accomplish grand, previously impossible things.

Communication and History:
Communication is an integral part of history. It not only has a critical role in the events, attitudes, and ideas that make up what we think of as "history", but it also defines the creation of history itself, as we create documentaries, books, articles, and more. We define as "prehistoric" the times before recorded communication existed, and in this way, tacitly accept history as implicitly connected with communication.
Communication shapes events and thinking because it is, in essence, how human beings connect with and affect each other. Ideas like religion, freedom, war and peace are spread and affect the lives of all of us, and this very spread is communication. Peoples opinions on what should be done are shaped in this way, and the people then shape the world around them.
New methods of communication allow people to spread ideas further and more effectively than before. Protestantism would have been dead without the printing press, freedom behind the iron curtain was greatly supported by the radio, and cat videos would have never caught on without youtube. History is then our record, and our stories, about how these things changed the world.
To be honest, entire books could and probably have been written about the interchange between communication and history, but in the end, it can be seen that history and communication are inseparably intertwined. History is how we communicate the stories that happened, which were often caused, affected, or stifled by communication.

Final Reflections: Jolene Kirk

Hi, My name is Jolene. These are my thoughts and experiences with my Rhetoric and Civilizations class. Below you will read about my self-directed learning, my project, and my thoughts on the importance of communication. 

Final Reflections: Katelyn Dalton

My Self-Directed Learning

With this semester's self-directed learning program, I was able to develop research skills beyond my previous capacity. Perhaps this was because my studies were more intentional. After the lecture on "Industrialization and Imagination", in which Dr. Burton mentioned that the Romantic period of the arts was a response to the ideologies expressed in the early 1900's, I decided to explore music from this period. The years 1750-1900 showed an explosion of ideas regarding individuals, governments, and technology. The music produced during this time definitely demonstrated this; for example, it was during this time that it became very popular for musicians to go "freelance" and live the "bohemian lifestyle"; a major change from their previous lives of servitude. This way of living resulted in financially struggling musicians--but musicians who could write the way they wanted. To study, I decided to listen to a 45 minute symphony by Hector Berlioz, entitled "Symphonie Fantastique". This piece was considered very radical for the era, and featured a larger ensemble and a larger sound than had ever been used before.

Later on in class, we learned about the 21st century and the Digital Age (a launching point for our final project). While I've never been hugely interested in economics, the "long tail" concept interested me. I did some research and found the website of the guy who created this theory. The Long Tail theory essentially explains "niche" culture. Because production and storage costs are going down (since we do so much of our business online), it can now be economically efficient to cater to a wide variety of niches instead of just selling one thing catered to the masses. This concept alone helped me to better understand the demands of the digital age: individualism and identity.

My Evolving Project

My project definitely started out in the theme of identity, but I was surprised by how much it evolved (and how much my opinions changed) within this topic. My first iteration argued that the connections facilitated by our online identities was actually driving wedges between cultures and societies. While I ended up moving in a different direction, Mitchell Cottrell, a member of my group, ended up having a similar perspective which he developed here.

My project unfolded as I sought out social proof and tried to answer the questions posed by my classmates. Jolene Hammond, a member of my class and group project, mentioned that when we are online, we tend to be a different version of ourselves. This caused me to start thinking about how our online identities differ from our "real" identities. After my second project iteration, Adrian Foong commented with an extremely pertinent question: "does it matter how I live my personal life if I give 100% in my professional life?" Keeping this question in the back of my mind helped me to develop a major component of my final personal project, where I argue that it is completely ethical for employers to review the social media profiles of potential employees.

Once we were put into groups for our final project, I was able to see what facets of identity other members of the group would be focusing on so that I could specialize my topic. Our group project changed drastically inbetween iterations. While our first group post was centered around a video we made detailing the digital presence of our professor, our final project had a personal video that applied to a wider audience, as well as concise "hooks" for each of our personal projects.

Communication and History

I would argue that communication can define society, as as such, methods of communication demarcates cultures and generations. Whether it's the printing press that came about it the 1400's, allowing Martin Luther to more broadly disseminate his 95 theses, or the coffeehouses and salons of the 1700's that allowed the Republic of Letters to function, or the text messages and social media platforms of today that allow major news items to be announced in 140 characters or less, the way we communicate causes social progress.

Whether we like it or not, history is cyclical. In the words of Edmund Burke, "Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it". By studying many eras of civilization so quickly this semester, I was able to make more connections between them and see those patterns. Perhaps most importantly, this allowed me to make connections between past eras and the current time. For example, new forms of communication always causes unrest. People resist change. It happened when the transition between illuminated manuscripts and the printing press was being made. People were uncomfortable with this new method, so printers tried to print books to look like illuminated manuscripts. However, the potential of the printing press was eventually unleashed. Because I know this pattern of the past, it doesn't surprise me when society gets stuck on the PDF file and struggles to move on to more interactive forms of text documents. I know that the potential will eventually be discovered.

The way we communicate now will determine the amount and type of social progress that will be made. The sooner we can find a balance between sticking with what we know works and being flexible with change, the sooner and more efficiently we will be able to progress.

Final Reflections: Kotahi Tarawhiti

My self directed Learning:

I think this project really helped me wrap my thoughts around feelings I already had toward the digital age. My self-directed learning really started to take off when I would leave class ready to apply the different things that we discussed in our first groups. My group was great at helping me recognize holes in my thesis, and we’d discuss where to look for greater information. A lot of my resources for learning came from books and online sources, but the greatest validation of my thesis really being a modern day issue came from talking with my family.

I discovered a love for books when doing my self-directed learning, and specifically fell in love with reading about the renaissance and enlightenment periods. Boorstin helped me gain a good understanding of a few points, but I loved imagining myself in the time period when I read the script of Hamlet and poetry from Shakespeare. I found that the most helpful online sources came in video form. BBC had wonderful documentaries, and they were extremely helpful because they had access to places and resources that were directly from those different time periods.

My favorite documentary was about the Industrialization revolution. The researcher literally walked through the streets of Europe explaining at what time and place specific events occurred that were essential to the revolution… like water powered factories! This really catered to my needs as a visual learner.

One of the greatest benefits of being in control of what I studied outside of class, was that I could study according to my needs and desires. This project especially helped me become an agent to act and gain experience in my own unique way.

My Evolving Project:

I knew that there were a lot of issues debated about social media, but I wanted a unique angle. I went home most Sundays out of the semester and I started noticing how my family was pretty addicted to social media. I tried talking with them, but it seemed pretty difficult to have a worthwhile conversation. Upon realizing this, I discovered what my angle could be for my argument.

I decided to focus my research on how identity is affected because of the pressures of Social Media. As I talked more with people I was close with, and those I wasn’t so close with, I started to recognize that what we like, share and follow through social media can totally mold us into false identities. When I was in my first group, I really enjoyed Michael’s posts concerning the inequality between women and men in the media. His thoughts really helped solidify what I was trying to help others understand about the molding of identity.

My personal project grew as I discussed my ideas within my “identity” group. Katelyn Dalton’s argument was centered on the perception of identity through social media, which is the very reason why I feel it’s important that we as humans must gain experience outside of social media in order to properly mold who we are.

As my argument began to take form, I realized that the best way to express it would be through modern slang. I used words and phrases familiar to “millennials”, in hopes that it would affect the younger crowd the most. My argument moved from being a logical explanation, and more towards being a call to action.

Communication and History:

The more I’ve studied about the importance of individual identity in this digital age, the more I’ve realized how essential good communication is to molding a strong identity. From my first rhetoric and civilization class to now, we’ve discussed some of the greatest minds in the world and how they’ve communicated their ideas and concepts to the world. Not just what they’ve shared, but also how they have shared it, and I believe it has catapulted the way in which we think and progress in this modern age.

Not all communication throughout history has been perfect, but communication and the mediums in which it has been conveyed through time, has given people the opportunity to unleash their thoughts on the world. The creation of books and letters allowed ideas to be spread to all different countries at an early age. Now we live in a time where communicating ideas and opinions can happen at the click of a button.

After studying communication and the affect it has had on society throughout history, I wonder if in the next few decades we will start to “Ad Fontes”, or try going back to communicating with less technology. Social Media and other forms of mass distribution have been a great tool in the progression of the world, but I also believe that it is taking away precious opportunities to solidify identity. All in all, communication is an essential aspect of building a strong society, but I believe that it can be stronger in our day if we were to maintain a balance of communication with and without technology.

Final Reflections: Alec Hammond

My self-directed learning
By choosing what and where to research, I gained a far more wholistic perspective of history. I was able to focus more on cause-effect relationships. Initially, like many of my peers, I was more interested in filling the requirements of my assignment than taking advantage of this unfamiliar freedom. I began by examining woodcuts and paintings at the MOA, reading primary sources, and looking at old maps.

As we shared our findings in our cohorts, however, I realized that the things that interested me were often the things that interested my peers on a more personal level. Tommy, for example, often talked about the power of nations during the Renaissance and Enlightenment, and would compare that power with the power corporations hold today. I decided to better use my time by exploring things that would resonate with me personally.

I revisited the MOA, spending time viewing one of my favorite artists: Norman Rockwell. Except this time, I paid closer attention to how he portrayed major global events. I got lucky and was able to follow some curators who were giving "private" tours to museum donors. I began watching documentaries on the space race, globalization, and today's digital era, all from different countries. It was interesting to see common themes emerge in different forms.

As I began making my learning more personal, I felt more invested and started connecting events from earlier periods to today. Essentially, it was this new lens through which I viewed history that helped sparked my interest in the relationship between tolerance and radicalism.

My evolving project
I found that by developing my topic in a group environment and socially proofing it along the way, I could refine it more easily. Driven by both my personal research and personal experiences, I wanted to know whether tolerance could actually promote radicalism. Ironically, the very issue I was exploring initially inhibited me from sharing my views through social media.

Thankfully, my group members were supportive, and Michael encouraged me to share my ideas. I received "social proof" from friends and family members who both agreed and disagreed with my claim. Through this exercise, I came to understand the power of a personal angle.

Integrating my topic into our "hub" project wasn't difficult at all. Chloe, Michael, and I were able to connect our ideas fairly quickly. Establishing a format, however, proved to be the most difficult issue. We tried a variety of visual techniques using animations and GIF's. There were no predetermined criteria, so we found ourselves experimenting after every iteration. Several other group videos were more personal and seemed to hold more weight.We too decided to feature a more personal look and filmed each of us in our final project.

Communication and history
Society describes the interactions and relationships between people. History is simply a record of these interactions from a given point of view. As such, the way society interacts and is recorded depends entirely upon the forms of communication available.

With new communication mediums come developments in both society and its history. Before the Gutenberg press, for example, society was dependent upon the few who could read. Precious information like trade routes, ancient Greek history, and even the Bible, was usually shared orally by this elite minority. After the press was developed, however, information began spreading at an unprecedented rate. Even more surprising, literacy improved. Society literally began to adapt to this new communication platform.

By studying the effects of the Gutenberg press on Renaissance society, I now understand that our own society has the potential of undergoing a "Gutenberg Revolution". The internet has made possible several new communication platforms, like social media, that essentially eliminate the feedback gap between individuals.

This new environment is redefining our social structure as we speak. We no longer have to rely on the "clerics" of the Dark Ages (professionals and specialists) to receive information. Crowdsourced projects backed by amateurs are putting valuable information into everyone's hands for free.

Giving everyone voice, however, also changes the way history is and was recorded. Now anyone can redefine exactly what happened at Jesus's birth with the click of a button. Current events are covered by so many sources and angles, its hard to get the "real" story. In short, both history and society will forever evolve as new forms of communication develop.

Final Reflections: Jackson Berg

My self-directed learning

The self-directed learning remains one of my favorite aspects of the class for me. Although not all students enjoyed the lack of strict requirements, I felt that it allowed me to explore topics that were actually interesting to  me, whilst still helping in-class learning. Much of the information I consumed came from books like Vindication of the Rights of Women and Napoleon: A  Life because that's what I love. The Right's of Women was written by a Mary Wollstonecraft a leading feminist leader in the 1800s. This book allowed me to tap into the leading arguments of the day on the rights of women, and what epistemology they used. Napoleon: A Life gave me a hindsight view of history and allowed me to understand the importance of religion and changing social classes in the French Revolution.  I also gained some useful knowledge from other media such as YouTube videos about famous enlightenment thinkers such as Voltaire and Thomas Paine. I even watched a Netflix mini series about Cyber Crime. By watching this mini series I gained valuable knowledge about how the digital age is being changed by the advances in cyber crime. Overall my self directed learning allowed me to see the topics we discussed through the lens of people who actually lived during that time. This  gave me a deeper understanding of the impact of history on our present day.

My Evolving Project

Where my project started and where it ended looks like the results of  a game of Telestrations, where the picture you draw at the beginning looks nothing like the final picture.This change in topics require changes along the way but really centered around one major pivot, switching from ending foreign aid to how social media builds real friendships. 

 My initial idea was to focus on why we should end governments giving foreign aid and instead give people the power to help others. This initial blog post was nothing more than a few rather quickly drawn note cards with a small amount of text. As I discussed this idea with my original cohort, Chloe Kent and Nathan Lambert,I realized that although this topic was currently relevant it didn't really have the personal angle that we discussed in class. One day in class we were discussing the excellent personal angle Alec Hammond's blog post it hit me; I should write about Quidditch!

As I thought about our discussions on social media and digital communication throughout the semester I quickly realized that social media and other digital tools were making new friendships possible. This went against popular opinion on the inherent evil of social media. My blog post A Case Study in Quidditch quickly became the most viewed blog on the class blog. I knew then that I had found a topic that could actually grab people's attention. I shared it on social media  and the response was similar. Through social media and in person discussion with friends and fellow Quidditch players I gained valuable insight on my argument and design, eventually leading to my final post Social Media is Building Real Friendships: A Case Study in Quidditch.  A much more polished post. 

Communication and History

Communication shapes the lens through which we view both the past and the present. The way we tell our stories and the stories of others through communication not only affects how our history books present history, it is also the driving force behind many of the most important events in human history. Communication has such a powerful effect because it allows people to spread ideas, both good and bad. These ideas lead people to take action from the liberating idea that all men are created equal of the American Revolution, to the demagoguery of politically leaders in the 2016 election. One was spread on parchment and the other through digital media but both shaped history. 

Studying history has given me a greater appreciation of the power of communication in our present day. The power of digital media on communication shouldn't be underestimated but as I studied the history of communication I gained a valuable insights about the effect of  communication. That insight is that we tend to think that every new form of sharing our ideas from the printing press, to social media will destroy the fabric of our society. This often happens as people focus in on the negative effects of each new form, and don't look at it from a bigger picture. Each change in communication effects our society but often the effect is more incremental than we think once we get past the initial adoption phase. 

A prime example of this is social media. There is no shortage of information about the evils of social media as it's rapid rise has changed much about how we talk to one another individually and as a society. As I reflected on the similarities to the reaction of society to the printing press I realized that what we are experiencing isn't quite as new as we thought. When we think of the printing press we now realize all the good that it did over the course of the last couple hundred years and I believe the same will be one day be true of social media. Just as our societies coped with the changes then, we will cope with and learn to better use social media and other forms of digital communication to spread world changing ideas. All we need to do is adjust. 

Final Reflections: Michael Trauntvein

My self-directed learning

I consider the first half of the course to have been the most important for me, academically.  During this time I learned the most as a result of the learning I conducted outside of class.  I studied several original works such as Martin Luther's 95 Theses, Sir Francis Bacon's Novum Organum, and newspaper articles about Jack the Ripper.  I enjoyed going to the sources for my learning instead of reading summaries online or in class - I felt that in this manner I learned more and was therefore more capable of valuing the works and the historical period in which they originated.  I typically began my studies on Wikipedia where short biographies and historical summaries helped me formulate an idea of the individual or concept in question, and then went more in-depth by looking at images, reading primary texts, and visiting scholarly websites to learn more and put it in context.  I did this with Martin Luther on January 7 and William Tyndale on January 9, as well as with Jack the Ripper on January 21-22.  Overall, I am please with what I learned, though I wish we had spent more time on the subjects.  I feel as though I attended a banquet, but was only able to enjoy the appetizer.  In my opinion, a mere month of personal study is not nearly enough to cover the last 500 years of world history.  

My evolving project

My project was born from my Midterm Exam follow-up post in which I talked about similarities between the pattern of events of the 20th Century and the 21st Century.  My topic began changing as a result of the cohesive group collaboration which developed about halfway through the project.  Instead of simply reporting on patterns that I had noticed, I tied the topic into that of communication.  As the class topic finally came to light, it became easier for me to continually rework my project to better align with it.  The final, and most helpful thing, was being able to work in a group with Nathan Lambert and Jonah Hainsworth in which we were able to formulate a single argument and apply it to our individual projects.  As the "Patterns of the Past" group project grew stronger, so did my individual project.  My group members had good suggestions for my project, which helped steer it in the direction that it needed to go.

Communication and History

Communication is a near-constant thing for humans - unless we are asleep or otherwise incapacitated, we are always communicating in some way or another.  Anthropologists agree that it was this vital step in evolution - advanced communication - which set homo sapiens ahead of all other animals.  From the earliest forms of oral communication, language was born, and thereby the ability to convey abstract concepts and ideas.  Written communication came next, and finally cellular and digital communication.  Communication in each of these aspects has played its part in shaping the history of mankind.  In fact, it can be said that history hinges on important communications. 

How does history hinge on communication?  A look at our world throughout the ages provides enough evidence.  I was intrigued when I noticed in my studies that events such as the Renaissance, the Protestant Reformation, the American revolution, and even the War on Terror all stemmed from documents of singular import.  The Renaissance from the rediscovery of the Letters of Cicero, the Protestant Reformation from the posting of the 95 Theses, the American Revolution from the Declaration of Independence, and the War on Terror from President Bush’s 2001 ”Speech to Joint Session of Congress”.  Studying these patterns of the past changes our understanding of how the contemporary world works, and how events today are shaped under similar circumstances.

World events are still shaped by communication, though the medium is rapidly shifting.  In lieu of any single great communication that captures the heart of a nation, we see a single Great Communication in which all people, everywhere, collaborate and correspond digitally.  Texts, tweets, and status updates now achieve the same results as the great documents of the past.  History-changing social reform, religious movements, and philosophical remarks now occur through this Great Communication that has spread throughout the globe – a trend which is unlikely to change until the next breakthrough in human communication.  No more are speeches and declarations written by great men necessary to affect change; all we need is a cell phone and a few million followers to say the same thing as us.

Final Reflections: Sarah Evans

My self-directed learning

To be quite honest, I was not extremely excited about the self-directed portion of this calss in the beginning of the semester, but I really did grow to like it and appreciate the freedom and flexibility we were given. I suppose at first I was just expecting to be told what to do, do it meeting the requirements, and then receive my deserved grade. All of this is pretty ironic since my final post ended up being about how this structure is contradictory to learning (more on that later!). IN the end however, I really began to take advantage of the self-directed learning. My favorite activity to do was to visit the special collections of the HBLL. I read the encyclopedia Britannica and a copy of Martin Luther’s original German Bible! I had no idea that these wonderful resources were available to us as students and I appreciate this class for informing me of that. What I appreciate more form this unit however was the work ethic involved. I learned that the more enthusiastic I got into a time period or concept, the more I learned from others as well. Jordan Argyle  and Katelyn Dalton always had creative ways to go about the self-directed learning and I appreciated his ideas. I saw that he put time into his learning and then was an eager participator in class discussions. I started to branch out a bit more after noticing this.

 My Evolving Project

I had no idea at the beginning of this unit how much my project would evolve! I started with really poorly drawn stick figures on index cards and ended up with a well-integrated and cohesive argument about literacy and education in the 21st century world. My first version  was basically a short  history of public education, with no real focus, drive, or personal commentary. Amanda DeBuse was the most helpful classmate in regards to commenting on my posts. She helped to shape them and make them follow more closely to the class guidelines. Originally, I was intending on being a part of the communication and collaboration group, arguing that both of these skills are critical for improving education. However, I was thrown for a loop when Dr. Burton put me in information and literacy. I was afraid I would have to start all over! But, Jordan, Jason, and Eli helped me to rework my revised blog post  to fit in with this category more cohesively. I eventually turned my  final blog post  into an argument that a critical aspect of 21^st century literacy is being able to reason with one another to reach new conclusions and possibilities and learning, a concept which I applied heavily to the classroom.  In the End, Jason, Eli, Jordan, and I were able to pull off a well-rounded and well-integrated thesis of how communication and dialectical thinking are critical tools required for avoiding harmful confirmation bias and sorting through the sea of information we are exposed to

Communication and History

Everyone has always said “history repeats itself!” I guess I have always believed this but never stopped to consider any concrete examples, or if this statement really is true. From this class I have been able to verify for myself that it is. In the first unit of class we spent about two months looking for patterns of one theme throughout a large time span. This helped me to see how our present day and the future are really just representations of what has happened in the past. We will always be seeking to acquire new knowledge, we will always want faster and better technology, our identities will always be in question, and there will always be a conflict between autonomy and control. But more importantly, this class (especially my group project) has taught me that we can change this pattern through communication! I think that Jason Peterson’s final post  is the most on point with this concept. He argues that as we engage in dialectical thinking or communicative reasoning, we will be able to avoid the problems of the past to improve future learning and open new doors of possibility.

This whole “change the world” idea seems like a hefty task, and people argue it can't be done. But this class has shown me that we, the rising generation, can be collaborative, we can work in groups, we can meet deadlines and expectations, and we can do hard things. It has taught me that we are up to the task! What is critical is that we do not forget what we learned this semester. We need to remember and apply it if we want a better world to live in tomorrow. 

Final Reflections: Michael Stevens

My Self-directed Learning

This past semester was my last as an undergraduate student at BYU. I'm graduating in less than a week and it's pretty surreal. I couldn't have asked for a better course to have been a part of my final undergrad semester because of the self-directed learning portion of this class. At first I played it safe, only venturing onto the internet to count as research time. Soon enough, however, I realized I had a unique opportunity to craft my own education in a profound way.

I first explored the BYU Museum of Art to look at 16th century woodcuts by Albrecht Dürer, showing the strong presence of religious authority all the way until the Enlightenment Era and the Industrial Revolution. On occasions I spent several hours in the BYU Store reading books, such as "Smithsonian's History of the World 1000 Objects," "A Very Short Introduction: Socialism," and "A History of the Twentieth Century in 100 Maps." 

Besides reading, I visited various galleries in the Special Collections section of the Harold B. Lee Library. The Rose Marie Reid gallery in particular taught me a great deal about women's rights, the topic I wrote my personal project on. I attribute in large part my initial interest to the topic of feminism, womanhood, and social change on my experience in this gallery. The process of going beyond what we would normally look at for the sake of education proved invaluable in this moment. If you want to learn more about what I did in my self-directed learning, click here.

Final Reflections: Adrian Foong

My Self-directed Learning

I really enjoyed the flexibility to learn up on what I found to be interesting, and relied heavily on online resources to complement the textbook. When I did branch out from Wikipedia and History.com articles, I watched a documentary on the Battle at Stalingrad. I found myself enjoying the documentary, even though I was merely doing it for homework. However, my favorite period that we studied is the 21st century. There is something really intriguing about studying the time period that we are currently living in. The meta aspect of trying to understand the trends and cultures of our present has really prompted me to rethink the world as we know it, and wonder if we ever differ in our method of changing and moving forward as humankind. For example, I’ve found that the themes of the era of enlightenment have resurfaced over and over again throughout the course of time.

My Evolving Project

My personal project began as a message of motivation to people who are trying to achieve great things but feel incapable of doing so. This stems from similar feelings I have about trying to stand out in a crowd of intelligent and talented individuals in college. The project began by focusing on the collaborative opportunities brought about by new technologies and the internet. Slowly, it morphed into the matter of amateurs and experts working together, to the power of amateurs versus that of the experts, where I claimed that amateurs can do as well as, if not better than, the experts. Tommy has given me tremendously helpful feedback on this debate, and has offered his thoughts on the other side in his posts.

As we formed groups, my topic changed to the power of people, as opposed to that of corporations and the government. Michael gave our team a really good comment about making sure that our audience cares about the topic on power and authority. As a response to this, I’ve tried to strengthen the personal angle on my posts and relate to the audience why I think it is important to know that individuals can make a difference in significant ways.

Communication and History

Whenever I think about communication, I recall the story of the Tower of Babel in the Bible. The grand scheme was foiled by the inability of the builders to communicate with each other. Where collaboration is required, communication is essential. In a team, team members communicate to relay information to other team members so that everyone working on the project are equally informed on their progress. With open communication, team members know what to work on, what roadblocks have to be removed and who to speak to for clarification on unclear information. While this is not obvious on a macro scale, societies work the same way. With information flowing freely, people know what progress is being made, what issues are at hand, and how to seek for more information if they need to. In fact, societies are built upon older societies. We have our ancestors to thank for recording the histories of peoples and nations using the media available to them, and now, to us.

Our study of history has opened my eyes to the importance of information, and how that information flows from one point to another. Had explorers like James Cook not record his mappings of his three voyages, seafarers would have had a much harder time navigating the seas. This communication – conveying of information – is crucial in the process of discovery and progress. Today, we hear a lot about the freedom of speech and censorship. This is a sensitive issue, but censorship is a form of obstructing the flow of information, and poses a threat to the progress of a society. This is perhaps closer to home if we observe communication within personal relationships and colleagues – when communication breaks down, the relationship breaks down as well. And so it is for a society.

Final Reflections: Amanda DeBuse

My Self-directed Learning

During the first half of the semester, I focused a lot on the evolution of the book through history, starting with early church fathers hand-writing books, and so on. I read a lot in "The Discoverers", mainly in part IV, where it talks about geography, mainly the invention of the map. I read part XIII in this book as well. I said in my learning log regarding this chapter, "I learned about the first mediums of what people wrote on ... and the section also talked about book printing and the size and type of font for the books, and how these made carrying small books convenient." This helped me see one of the beginning stages of the evolution of the books, before the church fathers wrote their books, and after, when the printing press was making font font size, and how that rose to further inventions for the book. I also read various Wikipedia articles about the Protestant Reformation, the Age of Enlightenment, knowledge, literacy, the various time periods we were studying, as well as articles about the actual evolution of the book, and its products, like E-books and iBooks. This helped shape my thinking about how people were living during these time periods, and what needed to happen in order for them to create each step in the evolution of the book, especially in the 20-21st centuries when more people found it convenient to read from a screen.

My Evolving Project

For my individual project, my first (main) argument was that book evolution creates a social divide because it was book evolution that first started this slew of digital media that is hurtng relationships. This was my first post, and Jackson pointed out in a comment that reading books enhances his relationships, so I decided to tweak my argument a little. I made it not so broad and said that this digital media that came from this book evolution is not hurting relationships, but is hurting society/civilization as a whole--civilization is hurt because relationships make up society. In a later reconstruction of my post, I followed Dr. Burton's advice and broke it down just a little more by saying that this is hurting communication as well, bringing it down to a very personal level. This idea of media hurting communication in civilization was brought into Laycee, Tailor's, and my group project. Laycee said that screens are creating a barrier between people, and Tailor said that people are losing their identity because of our digital modern culture. These all shape the main argument that technology and media is making communication and relationships deteriorate.

Communication and History

Communication is central to history and society because it is communication that makes a society, be it books, physically speaking to people, or digitally. It is central to history because it pretty much makes up our history since communication has changed and developed throughout the course of history. For example, like what I studied the majority of this semester, the evolution of the book was something that happened as history went on, and the medium of books was the way people communicated during their period of time. It is this history, this evolution of the book, technology, sciences, and so forth that changed my understanding of the contemporary world (today). This is because the things that were invented or started in history was a foundation of what we have now today--the written book in the 1600s was a foundation that needed to be there for today's digital media (and the book inventions in between), working in the fields was a foundation to factory work during the Industrial Revolution, which was a foundation to manual and business work now, the Scientific theory was the foundation of many scientific discoveries now, and so on. Our means of communication affect society in the past because, like it was already said, communication in the past spring-boarded communication in the future; the past gave us something to work off of. It affects society in the present because we are always finding different ways to communicate, be it new inventions, or new lingo. It is mainly digital communication that people use now in the present, and those new inventions will most likely be a digital product, and people would be using that new lingo on those devices. Communication will continuously change, no matter the medium, and in turn will change society because communication keeps society together.

Final Reflections: Nathan Ty Lambert

My Self-Directed Learning

My self-directed learning had the greatest impact upon my learning this semester. I tried to go to the BYU special collections every time that we had personal learning time to avoid the monotony of Youtube and Wikipedia. Reading, exploring, and researching the book Micrographia by Robert Hooke was the most rewarding of my researches. Learning about Micrographia launched me head first into the period of time called the Enlightenment. It helped me understand the main themes of the Enlightenment such as changing our frames of reference and collective collaboration. As a result of reading Micrographia I discovered the history behind the Royal Society and The Invisible College. I was able to relate the concepts and ideas that founded the Royal Society to businesses such as Apple or Google Inc. Second, reading The Communist Manifesto magnified my understanding of the ideologies of the 20^th century. It really changed my view on just seeing Communism as an inherent evil. I was able to supplement the reading with a documentary on Senator Joseph McCarthy. The 20^th century was full of clashing political ideologies that led to World War I, II, and the Cold War. I appreciate the 20^th century much more after reading and watching primary documents such as The Communist Manifesto and The Twilight Zone. In conclusion, I spread my self-directed learning out over many different avenues in order to gain the most knowledge about subjects that were intriguing to me.

My Evolving Project

I was very scared and confused when I finished reading the prompt for the final project. I did not understand how I was going to contribute to the final project or my personal one. I began with the concept of revolutionizing the United States of America’s healthcare system. I related it to the failure of the French Revolution and how sometimes there is too much change. I finished sketching my ideas on the index cards and published them in the “When is Change too Much?” blog post. Upon receiving comments from Jackson Berg, I realized that my topic would not be able to fit in the class theme of critical communication. I completely changed directions by writing about the lost generation of World War I and social media. I received many comments from Jolene and Kaitlyn that helped shape my final project. In addition, thanks to Jordan Argyle I realized that I should create an introductory video to my individual blog post.

            Our group project began on shaky ground as well. I was assigned to be in the Patterns of the Past group, which I feel did not really fit well with my individual project. We had many iterations of this project as time went on. At first the group wanted to produce a Moovly video, but decided that a more personal video would be more effective. The group video that we had posted was very primitive and took a lot of time to finish. We received very good feedback from Eli Hainsworth and from Professor Burton. We decided that we needed to add personal angles into our argument and video just as the group about Social Media and Digital Tools did. Lastly, we added the finishing touches with the sounds and pictures in order to produce our final product. This resulted in a much more effective and appealing video introduction.

Communication and History

Communication is central to society because it provides a means through which humans can interact. In order to form a civilized society it is necessary to have a form of communication. There has always been communication, but the mediums in which society communicates through change rapidly. The newest form of communication and interaction always make the headlines of human society. They are the crowning event of that century. When we define an era or century, we usually do it through the type of communication that was present during that era. Communication has shaped our history, thus molding our contemporary society. Understanding the different forms of communications in the past has led me to conceptualize communication in the present more effectively. The invention of the printing press revolutionized the way ideas were spread in the 13^th century. Communication became much quicker and more ideas were spread. This was very evident in the birth and evolution of The Invisible College. The Invisible College heavily utilized the fruits of the printing press as they published and spread their scientific ideas. Seven hundred years later a new form of communication was born which we know as the Internet. Humans could now communicate more rapidly than ever before. Institutions such as Apple Incorporated took advantage of the Internet to spread their ideas. Just as their predecessors, the new form of communication had aided them in becoming a world-renowned institution. In conclusion, the invention of the Internet completely shapes our current society, but also helps us understand the past better. As there are infinite ways to advance communication, there will always be infinite ways to revolutionize the world.