I saw the Social Network last night and I was very impressed. I do not want to turn this post into a review of the film, except that I will say I found the script hilarious, sharp and witty. The acting, especially Justin Timberlake, was natural and compelling, and the music by Trent Reznor was a perfect complement. It was not just background music, but at times felt like another character helping to move the plot and add tension. (I am actually listening to it now as I type this post.)
I know some people have criticized the movie for not having any positive female characters, and while I agree this is a valid criticism, I would like to state that while we may not agree or like to admit, the mind of the college man dwells in dark places, and most of our time in those caves is spent pondering one thing and one thing only- Women. I am sure there are balanced, well-intentioned, sensitive, young men out there, who do not spend every waking minute of their college life obsessing about women, but for most of us college is a time of great insecurity and is most often consumed by trying to find ways to be as close to the opposite sex as possible. The sexualized fantasies of the film may have been exaggerated and unrealistic, but the obsession was not.
But like I said in the beginning, this was not meant to be a review of the film. As I was watching the film, I couldn’t help but thing about how the Internet is changing the way we create and understand self, and more importantly how does this newly developed public self go about creating social groups and/or communities? How do we as adults who did not spend our schooling years making friends online, learn to understand this change and work with our students to understand the new phenomena?
One of my favorite lines of the film was when Timberlake’s character is at a party and says, “First we lived on farms, then we moved to cities, and now people live online.” While this idea may terrify some, or feel like hyperbole to others, I feel it is pretty close to the truth. While it may appear quaint and nostalgic to champion face-to-face interactions, please believe me I am an advocate of the organic as well as the digital, the reality, whether we like it or not, is that we spend a great part of our lives living online. I am not talking only about those of us who have embraced the social web, those of us with blogs, youtube channels, twitter and The Facebook, I am talking about your average person who Skypes friends, checks status updates and photos, and stays connected through the web. We are all slowly migrating from the cities to online.
For most adults, this living online has been a slow shift. We knew how to make friends, some of us better than others, before the Internet, and so transferring the ability to maintain relationships in “real” life, to life on the web has been a steady continuum. But how do kids these days deal with it? They are learning how to make friendships online as they learn how to do it face-to -ace. This is a fundamental shift in how we foster and maintain relationships and build communities.
It is important that we acknowledge the fact that sites like Facebook are where young people to go to be social. Many nervous administrators want to block social networking sites, like Facebook, but they must realize that this is where kids hang out. While this idea of hanging out on the cloud or in cyberspace feels strange to those of us who did not spend our time there as kids, we owe it to the students we teach to begin to understand the dynamics of online social life. We must begin to ask students what life is like on the web, so that we can help them understand the value in face-to-face relationships. On a more selfish level, it would behoove us to learn more about socializing online as many of these kids will be in charge of the world as we age, and it is always a good idea to understand how they operate. Teachers have a tendency to think that the way they did thins was better than the way they are being done now, so they are constantly trying to force students into the model they feel the most comfortable with. Social networks are here to stay, and we can pine for the good old days when life was private and people knew how to have conversations, but the reality is that those days are gone. We can help students understand the importance of face-to-face interactions, but not until we show them that their digital social rituals have value.
I think the film exposes some important areas for exploration. The main one being, why are we social at all? On the web or off. What is that pressing need that we have as humans that makes us want to fit in and be loved. To be accepted. It is easier for mature adults to look back at our teenage years and scoff at our juvenile behavior in middle or high school. Or to be embarrassed of the days when we considered joining a fraternity or a “Final Club” so that we could be cool and find a date. All of these activities, merely, highlight the need that people in general are insecure and looking to fill the gaps in their personalities with the acceptance of others. We want to be understood, accepted, and if we are lucky loved for who we are. The problem becomes how do we articulate who we are to others.
In the past before the Internet, we relied on what I think are more superficial indicators. For me, in middle school I was judged by how I dressed, which reflected my economic class status, by how I looked, and by the way I acted in class etc…None of which were remotely accurate to the person I was. Like most adolescents and young adults, I had a rough of idea of who I was, but most days even I was confused. So to be judged and evaluated on how I presented myself to the world seemed unfair. No one got me and I had no way of setting them straight.
I think this need to present ourselves as we create and recreate ourselves and change and grow is the central theme of both the movie The Social Network and social networks. Zuckerberg’s goal was to give people a place to stake claim and announce to the world who they are. He wanted to level the playing field. You could, by publicly sharing your profile, dictate to the world how to perceive you once and for all. You no longer had to be the quiet wallflower or the dense jock, if people could see the books you were reading or the music you listened to. Suddenly, you became much more multi-dimensional. Social networks allow us to create who we are much more accurately than non-digital life.
I think I may have more material that will fit into this post, so I will wrap up for now. In closing, I just want to point out that life has changed, is changing, we are in the middle of a very exciting time. The very nature of who we are and how we connect with others is in flux, but this change need not be terrifying. Yes, our children socialize in radically different ways than we did when we were kids, yes young people tend to stare at screens instead of at each others eyes, but we must keep in mind that behind every screen is another person, or two, or three. While staring at a phone and texting may appear anti-social to us, it is actually the most social of acts for them. We cannot ban or force kids to abandon a form of socialization simply because we don’t understand it or because it makes us feel uncomfortable. Make me think of a line I just read in John Spencer’s book Teaching Unmasked: Criticize the tools you use and use the tools you criticize. I for one am going to tack that up on my classroom walls and jump in feet first to help my kids find their voice, find their passion, and their confidence to build and maintain meaningful and mature relationships, both face-to face and online. You can choose to stand on the sidelines and fear the world as it comes at you, or you can choose to go with the flow and move forward.
I think this is a very nice post that brings up some great points. Perhaps the one think I would like to talk about and thank you for is understanding that blocking our generation away isn’t going to help us become any better. Just because adults didn’t do this when they were our age doesn’t mean that’s is wrong. Had their parents socialized the way they did? Yes true, the internet can be a dangerous place but whatever was done back then was probably dangerous on it’s own. I admit that at times facebook or social networks just become a race for who has a more social life, but I only started using facebook about 6 months ago and if anything I seem to be more involved in my friends lives then before. I admit that I spend a lot of time that could be spending studying for my biology test and so forth but still i don’t think that time is spend wasted.
Also, facebook is not my real life. Usually what happens on facebook stays there. If me and my friend have a huge conversation on facebook about something it’s usually forgotten when we are face to face as we shall talk about other matters. Also, if anything I have come closer to people I know though facebook. Constantly writing on each others walls asking about homework assignments and talking about tv shows i am connecting with people more and more than ever before.
Living in the lazy society we are in, facebook helps us in that way. For example. I saw on facebook that my friend had an event planed called “Desi day” to celebrate Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi culture by dressing up to school, wearing national dresses and having fun. Due to the fact it was on a Friday in the US, which is a school day off for me I made it on Thursday for my school. Now I have quite a few friends attending and on that day we will all dress up and celebrate the desi’s we are. If it had not been for facebook, I would not have even gotten the idea in the first place, and on top of that I would have not been able to make this event in my school. Would I want to go person to person telling them about this day I am planning in real life? Or was making an even on facebook and adding a few friends faster. It took me what 5 minutes and now as it spread though the social network we got a event planned that if anything will help bring us and our community together. What’s the harm in that?
So i have the same advice to people who don’t understand what my generation is going though. Just because you didn’t do it in your time, doesn’t mean it’s wrong. Look back and remember in your past, what you did, was that not radical, was that not dangerous? The world is changing and changing along with it is what’s best for us all.
To me the most interesting thing about that movie is the level of artistic sincerity everyone brought to it. It’s as deadly serious as “Citizen Kane” or “All the President’s Men” or any other celebrated movie based on loosely on fact.
That says to me that no matter how our relations change in the face of online communication, human beings will still be capable of the focus and intelligence to attempt to tackle the big questions. A semi-autistic teenager inventing Facebook just a few years ago has been made the subject of a very good, possibly great, movie, with resonating universal themes and classically tragic overtones. There is hope for the future, not just for how we interact online, but for great art. Maybe 10 years from now we won’t be watching 2-hour movies like this, but I definitely think our artistic expressions will be just as rich and relevant as ever.
Hi, my name is Matt Miller, I am a student at the University of South Alabama and have been required to comment on your post for Dr. Strange’s EDM 310 Class. I really liked the movie. I find it so amazing that some kids just like me could invent something used by so many people. I also liked the statement Timberlake’s character makes. It is definitely true, the development of our society, it makes you think, “What’s next?” The inventors become so rich so quickly, sort of like the internet changing quicker than anything we’ve ever seen before.
Great review for further reading:
When a human being becomes a set of data on a website like Facebook, he or she is reduced. Everything shrinks. Individual character. Friendships. Language. Sensibility. In a way it’s a transcendent experience: we lose our bodies, our messy feelings, our desires, our fears. It reminds me that those of us who turn in disgust from what we consider an overinflated liberal-bourgeois sense of self should be careful what we wish for: our denuded networked selves don’t look more free, they just look more owned.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2010/nov/25/generation-why/?pagination=false
My argument though is , why don’t help grow our online selves, instead of allowing sites like Facebook shrink us down to data.
Lot’s to think about.
“Criticize the tools you use and use the tools you criticize.”
I agree and do both. This is what bell hooks argues as well in Teaching to Transgress – that we need to engage, understand and critique the cultural production of those we teach/engage (regardless of our own issues with it). This is why I still have an account however many times I’ve reactivated and deactivated.
I just wish as many people who saw the Social Network read the California Ideology:
http://www.metamute.org/en/content/the_californian_ideology_0
I’ve never actually seen this movie, although it did seem very appealing to me. What I did find, however, was how many middle schoolers I heard talking about the movie. I didn’t grow up in the social media world, but I am slowly evolving into it being a huge part of my world. Dr. Strange’s EDM310 class has really brought me into the world of blogging. I don’t think that I had ever really been involved in the blogging world before this class. I hope to continue to learn how to incorperate social media into my life!
Carey Dekle
EDM310
Univesity of South Alabama
Jabiz,
One of the things that came into my mind while reading your post is actually something we Tweeted about last school year at some point — mistakes. The only part of social networking and social media I find frightening is the mistakes that students make that can now potentially follow them forever. A think it begs us to redefine how we look at an individual person — as a work in progress; not as a finished product. We need to make mistakes in order to learn and move ahead, and yet, it is these mistakes that students are beginning to be judged by very early in life. If I want to hide what I did at a high school party 20 years ago, it is quite simple — I don’t mention it. But now, students may still have photos of a high school error in judgment floating the Internet years later.
The solution? First, I am not one for sticking my head in the sand and saying, “Therefore, the Internet and social networks are bad and should be banned.” This won’t work anyway. An example of this, our IT Office banned Facebook Apps and be the next afternoon, the sophomore class had established a VPN to get around the block. Why bother blocking? It truly servers no purpose other than to give junior hackers a place to practice their arts. Instead, we need to educate students. Second, we need to completely re-think what growing means. We need to begin to allow for growth in students; we need to begin to allow for students to make mistakes and learn from them, without holding their future hostage. I’m not suggesting that anything goes, but we do need to remember we work with children and young adults who are in the process of maturing; they are not mature, yet. Furthermore, we also need to begin to allow ourselves as adults to make mistakes. Of course, some behaviors will never be condoned or completely “forgiven,” but we must open the door on some. A poorly phrased status update, a poorly chosen photo, nor a poorly chosen video should not be how we are totally judged as a human for the rest of our lives. Counsel your colleagues who use social networking poorly. Notice I didn’t say preach to them, I said counsel. Discuss the negative and positive impacts of social networking with your faculty and students. Counsel logical and sensible behavior; counsel posting items we can be proud of later. Teach… And know that people make mistakes.
You make some great points, and I couldn’t have said it any better myself- so I will simply cut and post what I found the most relevant from your comment:
Begs us to redefine how we look at an individual person — as a work in progress; not as a finished product. We need to make mistakes in order to learn and move ahead, and yet, it is these mistakes that students are beginning to be judged by very early in life.
We need to completely re-think what growing means. We need to begin to allow for growth in students; we need to begin to allow for students to make mistakes and learn from them, without holding their future hostage. I’m not suggesting that anything goes, but we do need to remember we work with children and young adults who are in the process of maturing; they are not mature, yet.
Thanks for adding to the conversation.
Thank you for posting such an interesting and thought provoking blog post. It really gave me tons to think about and reflect on.
Tim
Mr. Jabiz,
Ah! Facebook! I, for one, love facebook, but I know lots and lots of people who DON’T and do not want it in the world of education at all. As you and others have already said, it does NO good to block students from facebook- they’ll just find a way around it!
I also understand the drawbacks of facebook, and how others can see that it may be a distraction. However, this is just the beginning. Before long there will be another social networking site greater than facebook that older generations will hate. Sooner or later, I believe that we could even be TEACHING on a social networking site. Already I follow a few teachers on twitter and/or facebook, and I’ll get an important message that way rather than checking my email!
I enjoyed reading this post, you make very interesting points!
Krysten Malone- EDM 310