Jan 15 2010
edgeblog 01
This is my first blog in the sense of an ongoing process, as distinct from the over-long Introductory piece about the nature of time and tennis that you might have skimmed through on my home page. To get into the spirit of the thing, I have decided to think of it as edgeblog. My initial goal is to write an entry every fortnight and see where it goes from there.
A great part of my interest in getting involved with edgeblog arises from an exchange I had with Keith Richards while we both worked at Aston University. He talked about ‘writing to fill a space‘ and ‘writing to say something.’ In fact, if you wanted to read about that, you could take a look at the attached pdf of Chapter 9 from my (2002) book, Continuing Cooperative Development. It’s a lot more interesting than this stuff, I can assure you.
Anyway, I have always felt lucky to have got this far through a working life in TESOL on the basis of writing because I wanted to say something and now, at this undeniably late stage of the game, I find myself writing to fill a space. That’s to say, I have recently learned that if we (as a team of colleagues) are to make our MA TESOL visible to people around the world who are googling for such a course, what we have to do is create ‘traffic’ to our website. If there is lots of traffic, Google will spot us and deliver us up to the screens of said searchers. The simile that Gary used to explain this was,
‘Like The Eye of Sauron.‘
‘Heavens!‘ I thought, in a determinedly secular manner, and shifted my thoughts immediately to the luminous delights of the Lady Galadriel . . .
However, I now understand better how the search engine must make bloggers of us all, rather as though in a perversion of a Gricean Maxim of Quantity:
Make your communications as frequent and widely dispersed as you can.
This must be what people mean when they talk about human cognitive evolution developing in interaction with our technologies, in the same way that the possession of mobile phones slowly erodes our ability to make arrangements that we feel any obligation to keep to. A Maxim of Quality, perhaps:
Make your statements as retractable as possible.
The difficulty then arises, however, that if you post only inconsequential drivel, people won’t come back, and where’s your traffic then? Eh? So quality does rear its stubborn head after all, and edgeblog has to appear not only frequently, but to be worth reading and worth coming back to. Oh dear.
Right! Competitions, they’re supposed to work. (Aren’t they?) I hereby invite entries for the best IT ‘evolutions’ of Grice’s maxims, in connection, possibly, with your thoughts on human cognitive evolution in interaction with our technologies. If you want to check out Grice’s originals, by the way, you could go to:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gricean_maxims#Grice.27s_Maxims
But be sure to come back here again and give us a bit more traffic. Entries will be judged at some auspicious future date and prizes may be awarded.
edgeblog will return at the end of January, along with revealing insights into that outstanding new teachers’ handbook:
Edge, J. & Garton, S. 2009. From Experience to Knowledge in ELT. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
And, some real surprises!
Julian
I think competitions work better when there is a prize. Anything on offer
While the winner will be judged only on merit, I think that any prize awarded should be specially designed for the person concerned. In both of these matters, edgeblog will take the responsibility for making unbiased but personally sensitive decisions.
I feel under pressure to add something of quality – but truth be told it has been a week of boundless quantity and so I fear there is little of substance. I will ponder this connundrum a little longer in order to enter as a serious contender.
I’m looking forward to further edgyblogs though.
I was very interested to see your new book. I am considering entering the competition at the ‘edgeblog 02′ level
I now feel under pressure not only to come up with something of quality, but to succumb to being turned into a blogger by the search engine.
So when will you be on Facebook , or are you already on it?
Congratulations on the book and on edgeblog too! I will contribute soon but will have to do some serious thinking first
I too feel the pressure to add something that is not just an empty means of increasing the traffic…
Hi Julian
I think once you get into the swing of this you’ll take to it like a duck to water. I’ve come across some good tips for blogging, I’ll see if I can find them and if so, at some stage, will return with a link.
Yes, I reckon you’re suited more to blogging than to tweeting
Meanwhile, just so I don’t leave you empty-handed, I’m posting a link to a photo I took on Saturday – it made me smile, I hope it amuses others too.
http://tweetphoto.com/9036637
Congratulations on the forthcoming book, will definitely check it out when it appears.
Best
Clare
Hi Julian!
Blogging is the only way I managed to actually keep a reflective log! Public privacy seems to work for me!
Anyhow…
An ESOL teacher’s take on Grice’s maxim of quantity:
Only provide as much information as can comfortably fit on your smartboard screen!
‘Speak’ soon,
Jane
A great addition to the blog world which I have still got to get used to … I am still a Wiki-man…
I am not sure that Grice’s maxims are changed much since we still:
say only what we want to say (quality)
as briefly as poss (quantity)
to as many as poss (relation)
as clearly as poss (manner)
I am sure my niece could do the above with 75 fewer characters but the poss. is as good as I get at the new text lang(uage)…
Will enjoy returning as long as someone keeps reminding me too — take care all. Phil
Hey. Welcome and thank you to all present here. I think that the competition benchmark has thus far been set by Jane, with a neat pedagogical twist on Grice’s Maxim of Quantity that should be an encouragement to you waverers to get involved.
I’m not altogether sure, but did Clare just call me long-winded? And no, no, I am not on Facebook. I do, however, keep a portrait in the attic . . .
Back soon with those insights you’ve been waiting for into Edge & Garton (2009), and I should give you all fair warning that I have just been informed by a breathtakingly reliable source that Amazon USA is down to its last two copies and re-ordering as we communicate. Well, as I initiate this communication, anyway. So, don’t hold back.
Best,
Julian
Hi everyone,
While reading some of the articles on the Wikipedia link Julian provided I was also browsing through my Facebook (i.e. wasting time), so it occurred to me it might be interesting to reflect on whether the evolution of the Gricean maxims can be evidenced on social networking sites.
In particular, I was thinking of the conversational interactions such as the ones below, in which users seem to be trying to make up for the mediated, asynchronous nature of the communication through an (exaggerated?) use of emoticons, block capitals and exclamation marks:
– OMG – I am sooooooo excited..Can’t wait to see you……ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..can u hear me screaming..
..phew.. let me know when u are well rested and have some time for a catch up
xxx
- must have been nightmare journey
- HAPPY NEW YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR !!!!!!!!!!!! UN BESO ENORME MAGGGGGGGDAA ! Y OTRO PARA FEFII
- I am back in Manchester and guess what, it’s freezing cold!! There is snow and ice everywhere!!… Nice weather for studying
I think these might be examples of how the Gricean maxim of manner is being ‘flouted’ with the purpose of making the communication seem less distant. Not sure what it means in pedagogical terms, though I suspect a new – maybe slightly paradoxical – IT version of this maxim could be: ‘Use whatever tools are at your disposal to convey your emotions’.
So, c u all soooon?
Best,
Magdalena