Her Blog: Nina Simon's Museum 2.0

The Participatory Museum (2010), by Nina Simon.

After I finished graduate study in art education, I started out as a college instructor. A topic that I included most often in my class was the idea of museum as a site of civic and cross-cultural exchanges. In my last semester before I left for a new position at the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago, I experimented integrating blogging in my class and engaged my students in using it as a way to practice community engagement. Their work was recorded in collaboration on Arts & Community Development blog. Throughout the class, a book that we referenced to on museum pedagogy was The Participatory Museum, by Nina Simon.

Nina Simon is museum leader who takes blogging into a space of innovation for the museum world. Described as “museum visionary” by the Smithsonian Magazine, Nina has a strong and clear vision of how to bridge the blog and museum together. Her book, The Participatory Museum, was fueled by the collection of posts on her blog, Museum 2.0. She sees the technology and web-driven society we are living in as an opportunity to optimize individuals’ learning in visiting museums. Seven years ago, Nina started the Museum 2.0 blog to explore the ways that the philosophies and directions of Web 2.0 -- which removes the authority from the content producer and put it in the users’ hands, allowing the users to be more engaged in their learning through the exhibit. 

Carol: When did you start writing online? And how did you start? 
 
Nina: Fall of 2006. I had attended a conference (Association of Science and Technology Centers) and was just blown away by some of the intriguing things I was hearing from brilliant people in the field who I was much too shy to approach. Blogging gave me a way to explore what I had heard and start to build a community dialogue in a safe and creative way.


Carol: Why is it important to you? How has the practice of writing online influenced you? 
 

Nina Simon

Nina: I learn from writing. The process of it – the research, the thinking it out, the writing it down – all leads me to discover things I didn't realize. The transparency of online writing both energizes me and pushes me to keep doing it. I know there is an audience out there that doesn't care if I'm exhausted or stressed or on vacation. They expect a post every week, and I want to deliver. And when I was writing The Participatory Museum online using a wiki, the open format allowed readers to help significantly sculpt the final text both in content and style.

Also, as I've gotten more busy at work, blogging has remained an important point of reflection and sharing in my week that would be easy to neglect otherwise.

Carol: What do you aim to achieve through your own blog?
 
Nina: Mostly to learn aloud, to share ideas, and to force myself to honor the need for reflective practice in my own work.

Carol: Any other blogs (particularly those by women) that have influence on you?

Nina: When I first started blogging, my absolute favorite blog was Creating Passionate Users by Kathy Sierra. Unfortunately, she closed down her blog in 2007 due to misogynistic threats she received from trolls online. I still learn from going back to Kathy's posts, and I sincerely hope that we are moving beyond the kind of hate speech that ended her blogging.

Her Blog: The Map is Not the Territory, by Malke Rosenfeld

Art can be manifested in many things, including mathematics. In her program "Math in Your Feet," Malke Rosenfeld turns percussive dance into the platform for a robust choreographic inquiry into mathematical thinking, practices and topics. I first met with Malke through ALT/space, an international online writing project of the Teaching Artist Journal. Besides serving as an editor for ALT/space in which she curates stories of practice from those working at the crossroads of art and learning in various disciplines and communities, Malke is a dynamic percussive dancer, teaching artist, and writer.

Malke Rosenfeld

Malke documents and shares her personal journey toward a deeper understanding of mathematics and how to teach it on her personal blog, The Map is Not the Territory. Interestingly, her inquiry often overlaps with the adventures Malke has with her seven-year-old daughter.

Love between daughter and mother, mathematics, dance and blogging all come together. Malke’s story of finding herself in blogging organically sprang from an interest in the idea of connecting – with art, people, teaching and learning.

Carol: When did you start writing online?  And how did you start? 

Malke: I started my blog The Map is Not the Territory in October 2012. I had just submitted my article, Percussive Dance and the Path to Math, to the Teaching Artist Journal. Feeling flush with success for finally finishing the piece (it had taken me years to get past the first 500 words) I all of a sudden felt like there was a lot more about my work I wanted to share. I was also hoping to connect with others who were, like me, working at the intersections of art, movement, and math education.

Carol: Why is it important to you?  How has the practice of writing online influenced you? 

Malke: It sometimes takes a while for me to process information and I often leave conversations unsatisfied with myself in terms of what I have been able to express. Having an opportunity to reflect on my work in a quiet (but ultimately public) environment has allowed me to flesh out my thoughts fully, share my ideas, and deepen my teaching practice all at the same time.

Carol: What do you aim to achieve through your own blog? 

Malke: My aim is three-fold: To have a place to reflect on the topic of teaching and learning mathematics in a hands-on, design environment; to be able to share my approach to both of those things with others; and to develop a network of colleagues.   

Carol: Any other blogs (particularly those by women) that have influenced you? 

Malke: I was recently invited to become a contributing writer to the Moebius Noodles blog, a fantastic resource full of adventurous, meaningful math experiences for young children and their adults. This is a great honor, considering that the combined work of Maria Drujkova and Yelena McManaman has already contributed so much to my math understanding.  

Her Blog: Vita Brevis Arts Longa, by Lee Ann Norman

In 2009, I saw Julie & Julia, a feature-length movie about Julie Powell, a young writer living in New York who once dissatisfied with her dead-end jobs, created an exceptional experience with the well-renowned chef, author, and television personality Julia Child (1912-2004). After Powell discovered Child's cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, she aspired to cook all 524 recipes in one year. To motivate herself, she documented her progress on her blog, What Could Happen?

Several years later when watching this film, it still resonates with me. When blogging becomes a regular practice, the power of writing and sharing is endless. Powell's journey reveals how blogs can be a form of art and can evolve into a space in which a woman influences another woman, and may lead her to challenge, experiment, and teach herself in something unprecedented in her life.

A similar situation happened to me. Prior to joining IMOW's Her Blueprint, I was a contributor for the Teaching Artist Journal ALT/space, a multi-authored blog dedicated to sharing stories of individuals in the field of teaching and art-making. Through this space, I had the opportunity to get in direct contact with other admirable people with whom I might not otherwise have ever connected.

As 2013 kicks in, I would like to begin by exploring the art of blogging among women and the way it influences them. I want to find out how blogging plays any role in their life, personally and professionally. Overall, I hope my search and interviews with these women writers to serve as a platform to continue inspiring other women to write online.

I began with Lee Ann Norman, artist, writer, and cultural critic who currently lives in New York.

Carol: When did you start writing online? And how did you start?
 
Lee Ann: I started writing online as part of the Representations: a series on culture, politics, and aesthetics I did with Experimental Station in Chicago in 2008. We wanted and needed to find a way to reflect upon the programs, and hopefully engage participants in ongoing conversation. The program lasted a little over a year, and during that time, I tentatively started my own blog as I began to focus more intently on art writing and cultural critique.

Carol: Why is it important to you? How has the practice of writing online influenced you? 
 
Lee Ann: I'm not so sure the "online" part of writing is that important to me. It is certainly more of a necessity in contemporary society, although I don't think books will become ancient artifacts any time soon. In the last 20 years, the way that we receive and consume information has changed dramatically. When I was a college undergrad, the Internet was still a vast, unexplored territory, and by the time I graduated, the web was full of all kinds of new information, content, and voices. ("Google" had become a verb?!) What's amazing about online platforms for writing and ideas is that it has great potential to democratize culture. Online platforms give more people more say in discussing and determining what is valuable in culture, which can only be a good thing…Access to information (think: google project to digitize books and the number of universities and comprehensive libraries that have joined in since that started, etc.)

Carol: What do you aim to achieve through your own blog - vita brevis arts longa (Thoughts on Culture, Politics, & Aesthetics)? 

Lee Ann: Since I've had this online space - a blog, but not quite a blog - for almost 5 years now, it has undergone a number of iterations with varying focus and held up different projects and ideas of mine. This year I'm preparing to (finally) take the plunge and purchase a domain, and get more consistent with exploring a topic that is of most concern to me right now, which is the role of questioning and discovery in art. On vita brevis arts longa, I write about art, music, film, dance, and culture generally, but I still struggle to reconcile ideas about proximity to artworks and criticality. In visual art writing, people tend to error on the side of more distance being good, while in performing arts criticism, the writer's experience can sometimes overwhelm the reader. I am interested in exploring the value of asking questions of an artwork or experience. I want to know what I don't know and feel comfortable with the knowledge that sometimes I don't know how I feel about a work until I write about it. It's a difficult place to start, but exciting and valuable nonetheless. I'm always interested in how others see/experience/read the world and how their experiences influence everything. Our lives are the sum total of our experiences - a dynamic and fluid process and story. I want to create spaces - literal, tangible, virtual, spiritual, creative, etc. - that give life room to unfold....

Carol: Any other blogs (particularly those by women) that have influence on you? 
 
Lee Ann: I think most of the blogs I read are ones that seem to focus on sparking dialogue. They are rooted in knowledge and theory, yet, but they are open to and welcome varying opinions and views so that the platform grows in its richness and value. My friends are writing and thinking about interesting things about art and culture: Not Arriving and Aldrin Valdez. Other art blogs I like include c-monster by Carolina A. Miranda, Brain Pickings by Maria Popova, and then those on general culture/feminism like The Crunk Feminist Collective, Colorlines and Racialicious.

What Razan Ghazzawi Can Teach Us about Taking Action

Razan during The 3rd Arab Bloggers Meeting Oct. 2011, in Tunis. (Photo: Flickr - Ibtihel Zaatouri)

If you haven't heard the story yet, Razan Ghazzawi is the latest among a dozen bloggers, activists, and journalists who have been detained since the nine month uprising calling for the ousting of President Bashar Assad erupted in March.

Ghazzawi was detained on Dec. 4 at the Jordanian border by Syrian immigration as she tried to cross into Jordan to attend a conference on press freedom in the Arab world. Currently, she is being held in Adra prison and faces a potential 3- to -15-year prison sentence.

On Monday, Syrian authorities charged Ghazzawi with membership to a secret organisation, which aims to change the economic and social status of the state, conveying within Syria false news that could debilitate the morale of the nation and weakening national sentiment, violating Article 335 of the Syrian penal code -- banning participation in a riotous demonstration -- and inciting sectarian strife.


Who is Razan?
Razan, 31, is a blogger, feminist and human rights activist who has campaigned for the release of political prisoners and documented human rights abuses.

Prominent Egyptian blogger Zeinobia praises Razan's revolutionary spirit:

Razan has been active and outspoken when it comes to injustice. She is among a few Syrian bloggers that blog with her real name. She is U.S. born yet she is an Arab leftist nationalist. I think Razan Ghazzawi is the second female Syrian blogger to be arrested after Tal Malhoi.

I remember once, during the revolution in Egypt, Razan tweeted about how she and her family were glued in front of the TV every afternoon till late night watching Tahrir square in those 18 days and how she cried when Mubarak was ousted. Razan is another Syrian, among thousands of Syrians, detained for no reason except they want freedom and democracy.

Since 2009, Razan has been maintaining Razaniyyat where she blogs, mainly in English, about human rights, women's and gay rights, as well as Arab and Syrian affairs. She is also the media coordinator for the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression.

Syrian Uprising
On Wednesday, the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, urged the United Nations (UN) Security Council to refer Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity. The call comes as the New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) prepares to release a report also calling for Syria's referral to the ICC.

According to recent UN statistics, the brutal crackdown has left more than five thousand dead while thousands more continue to languish in prison. Today alone, violence across Syria has killed at least twenty-five people and the death toll is rising by the minute.


Time to Take Action
Since Razan's arrest, more than four thousand people have joined the Facebook campaign Free Syrian Blogger & Activist Razan Ghazzawi and started an online petition to demand intervention by the Arab League and the US government.

Twitter users have also launched the hashtag #FreeRazan to show solidarity.

As you can see, Razan was a person of action. So here's a list of ways that you can also take action:

• Write an email or send a fax to your local politician, Foreign Minister, members of parliament of congress. Use the internet to find their contact details or see this list of emails. Razan is an American Citizen – here is a list of US Embassies to contact demanding they take urgent action.
• Use your profile photo to draw attention to Razan’s arrest and the plight of all prisoners in Syria via Twibbon or you can use this image, or make your own.
• Use the tag #FreeRazan to share links, videos, news from #Syria – keep attention levels UP, don’t let this important news be overpowered by other stories and fade from view.
• Post news and links to FaceBook, blog, forums, and in comments on videos and news posts about Syria. If you write, please write about this issue.
• Schedule tweets for when you can’t be online – use Dlvr IT for feeds or Buffer for individual tweets. Also, Razan’s twitter account is currently being managed by her friends and supporters. Follow her if you’re not already @RedRazan for important updates.
• Join the Free Razan FaceBook page and share the page with all your friends.

If you have more ideas, please share them here.