Social Bookmarking Soulmate

My “Social Bookmarking Soulmate”:  Jennifer M. Jones.
(http://www.citeulike.org/user/jennifermjones)

According to Jennifer Jones’s profile on citeulike.com, she is a PhD student in the department of Media and Communications at the university of Leicester in England. Jennifer’s bookmarking topics include tags such as: media, technologies, social, twitter, education, culture, and control. She currently has fourteen articles in her library, all related to social media and cyber communities. Although Jennifer’s bookmarked- articles and tags are organized and relevant, she doesn’t add personal comments or has a great variety in her library. 

I found an interesting link to a study through Jennifer Jones’s profile, that was published in 2009 by Neil Selwyn in the Learning, Media and Technology Journal called “Faceworking: Exploring Students’ Education-Related Use of Facebook”. This research was conducted in a UK university and analyzed the relationship between students’ activity on the social-networking site, Facebook, and their engagement with traditional educational activities. The results of the study concluded that despite the criticism and common fear that social networking compromises learning in school, a significant number of students claimed that Facebook plays an important role in their self-identification as students, as well as it appears to provide a ready space where studying and learning can be shared between students. 

Another interesting link I found through Jennifer’s profile connected me to a book about how technology affects society called “Virtual Culture: Identity and Communication in Cybersociety”. This book is a collection of essays that discuss issues associated with virtual cultures that participate in “cyberhate”; a term used to describe offensive and hateful discourse that occurs online. The book discusses the negative effects of “cyberhate” on issues such as: homosexuality, religion and race. In addition, the authors also consider the new useful and productive opportunities that the internet offers, such as worldwide communication, and international awareness for social and political change. Even though this book was written in 1997 and many adjustments have changed the internet since then, I found it very alarming that “cyberhate” remains to be a serious existing problem that hasn’t been resolved or fixed to this day.  

Jennifer Jones’s profile and library of articles could be useful and helpful for anyone who is interested in the effects of social media and technology on society and important social issues. Her collection of sources include both current studies as well as other academic works that dates farther back. Overall, Jennifer accumulated an interesting selection of links to different studies, articles and research.