Learning From "Learning From YouTube"

As mentioned in a previous post, I spoke about a year ago to a Pitzer College media studies professor who was teaching for the first time a course called “Learning From YouTube.” During that interview, Alex Juhasz explained the concept of a class "on, in, and about YouTube," as she put it.

Students would take a close look at how the video-sharing site serves different audiences, including college students in an academic setting. They’d post every assignment online and speak to each other (and outside observers) primarily through student-generated videos uploaded to YouTube. As another wrinkle, class sessions would also appear on the site for all to see.

So began the most transparent course in American higher education history.

I caught up with Juhasz again last week as she prepared to start another academic year. We spoke about what lessons she and students learned about YouTube, how the media covered the course, and how it ended up taking on a 'Truman Show'-esque quality.

Here’s an abbreviated version of our conversation. (TMM= This Media Moment;
AJ= Alex Juhasz)

TMM: You posted a series of video blogs on the course Web site, and in your final video you called the course a “wild experiment in education.” Are you satisfied with the experiment?

AJ: I’m more than satisfied. It gave me a lot of critical insight into how YouTube works. I’ve written a lot academically about YouTube, but I never would have gained the same insight had I not engaged in the experiment. The interactions with 30 young people were critical. I don’t need to do the experiment again in exactly the same way, because I learned quickly and efficiently what YouTube doesn’t do and why.

TMM: When we last talked you said that you were "underwhelmed" and "unsatisfied" by much of the content on YouTube. Then there’s this passage about class discussions from your blog:

"We've also deduced that there are two YouTubes: the mainstream one made and maintained by Google and millions of users out to waste some time, and the innumerable experiments in form, content, behavior, and community that fall outside the logic of entertainment, advertisements, popular culture, hits, numbers, and favorites. See one and the other becomes less visible; ask a question of the other and learn little of use to understand the first. Our class falls into the second category: unseen by most, unattended to by the site's architecture and poorly supported, barely getting by but learning nevertheless."

It seems like your critique of the site and its ability to serve your class didn't change much from start to finish?

AJ: Our critique of the site stayed the same. I’d have to say it sounds banal, but it’s important to emphasize that corporate ownership of the site produces certain structures; it has a logic of its own. There’s nothing wrong with corporate logic. That logic is organized around making you want to waste time by moving from video to video in a form of distraction that gets viewers to ads. My criticism isn’t that it’s corporate – God bless them that they figured out a way to make money.

But it’s not a structure that produces other things humans might want. I’m a college professor. I’m interested in looking at things carefully, linking and working collaboratively. [The people behind YouTube] don’t want it to be a place of community. They want you to stay distracted as an individual watching a lot of videos.

TMM: Did the students feel the same way?

AJ: They came in as boosters of the site and didn’t leave as boosters. They still generally like YouTube, have fun on it and think it’s exciting. But when the guy who runs the politics page at YouTube came to speak to us, students were very critical of the way that page limits interactions -- one of the hallmarks of Web 2.0.

Put it this way: Everyone can put a video on YouTube, but if only three people see a video it won’t ever move up. It’s democratic in that people can get on it, but it’s not democratic in the ability for people to move equally within the site.

TMM: The course received quite a bit of media attention. Among other appearances, you went on Fox News and CNN. The television headlines ranged from “You Kidding: Class focuses on YouTube” to “YouTube 101: Educational Wave of the Future?” – and both of those titles appeared on FOX during the same interview. A local NBC affiliate referred to “that laughter of a class.”

So I was a bit surprised to see on your blog this post:

"I've been able to do nothing else all day but worry about how I represent myself, my ideas, my course through a mainstream media which does not usually talk my language or acknowledge my concerns, given their erudite nature and political leanings (see my blog!). But reporters have been polite and inteligent, I'm an expert after all, a PhD; as have I. Why?"

I'm curious to hear more.

AJ: The reality was that I was treated well by everyone in the media. They are smart people, and they understand that people want to think about new technology. I think they were enjoying talking to me, as I was relatively capable of saying what issues were on the table.

The radio talk shows were generally serious. Most stations screened it as a joke. That was their entry in. It’s easy to joke about it, to say kids are watching car crashes and kittens, but anyone who spends any time on YouTube knows there’s a lot more going on than that. Again, everyone was respectful and serious, but most could only frame the course as a joke.

One of the problems is that video blogging and consumer-produced culture is still considered a joke. But we ignore YouTube and user-produced content at our own risk.

TMM: How did it go with students’ work and comments in class being out there for everyone to see?

AJ: It didn’t go very well. Students didn’t like the course being that public, and being judged by the YouTube community. It points to the poor standards of cultural interaction on that space – and to the differences in social norms. You aren’t allowed to make fun of people in the classroom, but on YouTube you can say what you want.

Most people who came to watch the class were interested in the experiment, but we had our problems and students felt attacked. People were putting response videos on the site just to get hits and to get their cause mentioned on TV. At one point we stopped allowing others to add video.

TMM: How did the cameras affect you?

AJ: It got easier as the semester went on, but it does limit your freedom of expression. And maybe that’s good. There’s a lot of self-censoring that occurs. I was self-conscious that colleagues were watching and saying, “she totally missed that.” I probably didn’t teach as well because I thought I was being judged all the time.

TMM: So are you teaching this course again?

AJ: Yes, this fall, though there are some changes. We likely won’t be taping all the lectures. Students will still do assignments as before on video, but we’ll be reading real books on Internet studies and media culture instead of mostly limiting interactions to YouTube. It’s important for them to see the limitations of the site, and to value long-form content.

The best way to learn is to see what you can’t do in three minutes.