Academic Uses of Social Media
Channel: The Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society
Date: 2011-05-12

Social media — from blogs to wikis to tweets — have become academic media, new means by which scholars communicate, collaborate, and teach. This distinguished panel of Harvard faculty discuss how they are adopting and adapting to new communication and networking tools

Panelists include:
Michael Sandel, Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Government at Harvard University (www.justiceharvard.org)

Professor Sandel's course "Justice" is the first Harvard course to be made freely available online and on public television.  A website including lecture videos, discussion guides, poll questions, and other resources has generated discussion among students and other viewers around the world.  The website is currently being updated to make greater use of social media tools.

Nancy Koehn, James E. Robison Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School (http://twitter.com/nancykoehn)

So much of the information we receive and send on the overflowing river ways of social media is immediate and detached from a historical frame or often, from any kind of larger frame or context whatsoever. What does it mean for a society to increasingly default into reliance on immediacy and brevity and widespread access as the ne plus ultra in knowledge creation? Knowledge is more than access to information, and wisdom is more than knowledge accumulation. How can we use social networks to create strong foundations for right action and sound choices?

N. Gregory Mankiw, Professor of Economics, Harvard University (http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/)

Over the past several years, Professor Mankiw has maintained a blog, originally aimed at students in his undergraduate course Ec 10, but eventually reaching a much larger audience.  He will talk about the pros and cons of such academic blogging.

Harry R. Lewis, Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science, School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University (http://harry-lewis.blogspot.com/)

John Palfrey — Faculty co-director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society — moderates.

This panel was held on May 3, 2011. Find out more here: http://www.faculty.harvard.edu/about-office/events/1035/academic-uses-social-media-exploring-21st-century-communications