Verde Smoke

[More info on a campaign that Lawrence CommunityWorks is devising to empower citizens to get involved in local political campaigns and citizen journalism - they need help developing new media tools to support these efforts!]

How I eased into rewriting a memo about my thesis from the comfortable spot of a reflective blog entry…

It’s February school vacation this week. I know this, because sitting across from me on my morning bus commute is a foursome of teenage girls. Even though I’m rocking tunes from my iPhone and ruminating about morning meetings, they catch my eye.

I often struggle with my decision to be a proponent of participatory media in the community-organizing field. There often seems to be bigger fish to fry or easier ways to get stories out there.

The initial phase of this project had the goal to empower Lawrence youth to conduct, record and edit audio interviews with employees of the relocating Southwick Company and key participants in the Union Crossing re-development project.

Barring a snow cancellation, I’m slotted to present my research tonight at the Harvard-MIT-Yale Cyberscholar Working Group.

On this spot, a little girl hesitantly stands at the edge of a deep abyss. Spine stiff, her toes curl back as she stares over them into the space beyond.

Fellow MIT DUSP student and native Indian, Amruta, graciously invited me to attend her older brother’s engagement ceremony, in her hometown of Vadodara (aka Baroda), in Gujarat near Ahmedabad.

We’re using Ning to create some private social networks with the students as part of the digital storytelling / civic media project and I’m testing out how the slideshow of photos and a short video I uploaded there looks when embedded here. What do you think?