As I stated in my last entry, I am no authority on this subject. I am just very passionate about it and am eager to find any and all information out there relating to it or correlating it with other media studies being done in association with the internet. What I have found in my search for information on cyber anthropology is that everything is very scattered or has become stagnant. I always find myself disappointed when I find a promising link to information and find that it was last updated over 10 years ago.
I have also found that (please correct me if I am wrong) there is no definitive authority on cyber anthropology, no end all be all source where one can find studies pertaining to it or research completed on it. Even pages with lists of journals and such have several links that are out of date or otherwise dead. The goal of this blog is to stay active and at some point compile a compendium of current and past studies, be an instigator for new studies, gain opinions and insight from those who are also interested in it or have some authority in the field while at the same time serve as a place where I can hash out my own thoughts, ideas and opinions. While I don’t necessarily think of myself as a pioneer here, I do hope this blog becomes a kind of torch to keep the study active and current and perhaps light the way for more cohesive and collective study in the field.
One last goal is that I’d like to present all of this in a way that it is interesting to people both in and outside of academia. I want it to be accessible by everyone and applicable by all who can find ways to apply it. I’d like to find ways to translate the stiff college writing and peer reviewed articles to the gamer, blogger, and social-networker, while at the same time providing academia with a link to their thoughts and opinions on what’s being written about them. In addition to that, I would love to be involved in finding ways both academia and its research subjects can apply the research being carried out.
I suppose these are pretty lofty goals and will take lots of time, patience, and tenacity to carry them all out. What would please me most is for this blog to generate a community of gamers, bloggers, social-networkers, anthropologists, sociologists, ethnographers, students, professors, researchers and the like who are all interested in the study and application of cyber anthropology. At the moment, other than starting my new position tomorrow as an information architect and continuing my studies in grad school in applied anthropology, nothing excites me more than looking for ways to make this happen.