1. WCU Workshop: Social Media in Korea
22 September 2009
16:00-18:00 p.m.
Location: 302, The 2nd Human Knowledge Hall, YeungNam University
Participation: open to advanced undergraduate and graduate students; maximum 20 persons. Interested persons should register
per email with WCU workshop coordinator JuHyang Kim at: wcuatyeungnam@gmail.com
Workshop Facilitator Nicholas Jankowski
WCU Visiting Scholar
Virtual Knowledge Studio (VKS) for the Humanities and Social Sciences
Amsterdam, the Netherlands
WCU at YeungNam
Information on the WCU project at YeungNam University may be found at the web site of the WCU Webometrics Institute. A
group blog for the project is maintained at WCU Project Yeungnam University.
Workshop Description: Social Media in Korea
This workshop, held in “master class style,” will stress discussion among advanced undergraduate and graduate students
interested in the study of social network sites and other social media. The two-hour seminar will begin with a relatively short
presentation (ca. 20 minutes) by the WCU project visiting scholar (Jankowski). The presentation will be based on a draft chapter
for a forthcoming textbook on digital media. Participants in the workshop will be expected to read the draft text prior to the
meeting. Additional preliminary readings will be assigned related to social network sites and other social media. Most of the
seminar will be devoted to discussion of these texts and to reflection on the meaning of social media for Korean youth and
possibilities for empirical research.
Preparatory Assignment
1. Identify 1-2 articles that you consider central to understanding what are commonly termed ‘social media’, ‘social
networking sites’, (micro)blogging. Compose a short (1-2 paragraphs) statement as to why you consider these
documents important for (scholarly) understanding of these innovations. Valuable sources of documentation on social
network and microblogging scholarship are available on the sites maintained by danah boyd:
http://www.danah.org/SNSResearch.html and http://www.danah.org/TwitterResearch.html.
2. Compose a formal research question that you feel suitable for guiding a scholarly / scientific study of social media. Be
prepared to discuss the rationale for this question, its theoretical grounding and a possible study design / methodology
for an empirical exploration of the RQ.
3. Conclude this assignment with a short biographical sketch (maximum 200 words) indicating academic and professional
background, research interests, and possible publications.
Workshop participants should submit this assignment per email no later than Thursday, 17 September, to Jankowski at:
nickjan@xs4all.nl. The assignments will be placed on the WCU project web site in a section with access restricted to
participants.
Preparatory Readings
Workshop participants are requested to read several of the articles published in a theme issue on social network sites by the
Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication (JCMC) in October 2007. Also read a response to the introductory article in that
issue subsequently published in JCMC the following year; the bibliographic details for these readings may be found below; all
readings are available online at the URLs noted. Please be prepared to discuss this material during the session.
• boyd, d. m., & Ellison, N. B. (2007). Social network sites: Definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer-
Mediated Communication, 13(1), article 11. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/boyd.ellison.html
• Hargittai, E. (2007). Whose space? Differences among users and non-users of social network sites. Journal of
Computer-Mediated Communication, 13(1), article 14. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/hargittai.html
• Kim, K.-H., & Yun, H. (2007). Cying for me, Cying for us: Relational dialectics in a Korean social network site.
Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13(1), article 15. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/kim.yun.html
• Humphreys, L. (2007). Mobile social networks and social practice: A case study of Dodgeball. Journal of Computer-
Mediated Communication, 13(1), article 17. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/humphreys.html
• Lange, P. G. (2007). Publicly private and privately public: Social networking on YouTube. Journal of Computer-
Mediated Communication, 13(1), article 18. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/lange.html
• Beer, D. (2008). Social network(ing) sites. Revisiting the story so far: A response to danah boyd & Nicole Ellison.
Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13(2): 516-529. Available at:
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi- bin/fulltext/119414153/PDFSTART
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2. Biographical Sketch Workshop Facilitator
Nicholas W. Jankowski is Visiting Fellow, Virtual Knowledge Studio (VKS) for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Royal
Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He has served as Associate Professor, Department
of Communication, Radboud University Nijmegen, and is presently adjunct Professor at the University of Ljubljana,
Slovenia, and at State University of New York Institute of Technology (SUNY-IT). He has been a Visiting Fellow at Oxford
Internet Institute and Visiting Professor at University of Leuven, Belgium. Jankowski has been engaged in the study of new
media and research methodology since the mid-1970s; his publications include: The People’s Voice: Local Radio and Television
in Europe (with O. Prehn and J. Stappers, Libbey, 1992); The Contours of Multimedia (with L. Hanssen, Luton, 1996);
Community Media in the Information Age (Hampton, 2002); A Handbook of Qualitative Methodologies for Mass Communication
Research (with K.B. Jensen, Routledge, 1991; translation into Korean in 2004), Internet and National Elections: A Comparative
Study of National Elections (with R. Kluver, K. Foot, & S. Schneider, Routledge, 2007), and e-Research: Transformation in
Scholarly Practice (Routledge, 2009). He is presently preparing a textbook on digital media (Polity Press, forthcoming 2010).
Jankowski is initiator and co-editor of New Media & Society, founding board member of the European Institute of
Communication and Culture (Euricom), and editorial board member of Javnost-The Public. Email: nickjan@xs4all.nl.
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