Dennis Kennedy

I saw the following quote at the Weblogs in Higher Education blog. It struck me as a profound, even inspiring, set of thoughts that deserve some of your quiet meditation time:

"So maybe here's my point: blogging is not democratic only because it gives each person a place to publish -- it is also democratic because it is a body of practices that help each person invent something worth reading. It is as if freedom of speech is not valuable only or even mainly for its freedom, but rather it is valuable for the social practices that it helps a society cultivate, for the internal and social work it helps individuals do, and for the quality of the speech that results from those things. Not to mention the quality of listening."

Ken Smith goes on the expand on these thoughts in a compelling, even poetic, way. He captures some of my "two turntables and a microphone" notion of blogging, but goes much deeper than I have been able to do. If you want to get a sense for some of the potential of blogging, Weblogs in Higher Education is required reading. Here's the feed.

Among other things, Ken recently helped 40 students sign up for blog accounts. I now know that I have some work to do. What have you done for the blogging world lately?