About Conversatio
Conversatio is a research project conducted by C. Scott Andreas and Professor Kathryn Lofton at Indiana University exploring the nexus of emerging Christianities and Web 2.0. We welcome your comments, criticism, and encouragement - share your thoughts!
the approach
Though I am a web developer and a Christian, I’m engaging these movements from an academic perspective as an “outsider.” For more on this, see “On Professing and Confessing.”
the big idea ::
The Internet has become a significant site of worship and practice for many diverse religious communities. Scholars interested in new religious movements and the intersections between practice and communications media will necessarily need to become proficient not only in accessing sites, but also recognizing and navigating genres of digital technology. “Web 2.0” emerged as a multifaceted programming and marketing response to the dot.com crash in 2001. With an emphasis on blog culture (over the personal monologic personal site), open source software, and folksonomy (a style of collaborative categorization of sites seeking to mirror the brain’s associative tactics, Web 2.0 is as much a new epistemology as it is a literal digital revolution.
This project focuses on the exchange between Web 2.0 and emerging Christianities. The primary question is: What role has Web 2.0 taken in the expansion of emerging Christianities?
topics to be considered include:
- The study ephemeral religious culture and practice
- Participation in online communities as a devotional practice
- Web 2.0 as a space for connecting disconnected congregations (both with a physical, ecclesial referent and without)
- The vitality of the Web as a projection of physical community into the ethereal
- Blogs and forums as a space for discussion of niche matters within a religious context (e.g., Christianity and Peak Oil)
- Podcasting as “pirate radio”
- Web 2.0 as the home of “Indie media” and a Christian “countersubculture”
- The Internet as fertile ground for collaborative emerging Christian thought
- Identity formation as “post-[everything]”
- Interpersonal conflict and resolution
Our work will be led by a rigorous appraisal of online communities and interaction, as well as readings including:
- Who’s Afraid of Postmodernism (James K.A. Smith)
- Free Culture (Lawrence Lessig)
- The Blogging Church (Brian Bailey / Terry Storch)
- Hiding (Mark Taylor)
- We Know More Than Our Pastors (Tim Bednar)
- Connecting: How we Form Social Bonds in the Internet Age (Mary Chayko)
- Naked Conversations (Shel Israel and Robert Scoble)
- Organic Church: Growing Faith Where Life Happens (Neil Cole)
- Interpreting Audiences: The Ethnography of Media Consumption (Shaun Moores)
- Religion, Media, and the Public Sphere (ed. Birgit Meyer)
- City Reading (David Henkin)
One Response to “About Conversatio”
Leave a Comment
About Conversatio
Conversatio is a research project conducted by C. Scott Andreas and Professor Kathryn Lofton at Indiana University exploring the nexus of emerging Christianities and Web 2.0. We welcome your comments, criticism, and encouragement - share your thoughts!
the approach
Though I am a web developer and a Christian, I’m engaging these movements from an academic perspective as an “outsider.” For more on this, see “On Professing and Confessing.”
the big idea ::
The Internet has become a significant site of worship and practice for many diverse religious communities. Scholars interested in new religious movements and the intersections between practice and communications media will necessarily need to become proficient not only in accessing sites, but also recognizing and navigating genres of digital technology. “Web 2.0” emerged as a multifaceted programming and marketing response to the dot.com crash in 2001. With an emphasis on blog culture (over the personal monologic personal site), open source software, and folksonomy (a style of collaborative categorization of sites seeking to mirror the brain’s associative tactics, Web 2.0 is as much a new epistemology as it is a literal digital revolution.
This project focuses on the exchange between Web 2.0 and emerging Christianities. The primary question is: What role has Web 2.0 taken in the expansion of emerging Christianities?
topics to be considered include:
- The study ephemeral religious culture and practice
- Participation in online communities as a devotional practice
- Web 2.0 as a space for connecting disconnected congregations (both with a physical, ecclesial referent and without)
- The vitality of the Web as a projection of physical community into the ethereal
- Blogs and forums as a space for discussion of niche matters within a religious context (e.g., Christianity and Peak Oil)
- Podcasting as “pirate radio”
- Web 2.0 as the home of “Indie media” and a Christian “countersubculture”
- The Internet as fertile ground for collaborative emerging Christian thought
- Identity formation as “post-[everything]”
- Interpersonal conflict and resolution
Our work will be led by a rigorous appraisal of online communities and interaction, as well as readings including:
- Who’s Afraid of Postmodernism (James K.A. Smith)
- Free Culture (Lawrence Lessig)
- The Blogging Church (Brian Bailey / Terry Storch)
- Hiding (Mark Taylor)
- We Know More Than Our Pastors (Tim Bednar)
- Connecting: How we Form Social Bonds in the Internet Age (Mary Chayko)
- Naked Conversations (Shel Israel and Robert Scoble)
- Organic Church: Growing Faith Where Life Happens (Neil Cole)
- Interpreting Audiences: The Ethnography of Media Consumption (Shaun Moores)
- Religion, Media, and the Public Sphere (ed. Birgit Meyer)
- City Reading (David Henkin)
One Response to “About Conversatio”
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shel israel Says:
January 13th, 2007 at 12:19 pmHi. I would apprecate your noting that Naked Conversations was written by Shel Israel as well as Robert Scoble. Thanks.
January 13th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
Hi. I would apprecate your noting that Naked Conversations was written by Shel Israel as well as Robert Scoble. Thanks.