Communities: Virtual and Otherwise and just as real

Email, the web, virtual communities........ the list of terms associated with communications technology and the rapidity with which it has become part of our everyday life is altogether remarkable. My work as a college professor has changed in dramatic and interesting ways as on-line courses have become more and more popular.

But, to stick with my teaching, for a bit longer: in many ways, my work hasn't changed at all. It is still a matter of me, and texts and students--all in the service of having students become more literate, more well-read, better writers, more analytical and reflective in their judgements. That work doesn't change because reading and writing are things we have to learn and relearn and practice again and again and again. The technology has given us some new tools; the work goes on.

Virtual community? Is there such a thing? Can email and related technologies help us in this work? We think so and we are along the way in helping that to happen. "Virtual community" as a term has a certaing ghostly quality. Is it a community or not? The answer, in my experience,is that it is one way for a community to be about its business. Clear channels of communication, clear, actionable agendas, focussed discussions--all of these serve to inform what we do, so when we do sitdown to talk we do not always have to start over, we are along the way.

Technology, I know, is never a neutral thing. People have a variety of takes on it, but as technologies go, email and the ways we can use it to be about our business is a "mitzvah."

Email: wardens@stsaviour.dioceseny.org