Lawrence Lessig is on to something in his work, Remix. My interpretation of his most blatant theme is probably skewed by my bias as a future teacher, but I see it as this: Remixing (taking others' work and building upon it in a community of sharing that is greatly enhanced by more reasonable copyright laws) is highly beneficial to education, whether it be formal education or lifelong learning. This overview of Lessig's work is completely my own interpretation; in fact, I put my own educational spin on it that Lessig might have never intended. I just created (a completely copyright-appropriate) remix. I was able to do so because of the method I took in consuming the work. I did not read it front to back. Here is how I did it how you can remix your own remix:
1) Skim over the online version of the book, primarily looking at the chapter titles and section headings, reading through his introduction, and glancing over some anecdotes.
2) See what wikipedia has to say about the work. Click links that teach you about the author. Glance over summaries of some of his other works.
3) Go to goodreads.com and look through what others have to say about the book.
4) Look through others' blogs on the book using Google's blog search feature.
This method of reading a book takes away the author's connection with the readers, which is why such a method would be inappropriate for many texts. For Remix, though, it was perfect. I learned what I needed to learn, and I was able to learn it in the context of what I care about rather than what the author wants me to care about.
I think you're right about remixing being a positive phenomenon as far as it concerns teaching. So often I feel like I'm presented with the same material in classes because it's what isn't copyrighted and therefore widely available.
ReplyDelete