Evaluation of the Use of Blogs for Learning Purpose by Leung Frances

It was the most unfamiliar course among others in this semester. It was a bit shameful to tell that I was panic when I heard of the term ‘Cyborg’ in the first lecture. Feminism, dualities, gender identities… many different topics have been discussed in this semester which are all new to me. Also blogging as a learning platform is also new to me as it is rarely used in Hong Kong and frankly speaking I am still not very used to it. But undoubtedly, if blogging is promoted to be one of the learning methods, perhaps it is such a great platform for everyone here providing new ways of learning and thinking. Sharing among classmates can be done easily by weblogs and comments are always available for us to speak out and do a reflection effectively.

The common use of weblogs questioned us the concept of cyborgs. We rely on online materials for presentation and sharing here and a domain ‘blogger.com’ for uploading our materials and giving comments right at the bottom of articles. Haraway has defined cyborg as ‘a hybrid of machine and organism’ that in some extent, we can more elaborate it to whom rely much on technology and cannot live without it. I cannot imagine if I do not have any electrical devices in hand as my network is now mainly constructed on social network platform. As many of my friends are in other foreign countries, it is the most convenient and fastest way to get to know the status of them through internet. I rely much on internet in my leisure time too like reading magazines and watching programs and dramas online or surfing for the newest products of some brands.

The unit, I would say, is quite abstract and ambiguous as somehow it is very new to me and sometimes I cannot really get a full understanding on some topics. But it is a course which let me think of myself thoroughly to rethink our bodies, self identities in the virtual cyber world and finally the dualities like nature and culture, human and technology. Have we well controlled the technology we invented? The problem is that we, humans, are bounded by technology but are still claiming ourselves we are controlling it. Self – deception is obviously the solution dealing with technology. Technology saves us but kills us. Perhaps, the unit is a course for all human beings!