Podcasting Museums
Need something with which to occupy your commuting time? How about "iTunes U"?
At least once a month, I travel 300+ kilometers between my hometown and the city where I work, to visit over a weekend. If I decide not to drive, this means I have a long coach ride of over 3 hours during which I need to entertain myself. I've recently been playing around with iTunes U, a section on the iTunes store that allows you to download free lectures from universities and cultural institutions like museums. The quality is variable, mostly because the podcasts often supplement a full course, the content of which is obviously not available to the general public. (It's quite difficult to enjoy a lecture on Heidegger, for example, if you don't have the textbook or course pack with which to follow along the professor's discussion. This is apart from the fact that it may well be objectively difficult to enjoy a lecture on Heidegger, period!)
The most successful lectures, I find, are those which stem from guest lectures by renowned scholars speaking on a topic of their choice. While they are sufficiently general to be accessible without the need for a textbook, they are also intellectually stimulating. A museum-related example is a lecture given by Jeffrey Smith, an educational psychologist now working at the University of Otago in New Zealand. For those of you without access to iTunes, here is another link to the podcast: Museum Pieces: How Cultural Institutions Educate and Civilise Society There is also a video version here. Take a listen and let me know what you think. I found some of the concepts interesting, while others seemed painfully obvious or basic - what about you?
At least once a month, I travel 300+ kilometers between my hometown and the city where I work, to visit over a weekend. If I decide not to drive, this means I have a long coach ride of over 3 hours during which I need to entertain myself. I've recently been playing around with iTunes U, a section on the iTunes store that allows you to download free lectures from universities and cultural institutions like museums. The quality is variable, mostly because the podcasts often supplement a full course, the content of which is obviously not available to the general public. (It's quite difficult to enjoy a lecture on Heidegger, for example, if you don't have the textbook or course pack with which to follow along the professor's discussion. This is apart from the fact that it may well be objectively difficult to enjoy a lecture on Heidegger, period!)
The most successful lectures, I find, are those which stem from guest lectures by renowned scholars speaking on a topic of their choice. While they are sufficiently general to be accessible without the need for a textbook, they are also intellectually stimulating. A museum-related example is a lecture given by Jeffrey Smith, an educational psychologist now working at the University of Otago in New Zealand. For those of you without access to iTunes, here is another link to the podcast: Museum Pieces: How Cultural Institutions Educate and Civilise Society There is also a video version here. Take a listen and let me know what you think. I found some of the concepts interesting, while others seemed painfully obvious or basic - what about you?
Comments
Have also downloaded the Open University series on heritage. Might write a post about that later.