To me, the word “whither” is associated in my mind with academia; I’ve been to enough conferences to notice that at least one panel has the word “whither” in it (as opposed to “wither,” but that’s a tale for another time…), no matter the conference. “Whither the American West?” “Whither Shakespeare?” “Whither Postmodernism?” “Whither Plain English?” “Whither Michael Jackson’s Nose?” “Whither O.J.’s Missing Glove?” You get the point. Even the upcoming conference at Gallaudet will have a panel, “Whither Gallaudet?” But I digress…

Today I’d like to touch on the deaf blogosphere, aka DeafBlogLand. In the last post here, “Celebration of Our Realm,” a lively discussion has ensued between Tom Willard and a few others. Most of the time, I leave such discussions in the comments section, and let them play out their natural course. But looking over what people had to say, I saw that people either directly touched on or danced around a very important issue– one that I think is worth discussing in a post of its own (and hopefully, sparking a new round of comments!).

Willard began by stating he didn’t think that the deaf blogosphere would continue to expand, and felt that it was a fad. A number of people disagreed with him, for various reasons. Although this is not what I found ultimately fascinating, I must jump in with my two cents here.

While I don’t think the deaf blogosphere/DeafBlogLand will expand as rapidly as it did during the protest, it certainly will continue to grow. I had a conversation with Tayler Mayer, founder and co-moderator of DeafRead earlier tonight, and he shared that there’s an average of 3-4 new blogs a week being added to DeafRead. While this isn’t exactly a tidal wave, it is still steady growth; whether these newer additions will last remains to be seen. I’m seeing new handles all the time, here on my blog in the comments section and elsewhere. Just as blogs on other topics and in other areas have grown, so will the number of blogs/vlogs in the deaf blogosphere. At some point, the number will plateau, and the community will mature– some people will stop blogging, or decrease the number of postings they make. A number of us will continue to post on a fairly frequent basis. Most of the rest will fall somewhere in between. But I don’t see this phenomenon going away. It’s not like Ringo or some of the other more obviously faddish elements of cyberspace. I see the deaf blogosphere as providing a home for us, as Moi pointed out.

Willard continues by saying that he feels that blogs are an ineffective use of time, and that direct action is preferable. While a number of commenters disagreed, I think Willard, in his comments, has indirectly touched upon a very important issue: Whither the Deaf Blogosphere?

While the conference at Gallaudet will focus on Gallaudet and what impact the deaf blogosphere had on it and how the deaf blogosphere can help shape or aid future discourse on Gallaudet, a lot of people initially thought the conference was about blogging/bloggers and vlogging/vloggers. As most of you know, certain people were invited, while certain others weren’t. For quite a few, the initial disbelief/consternation quieted once Jill Bradbury explained the purpose of the conference and her rationale for the participants and topics. But that still leaves a larger question that emerged when the conference was announced: What about us? What does the deaf blogosphere mean?

To make a long post short, the question I’d like to throw out is this: What do you see as the purpose of the deaf blogosphere? What should we accomplish? Should we be expected to accomplish anything? Obviously many of us worked together to have some impact on the outcome of the protests– it showed the community the power of the blogosphere. Do we continue to harness this energy? In what ways?

Lest you think blogs do not have power, they do. Blogging, hearing or deaf, originally began as online diaries/public journals of people’s lives, for the most part. I got interested in blogging partially due to encouragement from one of my best friends, and out of my long interest in creative writing, but it also stemmed from a blog I read, a journal by a hearing woman. She posts every day, and her posts are roughly the length of a newspaper column. While she does touch on regional, state, and national issues, popular culture, and other topics, it is essentially an open diary of her life. Lots of people still treat their blogs like that these days. One of the first deaf blogs I started reading was Erfo’s– she’s changed the title a few times, and right now it’s “human of the female slick” (although the URL remains the same, and is one of the best URLs I’ve seen out there on any blog!). It is, was, and remains an intensely personal public diary.

From beginnings as journals/diaries, blogs have evolved a great deal, and bloggers wield quite a bit of power these days on the public stage, especially those that focus on politics. From the Left to the Right, top-notch bloggers/diarists have hundreds of thousands of readers, and in fact, a coalition of bloggers, led by firedoglake and aided by Huffington Post, has been granted press access to the I[rving] Lewis “Scooter” Libby trial, set to open to much on- and off-line fanfare on Tuesday, January 16– less than 48 hours from now. The Right has wielded a fair amount of influence as well, from Instapundit to Little Green Footballs (and this is probably the only time I’ll mention these two sites, much less in the same sentence, here. So take note of this historic moment and act accordingly. You won’t be seeing this happen again).

Blogs have been responsible for politically-related news items, as well as cultural events, in the last few years as well. The well-known Wonkette revealed the sexual escapades of Washingtonienne, who was sleeping with another Capitol Hill greysuit. DC Metro didn’t seem so grey after all for a while, in the fallout from the sexual trysts outlined online. Far more fallout resulted from blogger Lane Hudson’s revelation that Mark Foley was playing online footsies with teenaged House pages– and Masturgate was born.

It isn’t just in DC where blogs have impact, but politics has benefited greatly from blogging/bloggers, where citizens can stand on their own virtual soapbox. While some of it is the type of “talk talk talk” Willard decries, it’s the collective and individual actions that can and have made a difference, as evidenced by the examples I’ve given above. The difference is, instead of inviting twenty people for a conversation at my home, I can log on and find hundreds having a conversation on topics that interest me. But the end result can be the same– direct action born of these discussions.

Which leads me back, again, to the questions I posed in the middle of this post. I’d love to know what you think: What do you see as the purpose of the deaf blogosphere? What should we accomplish? Should we be expected to accomplish anything? Obviously many of us worked together to have some impact on the outcome of the protests– it showed the community the power of the blogosphere. Do we continue to harness this energy? In what ways? How is the deaf blogosphere evolving? How should it evolve?

A lot of questions, but I think the answers could be very interesting– possibly revealing, and potentially outlining our future.