"the medium is the message. This is merely to say that the personal and social consequences of any medium—that is, of any extension of ourselves—result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology."
— Marshall McLuhan
New Media, marked by the evolution of delivery channels and the rise of electronic transmissions, is not a new term. Nevertheless, online communicative platforms continue to proliferate and reshape the content and the form of cultural connections. Though I am not a digital native in the same mold as my students, home computers became affordable and popular when I was a teenager. My first computer was a Commodore 64. I built my first website with Netscape Composer back in the late 1990s. Such encounters led to a sustained interest in how digital technologies influence our writing and reading practices. My subsequent academic work addresses digital stories, video games, multimedia representations, and discussion boards. I often ask my students to consider the rhetorical affordances and constraints of media platforms at the same time they think about digital venues as windows into wider cultures.
Select Publications, New Media
Lunsford, Lauren, Bonnie Smith Whitehouse, and Jason F. Lovvorn. "Dialogism in the Digital Age: Online Discussion Boards as Constructivist Platforms." Advanced Research and Practice in K-12 Online and Blended Learning, edited by Tina L. Heafner, Richard Hartshorne, and Richard Thripp. IGI Global, 2019, pp. 459-476.
Dalton, Bridget, Kristin Robinson, Jason F. Lovvorn, Blaine E. Smith, Tara Alvey, Elaine Mo, Paola Uccelli, and C. Patrick Proctor. "Fifth-Grade Students' Multimodal Compositions: Modal Use and Design Intentionality." The Elementary School Journal, vol. 115, no. 4, 2015, pp. 548-569.
Lovvorn, Jason F. "Theorizing Digital Storytelling: From Narrative Practice to Racial Counterstory." Narrative Acts: Rhetoric, Race, and Identity, Knowledge, edited by Debra S. Journet, Beth A. Boem, and Cynthia E. Britt, Hampton Press, 2011, pp. 97-112.
Select Presentations, New Media
"Discursive Bodies, Digital Stories, and Rhetorical Challenges." National Council of Teachers of English Assembly for Research Midwinter Conference. Nashville, TN. February 2007.
"Narrative Knowledge and Social Action through Digital Storytelling." National Reading Conference (now the Literacy Research Association Conference). Los Angeles, CA. November 2006.
"Stories Seldom Spoken: Digital Storytelling as Rhetorical Practice and Social Activism." The Thomas R. Watson Conference in Rhetoric and Composition. Louisville, KY. October 2006.