In 1968 the famous artist Andy Warhol claimed “In the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes” and as technology evolves, this prediction has actually become true. I think that everybody knows what YouTube is so there is no need to explain how it works; on the contrary there is a great need to discuss about it, about its potentialities and limits. YouTube is an amazing tool and the reason why I appreciate it so much is that it gives “real” people the opportunity to provide entertainment and to make their voices heard. Moreover YouTube is accessible and easy to use: it is not only for young ( I found out that there is a 78 years old man named Peter who uploads videos with the user name “Geriatric 1927” that has become a sort of celebrity) but for everyone willing to shoot a video about anything (from political speeches to the most weird human behaviour) and then to upload it.
Recently the media have been talking a lot about YouTube and often not in positive terms. I remember some videos (I don’t remember if the video was uploaded exactly on YouTube or something similar) in which teenagers hit a boy with disabilities in the classroom: newspaper and TV shows just couldn’t stop talking about it and about the YouTube phenomenon and the YouTube generation. Everybody seemed to be horrified and blamed YouTube and the Net in general for spreading these awful images making its authors really famous with a high risk of emulation. Actually I don’t know if YouTube has a sort of “filter” or if everybody is allowed to upload everything but the first thing that came to my mind hearing all the journalists arguing was that the Website (and the Net) mirrors our society: a society that is a little bit sick and that lacks civilisation, a society full of ordinary people who don’t want to be ordinary any longer.
However let’s get back to the real topic of this post, that is YouTube and language learning. Most of the people enter the Website just for fun: they only want to watch the latest most bizarre video. But the idea of using such videos to improve our English is not bad, I mean, if learners have the opportunity to better their knowledge of their second language and at the same time to have fun, that is great! I don’t have a beautiful and satisfying relationship with technology but I’m open minded, willing to explore new ways to enhance my English and if YouTube is going to help me, I will try it out. As far as I’m concerned, I think that YouTube could be an extraordinary source of material, moreover watching short videos prevent learners from getting bored but I don’t think it could be a substitute for “real” lessons nor that it could be really effective.
Let me know what you think about it: I’m looking forward to reading your comments!
Recently the media have been talking a lot about YouTube and often not in positive terms. I remember some videos (I don’t remember if the video was uploaded exactly on YouTube or something similar) in which teenagers hit a boy with disabilities in the classroom: newspaper and TV shows just couldn’t stop talking about it and about the YouTube phenomenon and the YouTube generation. Everybody seemed to be horrified and blamed YouTube and the Net in general for spreading these awful images making its authors really famous with a high risk of emulation. Actually I don’t know if YouTube has a sort of “filter” or if everybody is allowed to upload everything but the first thing that came to my mind hearing all the journalists arguing was that the Website (and the Net) mirrors our society: a society that is a little bit sick and that lacks civilisation, a society full of ordinary people who don’t want to be ordinary any longer.
However let’s get back to the real topic of this post, that is YouTube and language learning. Most of the people enter the Website just for fun: they only want to watch the latest most bizarre video. But the idea of using such videos to improve our English is not bad, I mean, if learners have the opportunity to better their knowledge of their second language and at the same time to have fun, that is great! I don’t have a beautiful and satisfying relationship with technology but I’m open minded, willing to explore new ways to enhance my English and if YouTube is going to help me, I will try it out. As far as I’m concerned, I think that YouTube could be an extraordinary source of material, moreover watching short videos prevent learners from getting bored but I don’t think it could be a substitute for “real” lessons nor that it could be really effective.
Let me know what you think about it: I’m looking forward to reading your comments!
