RESEARCH MEMO
Date: February 17, 2022
Interview with Cat Taylor via Zoom, questioning her about the way she used Canva to create a narrative of how she is becoming increasingly socially literate after listening to podcasts.
Working Research Question: How did using Canva to illustrate and narrate your podcast journey contribute to the cognitive reinforcement of creating a narrative?
– My research question changed extensively during the duration of this interview: it was originally: What cognitive reinforcements did the process of creating a narrative of how you came to appreciate podcasts create for you as you reflected upon your podcast journey? Did you learn anything about your appreciation for podcasts/ do you have a deeper appreciation now?
And by that [listening to podcasts], I gained knowledge in a bunch of different areas, which in turn, really helped me. And one of the biggest things is being able to have more meaningful conversations with people, whether it be my roommates, or talking to my parents about more mature important issues and topics that I didn’t really know much about before.
– Cat Taylor on the surprising effects on social awareness by listening to podcasts
This quote sums up the most important conclusion of both of Cat and I’s projects – her literacy narrative centered around the many benefits of becoming more aware of the news and therefore socially literate, while mine centers around her use of Canva in explaining this literacy journey.
It’s often hard to decipher when one gains ‘literacy’ in a certain area, and by going back and really examining a journey, and taking time to self-reflect, such as by creating a project (and then talking in depth about how you made the project) you can see the benefits of a certain media, just as Cat did by listening to podcasts.
And that was like an afterthought too – I hadn’t really planned on talking about that. But as I was thinking more about the different impacts on my life, that came up too.
– Cat Taylor on how podcasts aided her in her public relations internship this summer
In creating her Canva project, Cat had time to reflect on other ways that using podcasts positively impacted her life. Becoming more socially aware via podcasts helped her in her public affairs internship this summer, a job that required a lot of knowledge on the current goings-on in the world.
And so it’s really interesting to hear from her – you know, she gets most of our news from radio talk shows in the morning on our way to work, or from watching the news at night. My dad still reads the paper, I wasn’t surprised. It was was fun to talk about that and see the distinct lines between how we use technology and how we get our information on the news.”
– Cat Taylor, on the differences between her and her parents on their medias of choice when it comes to the news
In the interview, I asked Cat many questions about how she used Canva to illustrate her journey becoming socially literate when it comes to the news, her literacy narrative being centered around her use of podcasts. Throughout the interview, we really became focused on the outcome of her use of podcasts, which was gaining a deeper insight into what’s going on in the world, and how (news). podcasts are very similar to just listening to the news on TV or reading a newspaper, just steered towards a younger audience. I found her comparison of how she ingests news via podcast versus her parent’s acquiring of news via TV, radio or newspaper fascinating in illustrating how important this media has become.
FURTHER RESEARCH QUESTIONS
- Do all types of podcasts have such an illuminating effect on various parts of one’s life?
- If Cat had used other methods of presenting her literacy narrative, such as a podcast or storyboard, would she still have been able to come to the same conclusions about her podcast journey?
- If a literacy narrative was required to be longer, what other ideas could have been thought up?
Sophia Maynard 