Today, we had two UNC faculty members, who have become public intellectuals via blogging or at least noticed beyond their specialities and this school, visit our class. The idea here is to see how knowledge capital and social capital can be expressed in the blogosphere by very different folks doing different kinds of work (intellectual work but yes work too). We were also hoping for and got interesting personal stories and opinions. Opinions for bloggers! I’m shocked! One thing to notice immediately is how passionately both feel about their writing and their engagement with the blogosphere.

Cori Dauber’s blog, Ranting Profs, is aimed at ‘media coverage in the war on terror’

Eric Muller’s blog, Is That Legal?, started out as random musings of a law professor — not necessarily about legal matters — but recently has been taken over by his research area — Japanese Interment in WWII — after a more than just lively run in with author Michelle Maklin.

Both have drawn on their readers for more information (knowledge capital) and support and references and other outlets for their work (social capital).