1) According to my Screen Time (or similar) app, I have been spending approximately nine hours a day on my phone lately. This is more than normal times.
2) The social media platforms I use most are:
#1 Instagram. Time spent per recent day: 2 hours
#2 Twitter. Time spent per recent day: 90 minutes
3) This is how I get most of my news (going through social media/going straight to a news app, radio, etc.):
- Up First Podcast by NPR
- Hourly Updates by journalists on their Twitter handles
- YouTube uploads by News Networks
While the internet seems to be inundated with the content related to the novel coronavirus and its wider socio-economic impact, there isn’t really a lot being said about the different ways this entire situation has completely uprooted higher education and the daily lives of millions of college students across the country. In situations like these when there is a pressing need to have serious adult conversation, there is very little room in public discourse for emotional talk, which is especially deemed even more trivial when coming from young adults and teenagers. As residence halls emptied out and campus became eerily quiet, I stayed put for the longest time and witnessed the deconstruction of a community that I had fostered around me. Amidst all the scary statistics and the press commentary, I came across an article written by a college professor for the New Yorker that detailed all that was being lost as education was being virtually translated to students instead of physical transmission in a lecture hall. As a freshman who relied on campus for both physical and emotional needs, the article struck a chord with me as it was truly empathetic in its tone and made sure to sketch out the nuances of students’ varying conditions. I really liked the way the author did justice to the insignificant yet vital in-person experiences that form the crux of a true learning experience. It helped that the source of the article was someone who has been, for years, an integral part of the college narratives as an educator and can provide an insight into the implications of the abruptness of the situation.
Previously, I used to filter my news consumption by regulating my media diet—I used to start my diet with NPR podcasts, skimmed through the New York Times website between classes, and ended the day with some comfort opinion talk show on CNN/MSNBC. However, in this highly volatile situation which has deeply impacted my life and continues to hold my family hostage in a house thousands of miles away from me, I have given into the urge to consume information as it trickles in, despite the source. It has led to a lot of junk consumption of Twitter news that provides any sort of development on the ever-emerging situation—from unverified citizen reports to simple rumours floating on the net. It is a scramble to latch onto as much of the information as humanly possible. Instagram, however, eats up a majority of my time as it is the place I chose to go to reminisce campus life when all the news gets really overwhelming and I am craving a little positivity. Considering it has not been long since everything transpired, there is a lot of lingering nostalgia about college life and it is reflected in people’s posts on Instagram. Since I am trying to hold onto the memories of my freshmen year that will never return, I flock to Instagram as it is my only virtual connection to college friends and the year that was.
Featured Image via The New Yorker
Atharva Tewari 