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I learn a lot on Tumblr. I follow a lot of really great people that post links, infographics, GIF sets, and comics covering everything from Star Trek trivia to trans* identity. I like that when I look at my dashboard, or do a cursory search of a tag I will experience a mix of future tattoo ideas and links to PDFs of social theory. Invariably, within this eclectic mix that I’ve curated for myself, I will come across a post with notes that show multiple people claiming that the post taught them something and so they feel obligated to reblog it so others may also know this crucial information. If you’re a regular Tumblr user you’re probably familiar with the specific kind of emphatic sharing. Sometimes it is implied by one word in all caps: “THIS!” In other instances the author is ashamed or frustrated that they didn’t know something sooner. For example, I recently reblogged a post about America’s Japanese internment camps that contained a note from another user who was angry that they were 24 when they first learned about their existence. I want to give this phenomenon a name and, in the tradition of fellow regular contributor Robin James’ recent “thinking out-loud” posts, throw a few questions out there to see if anyone has more insights on this.

Yesterday evening I asked Twitter if anyone had a name for this performance of learning that is so intentionally public. Most of the responses ranged from widely interpretable descriptors like “activist” or “advocate” to phrases that couldn’t be “repeated in polite company.” Several people used the term “social justice warrior” and noted that it was “typically not meant as a compliment.” frequent guest contributor Jeremy Antley made up the term “water-cooler crier” (as in town crier) which I like but doesn’t quite get at the persuasive aspect of what I keep seeing in Tumblr notes. A town crier doesn’t explicitly underscore the importance of their message the way a Tumblr user wants you to know how about the significance of Rose and The Tenth Doctor’s relationship. Admittedly, I don’t think I was as clear as I should have been in my original request, and the reference to “consciousness raising” might have primed people to think more politically than was necessary. So I think, for now at least, I want to call this affective condition simply “notorious learning.”

Notorious learning is the conspicuous consumption of information. It requires admitting ignorance of an important fact, so that the act of learning/consuming may be celebrated. It is always emphatic but can range from righteous anger to child-like glee. The individual instances of notorious learning can take many forms: A notorious learner can be grateful that her mind was blown by the semiotic insights of some anonymous Breaking Bad gif set maker or she can give a “signal boost” to an egregiously under-reported story of police brutality. In both instances the notorious learner wants to not just share the information, but share something about the perceived scarcity of the information.

Of course with scarcity comes a kind of value. The thing learned is important but it’s precious because the idea is so rare. Herein lies a kind of paradox: Reblogging reduces the scarcity and –in theory– could bring the value down to mundanity, but you continue to share because the information is important. In this way, the notorious learner is self-annihilating. They are always reducing the theoretical number of things to be surprised about; always seeking unearthed truths and marveling at how anyone went so long without knowing that The X-Files re-created scenes of the Dick Van Dyke show for that episode where Mulder and Scully go undercover as Rob and Laura Petrie. Seriously, did you know that?

I should stop here ––before I get to my Bigger Questions–– and acknowledge that I’m lumping really serious and important stuff (i.e. trans* identity, police brutality) with literal trivia. This isn’t because I think they’re of equal importance or magnitude, nor do I think notorious learners are treating all information with the same level of gravitas or importance. I acknowledge that as a straight cis white male there is a lot more information out there that I have the privilege of not knowing or voluntarily learning. I think that’s a big part of the notorious learner’s MO, although I’d want more empirical data before I said anything more. Which brings me to my first big question…

What is so satisfying about notorious learning? Why, on such a truly astounding array of topics, do people feel so compelled to admit ignorance so that they may underscore the importance of the information? Early twentieth century sociologist and economist Thorstein Veblen coined the term conspicuous consumption to describe how the nouveau riche flaunted their cash. In Veblen’s time it meant ostentatious furs and cars, today Mark Zuckerberg slaughters his own grass-fed meat. Perhaps, in an attention economy, we not only have to be very selective about what we spend time on but also flaunt just how much information we’re accumulating. If attention is precious and scarce, then aren’t we flaunting a kind of wealth when we show just how many things we paid attention to?

Regardless of whether one buys the econometric metaphors (I’m actually pretty suspicious of their neoliberal implications) I think we can all agree that this thing I’m calling notorious learning is performative. That is, people are deliberately drawing attention to the process of their learning, not just the importance/itnerestingness of the fact itself. I did a little bit of my own notorious learning when #ttw14’s anti-harassment statement was critiqued and made better immediately after posting it to our site. I wanted to express my gratitude and excitement that the community was making the statement better, while at the same time (again my subject position is important here) not doing that back-patting thing that straight, cis white people love to do when they learned a thing. Is notoriously learning mostly a platform for acting the white savior, or is it a site for critiquing it? I suspect it has to be both, or at least the former has to happen so that the latter may occur in the open as well.

I’d appreciate some notorious learning about notorious learning here in the comments. What do you think? Is this a new phenomenon, or just more visible? Are Tumblr users being conspicuous in their data consumption or are they just acting the enlightened individual?

 David is on Twitter and Tumblr.