Social knowledge Management: Use of Social Media for Disseminating Informal Wisdom of Elderly to the Youth

Abstract

With the growing popularity of ‘Social Media’ and ‘Web 2.0’, the concept of ‘Knowledge Management 2.0’ has evolved that allows individuals to create and modify content collaboratively. The objective of this paper is to propose a framework for a social knowledge management platform that provides a set of social media tools like blogs, video chats, wikis, podcasting, social networking, etc, to capture and disseminate informal wisdom of the elderly for societal benefits. Elderly citizens can play a critical role in shaping up a future if they choose not to withdraw as they age, but to nurture themselves and the community as active elders. Apart from formal knowledge acquired from formal institutions, the young generation must learn from the informal wisdom of the “age”, wisdom acquired from the school of life itself. Use of web-enabled and social media tools can help us to redefine the role of elderly in today’s global society for educating the youth more effectively.