Earlier this week, Duke University held our first Twitter chat during President Obama’s State of the Union speech. We came up with the idea in a brainstorming session about getting faculty to try new tools and use social networking to amplify their voices. The concept was to assemble a handful of faculty and post-doc students who are already on Twitter – or just interested in trying Twitter – to have a sidebar conversation during a larger conversation on the social network.

The result was the creation of the hashtag #DukeChat, linking to broader international discussion about the speech at #SOTU.

Terrorism expert David Schanzer, religion professor Ebrahim Moosa, Maurice Wallace of AAAS and other Duke faculty also participated in the Twitter conversation, which included about 250 posts. Others watching the conversation online Internet added their own comments. A complete transcript is available.

“As a ‘Twitter newbie,” I found the experience interesting and enlightening,” said political science professor Paula McClain, whose comments ranged from Obama’s “tough talk on China” to how House Speaker John Boehner was reacting to the speech. “It was interesting to see how my view sometimes corresponded with those of my colleagues and at other times differed. I am definitely up for this again.”

A Storify round-up of the Twitter conversation can be found here.