Month: March 2016

I didn’t quite know what to expect from the Ito article when I first read the title. Part of me expected a sort of dry, academic piece on “kids and the media” viewed from the lens of someone who sort of understands but still misses the mark. Suffice to say I was pleasantly surprised. I really enjoyed the section on “Geeking Out”, which is the type of new media engagement defined by Ito as “…an intense commitment to or engagement with media or technology, often one particular media property, genre, or type of technology.”

I would say this sort of behavior describes much of my childhood through adolescence: I would find some sort of community (gaming, politics, and the vast expanses of YouTube channels to name a few), attach myself to it, and learn as much as I could related to that subject. While someone from any other generation would likely look at this behavior of being glued to your computer screen as a purely negative thing, I can’t help but look back on those communities fondly and think that they were largely responsible for shaping my interests and personality as an adult today. I learned how to become an expert in a field (given one of little relative consequence) and from there, I developed larger obsessions that still carry on to this day.

Ultimately, I feel as though  the rapid and frequent process of large sums of information via “geeking out” is surely defined as literary activity, and the interactive portion only confounds this, and is a reflection of how “new media” is affecting our literacy capacities later in life.

My question then is this: How much of your childhood was spent “Geeking out” in online communities, and how do you think it has impacted the way you view and utilize literacy today?

In the article “Living and Learning with New Media” there is a part where it talks about how teenagers often have to find ways around the restrictions placed upon the ways they can socialize. Some of the main ways that they do this is by socializing in places that generally aren’t sanctioned to socialize in and using technology to socialize. The article says “because these work-arounds and back channels take place in schools, homes, vehicles, and other contexts of young people’s everyday lives, teens become adept at maintaining a continuous presence, or co-presence, in multiple contexts.” What I found most interesting in this quote was the phrase “co-presence”. In terms of technology I couldn’t help but think that this phrase meant that you might have one presence in the real world and another presence online. If that was what that meant then teenagers and young people today have tons of presences. For example, I might be present in class but also texting in my group chat of best friends from home and snapchatting a person in another state and posting a picture onto facebook that all thousand something of my facebook friends can see. As technology has developed so that all my social media needs are in one place (my phone), having a continuous co-presence is the easiest thing in the world. As a college student there are much less restrictions on hanging out with friends but there are still some that exist; not having the same schedules, not going to the same schools and things like that, so these work-arounds and back channels become the only way to keep in touch with people that are impossible to see for reasons other than our parents telling us we can’t go out.

Since Ito’s report was written a few years ago, there have been developments in media used by the youth that she could not account for. Today there is newer social media than MySpace and Facebook, which are medias like Instagram, and Twitter. Gaming has grown, to larger audiences, and new sites have been created in attempts to improve gaming experiences. And as for video sharing sites, YouTube remains popular, but Vine is a relatively new form, which is growing in popularity  as well.

With this newer media, do Ito’s theories of the benefits of new media still stand? Do the restrictive nature of Instagram, Twitter, and Vine improve these literacy spaces, or lessen their quality? Can you hang out, mess around, and geek out on these newer medias, and if so what kinds of examples are there?

In the Cornelius article, as well as the Lu article, those looking to attain a certain level of literacy are met with breakthroughs that change their view of literacy. For slaves, this was marked by the transition that comes with attaining literacy. Sella Martin described it as a “click of comprehension” the first time he was able to both read and comprehend written words (Cornelius 71). In the Lu article, she described a similar feeling upon realizing “social class” and the adjective “classy” are actually similar concepts. The distance between the two had been accentuated by the separation of “home” and “school” ideals, as well as English being a second language for her.

In both scenarios, reaching a new understanding involves restructuring the way they see and use literacy. For Lu, it was steeped in connotations and the ideology behind words. For many of the slaves in Cornelius’s work, it was about consolidating and expanding a new skill.

In both of these instances, however, these revelations are coming at what would be, to most of us, elementary-high school levels of achievement. How does restructuring come into play at higher levels? What sort of learning has caused you to restructure your literacy, or how you view it? How do these instances of restructuring change the way we pursue certain literacies?

In the article “When I Can Read My Title Clear,” Cornelius discusses how slaves had the desire to learn to read and write but were punished when their owners found out. They had to be extremely secretive about learning to read and write because the punishments were extremely severe. For example, Henry Wright’s father learned to read with the help of his master’s son, which he was told to keep to himself, because if the white men in the community found out one of the slaves could read and write, they would cut his fingers off. These severe punishments instilled fear in many, but also promoted secretive learning among those whose “sympathetic owners” allowed them to learn.

My question regarding this reading is why do you think slave owners were so afraid of the slaves learning to read and write? From what we have discussed in class, reading and writing seems to be a positive thing; it is something that promotes mental growth and forward, critical thinking. It is an outlet for us to release our deepest thoughts and calm the mind. Do you think the answer to this question revolves around power? Equal rights? Or do you think it is something broader or more personal than that?

In the Cornelius article, much of it discussed the “rights” given to slaves in the 1800s in each state, and the discrepancy in between. He references a Benjamin Russell in South Carolina who says “we were taught to read… it was against the law to teach a slave to write”. They went on to say that reading was taught against the law there, but there seems to have been no flexing the law when it came to writing. Upon reading this, my initial reaction was disgust. It felt that the community was okay with educating slaves, as they knew that they were able to learn those skills, but did not provide them with the means to express themselves.

With this thought, I had the question of “How is the skill of reading impaired without the ability to write?” For these slaves, who were surely silenced on a daily basis, writing could have been their outlet. The fact that they were taught to read is very fortunate, but still being denied writing seems very cruel. I imagine that – with the skill of reading – a slave in this time period could have benefited from this outlet or means of communication, at the very least.

The Lu article is all about the struggles between traditional classroom settings and the home. I found the stories and examples used interesting because they showed (especially the Marxism scenario) how even government and political ideologies affect literacy. However, I was most intrigued by something towards the end of the reading.

Later in the article, Lu talks about how both her and her husband are proud of how their daughter is doing in school, but they are worried that her very fluency will “silence” her in the scene of reading and writing beyond the classroom. I found this part interesting because (as a young college student myself) it makes me think how much classroom time is needed to perform your intended job later in life. So, my question is, what is more important, the ways of the classroom or more “on-the-job experience?” What is more important in developing into a white collared worker? Explain.

While reading the Lu article, a sense of familiarity overtook me. This struggle between what the school told her was true and what her parents showed her reminded me of a struggle we talked about earlier in the semester: the literacy practices of the Amish.

The article we read regarding the Amish did not talk about the views some of the young adults have if they leave the Amish community and return, but we touched on it a bit in class.

Do you think that the experiences and internal conflicts the Amish would have after leaving the community for a while and then returning would be similar to the struggle and conflict Lu discussed? If so, how? If not, why not and how do you think that the struggle or conflict would present itself?