Luke Buehrer
Dr. Amy Amendt-Raduege
Final Draft
English 101
April 18, 2010
No one argues that the world has changed drastically in the past decade with the rise of technology. When technology comes up, almost every one has an opinion. Some people like feel that technology is pushing literacy in new exciting directions. Where others like Sven Birkerts (Author of “The Owl Has Flown”) feel that “ We are experiencing in our times a loss of depth—a loss, that is, of the very paradigm of depth. A sense of the deep and natural connectedness of things is a function of vertical conscience.” (Birkerts 32) What he basically says here is that we are losing depth and wisdom, because of new conveniences technology offers. Is technology doing what Birkerts suggest (loss of wisdom) to people’s social lives? Maybe social interaction and communication skills are becoming less important with the new ease of technology, making peoples social and communication skills shallower and less meaningful.
Texting and chat rooms are now a huge form of communication. With cell phones people are now able to carry on conversations from almost anywhere, at any distance and at any time. Texting and other new technologies seem like it would be a good thing. First it makes communication much more efficient, allows for more social interaction, and can promote relationships. But what if it really is hurting instead of helping? Texting is now more common than phone calls; it’s quicker and allows people to hide behind text. Where people once had to practice carrying on real life conversations, texting offers relief from possible awkward situations. If something uncomfortable comes up, people can just stop texting; they don’t have to try ending the conversation. This can lead to poor communication skills, because little effort is put forth practicing communicating in hard situations.
Nicholas Carr, author of “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” notices a different developing trend caused by the Web, “The more they (literate types) use the Web, the more they have to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing.” (Carr par. 5) He is saying that the ease of sites like Google and Spark Notes is making reading for extended periods of time harder and harder. It seems that this same principle may be true for communication. Like skimming over different texts, one can skim over different conversations in chat rooms, never fully committed to one. This possibly leading to weak skills on carrying on lengthy talks, similar to reading long books or articles. Carr suggests that this inability to read leads to stupidity or at least being less competent to find information. Could these chat rooms could do the same? If people rarely carry on in deep conversions how could they develop vertical thinking? As Birkerts suggests, personal reflection and resonance is a big key to gaining wisdom. But without others to bounce ideas off of, wisdom is hard to grasp.
Carrying on conversations is important, but the context of the conversation is equally if not more important. Particularly true with teenagers, the conversations revolve around shallow self-centered garbage. Since they have access to these technologies all the time there is little effort put forth to have a meaningful talk. When this technology was not around, people had to either write a letter, or call a person up. This made for more meaningful conversations because access to talk was not always present. Someone wouldn’t write a letter to a friend saying you were just “hanging ‘round doin’ nothing,” as is so common now with the internet. Technology has made communication something that people do when their bored, just to entertain, not gain depth.
Technology is a great time-killer, but also offers a false sense of a social life. Sites like Face Book and Myspace allow people to have friends and a “social life” with out ever leaving their computer. There are lots of people with hundreds of on-line friends, but they don’t know half of them. They just like the idea that they are popular. In order to have a social life individuals must go out and do stuff with others, not just sit around blabbering to people about how bored they are. With out real life interaction, it seems hard to call these on-line friends true friends. Relationships are built off of past experiences together. This is hard to accomplish on-line, some people manage to meet on-line, get engaged on-line and first see each other on their wedding day. Although these sites can help spark relationships, healthy relationships occur off the computer.
Texting has had a huge impact, the U.S. Census Bureau found that text messaging sent on cell phones more than doubled from 48 million in December 2007 to 110 billion in December 2008(Is Texting Destroying English Language).This rise in text must have an effect of communication. Beth L. Jokinen, author of Is Texting Destroying English Language said, “With so much texting, it's bound to impact all the grammar and spelling educators spend valuable time teaching.” This impact easily could be harmful, but I wonder if there could be a more consequences of texting? Without the ability to communicate clearly and intelligently there could be some bigger consequences. If people begin using “Text language” for normal talking, a trend that is on the rise many things could be in harms way. Saying “Lol” and other chat room words makes for shallow communication. Without meaningful conversations, new ideas made be bouncing thought of each other will become scarce. The innovation that has made the past century may slow leading to a bleak future.
Texting also can lead to addictive habits. Teenagers especially have a tendency to over use this new technology. A very common symptom of people who over text is a loss of sleep; because they don’t want to miss a text. Many teenagers are becoming sleep deprived because of this. The director of the Oakland, California-based Public Health Institute's Center for Research on Adolescent Health and Development says sleep deprivation is linked to memory and concentration problems, anxiety and depression, moodiness and hyperactivity (What’s that tap tap tap in the night!; Teens’ texting causes sleep problems). If sleep deprivation is link to all these problems then there must be an impact on their social life as well. Being moody, tired and depressed must make socializing hard. It is almost ironic, the desire to be in constant communication may lead to depression, which leads to isolation. So by over socializing it may be possible to become anti-social.
Admittedly these sites do offer some good. They can help people’s social lives, but if only used correctly. The way I see how to use these site appropriately is to do two things, first use it to spark relationships. People can meet lots of people on web sites (like E Harmony a dating site), but you don’t continue your relationship on the site you go out and get to know them in real life. The other way it can be used for healthy relationships is by carrying on an already established relationship. If one already know someone well then it’s easier to have meaningful conversations on-line, because you know them. But relationships based around the computer can never be strong. Another way that sites offer good is to enable far away relatives or friends to communicate with each other. These sites can make people feel a lot closer to far away relatives and friends because they can carry on conversations whenever you want with them, and keep in touch with their life. The big key to using this technology, like almost anything, is moderation.
My perspective may be different from the average American because I use these technologies little. So I may not have first hand experience, but I have observed my friends partake in these technologies. I am not saying they are brainless robots, but I am concerned that this life style could lead to a loss in the future, with poor communication skills and possible weak relationships; life may not seem as fruitful. In the end, these trends will not end the world, but certainly technology like texting and chat rooms are not an activity to overindulge in.
Works Cited
Burrell, Jackie. "Whats that tap tap tap in the night!; Teens’ texting causes sleep
problems." (2009): n. pag. Web. 30 Apr 2010.
Birkerts, Sven. "The Owl Has Flown." 1994. Making Sense: Essays on Art, Science, and
Culture. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. 28-34. Print.
Carr, Nicholas. "Is Google Making Us Stupid." The Atlantic July-Aug. 2008. The
Atlantic Wire, July 2008. Web. 28 Feb. 2010.
Jokinen, Beth. "Is Texting Destroying English Language." (2009): n. pag. Web. 30 Apr
2010.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Draft #1
Luke Buehrer
Dr. Amy Amendt-Raduege
Assignment #1
English 101
April 18, 2010
No one argues that the world has changed drastically in the past decade with the rise of technology. When technology comes up, almost every one has an opinion. Some people like feel that technology is pushing literacy in new exciting directions. Where others like Sven Birkerts (Author of The Owl Has Flown) feel that “We are experiencing in our times a loss of depth—a loss, that is, of the very paradigm of depth. A sense of the deep and natural connectedness of things is a function of vertical conscience.” (Birkerts 32) What he basically says here is that we are losing depth and wisdom, because of new conveniences technology offers. Is technology doing what Birkerts suggest (loss of wisdom) to people’s social lives? Maybe social interaction and communication skills are becoming less important with the new ease of technology, making peoples social and communication skills shallower and less meaningful.
Texting and chat rooms are now a huge form of communication. With cell phones people are now able to carry on conversations from almost anywhere, at any distance and at any time. This seems like it would be a good thing. First it makes communication much more efficient, allows for more social interaction, and can promote relationships. But what if it really is hurting instead of helping. Texting is now more common than phone calls; it’s quicker and allows people to hide behind text. Where people once had to practice carrying on real life conversations, texting offers relief from possible awkward situations. If something uncomfortable comes up, people can just stop texting; they don’t have to try ending the conversation. This can lead to poor communication skills, because little effort is put forth practicing communicating in hard situations.
Nicholas Carr, author of “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” notices a different developing trend caused by the Web, “The more they (literate types) use the Web, the more they have to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing.” (Carr par. 5) He is saying that the ease of sites like Google and Spark Notes is making reading for extended periods of time harder and harder. It seems that this same principle may be true for communication. Like skimming over different texts, one can skim over different conversations in chat rooms, never fully committed to one. This possibly leading to weak skills on carrying on lengthy talks, similar to reading long books or articles. Carr suggests that this inability to read leads to stupidity or at least being less competent to find information. Could these chat rooms could do the same? If people rarely carry on in deep conversions how could they develop vertical thinking? As Birkerts suggests, personal reflection and resonance is a big key to gaining wisdom. But without others to bounce ideas off of, wisdom is hard to grasp.
Caring on conversations is important, but the context of the conversation is equally if not more important. Particularly true with teenagers, the conversations revolve around shallow self-center garbage. Since they have access to this all the time there is little effort put forth to have a meaningful talk. When this technology was not around, people had to either write a letter, or call a person up. This made for more meaningful conversations because access to talk was not always present. Someone wouldn’t write a letter to a friend saying you were just “hanging ‘round doin’ nothing,” as is so common now with the internet. Technology has made communication something that people do when their bored, just to entertain, not gain depth.
Technology is a great time-killer, but also offers a false sense of a social life. Sites like Face Book and Myspace allow people to have friends and a “social life” with out ever leaving their computer. There are lots of people with hundreds of on-line friends, but they don’t know half of them. They just like the idea that they are popular. In order to have a social life individuals must go out and do stuff with others, not just sit around blabbering to people about how bored they are. With out real life interaction, it seems hard to call these on-line friends true friends. Relationships are built off of past experiences together. This is hard to accomplish on-line, some people manage to meet on-line, get engaged on-line and first see each other on their wedding day. Although these sites can help spark relationships, healthy relationships occur off the computer.
Texting has had a huge impact, the U.S. Census Bureau found that text messaging sent on cell phones more than doubled from 48 million in December 2007 to 110 billion in December 2008(Is Texting Destroying English Language).This rise in text must have an effect of communication. Beth L. Jokinen, author of Is Texting Destroying English Language said, “With so much texting, it's bound to impact all the grammar and spelling educators spend valuable time teaching.” While this easily could be true could it have a even bigger impact. Without the ability to communicate clearly and intelligently there could be some bigger consequences. If people begin using “Text language” for normal talking, a trend that is on the rise many things could be in harms way. Saying “Lol” and other chat room words makes for shallow communication. Without meaningful conversations, new ideas made be bouncing thought of each other will become scarce. The innovation that has made the past century may slow leading to a bleak future.
Texting also can lead to addictive habits. Teenagers especially have a tendency to over use this new technology. A very common symptom of people who over text is a loss of sleep; because they don’t want to miss a text. Many teenagers are becoming sleep deprived because of this. The director of the Oakland, Calif.-based Public Health Institute's Center for Research on Adolescent Health and Development says sleep deprivation is linked to memory and concentration problems, anxiety and depression, moodiness and hyperactivity ( W h a t ' s t h a t ' t a p t a p t a p ' i n t h e n i g h t ? ; T e e n s ' t e x t i n g c a u s e s s l e e p p r o b l e m s). If sleep deprivation is link to all these problems then there must be an impact on their social life as well. Being moody, tired and depressed must make socializing hard. It is almost ironic, the desire to be in constant communication may lead to depression, which leads to isolation. So by over socializing it may be possible to become anti-social.
Admittedly these sites do offer some good. They can help people’s social lives, but if only used correctly. The way I see how to use these site appropriately is to do two things, first use it to spark relationships. People can meet lots of people on web sites (like E Harmony a dating site), but you don’t continue your relationship on the site you go out and get to know them in real life. The other way it can be used for healthy relationships is by carrying on an already established relationship. If one already know someone well then it’s easier to have meaningful conversations on-line, because you know them. But relationships based around the computer can never be strong. Another way that sites offer good is to enable far away relatives or friends to communicate with each other. These sites can make people feel a lot closer to far away relatives and friends because they can carry on conversations whenever you want with them, and keep in touch with their life. The big key to using this technology, like almost anything, is moderation.
My perspective may be different from the average American because I use these technologies little. So I may not have first hand experience, but I have observed my friends partake in these technologies. I am not saying they are brainless robots, but I am concerned that this life style could lead to a loss in the future, with poor communication skills and possible weak relationships; life may not seem as fruitful. In the end, these trends will not end the world, but certainly technology like texting and chat rooms are not an activity to overindulge in.
Works Cited
Birkerts, Sven. "The Owl Has Flown." 1994. Making Sense: Essays on Art, Science, and Culture. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. 28-34. Print.
Beth L. Jokinen. McClatchy - Tribune Business News. Washington: Dec 28, 2009.
Carr, Nicholas. "Is Google Making Us Stupid." The Atlantic July-Aug. 2008. The Atlantic Wire, July 2008. Web. 28 Feb. 2010.
Jackie Burrell. Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Ill.: Nov 1, 2009. p. 25
Dr. Amy Amendt-Raduege
Assignment #1
English 101
April 18, 2010
No one argues that the world has changed drastically in the past decade with the rise of technology. When technology comes up, almost every one has an opinion. Some people like feel that technology is pushing literacy in new exciting directions. Where others like Sven Birkerts (Author of The Owl Has Flown) feel that “We are experiencing in our times a loss of depth—a loss, that is, of the very paradigm of depth. A sense of the deep and natural connectedness of things is a function of vertical conscience.” (Birkerts 32) What he basically says here is that we are losing depth and wisdom, because of new conveniences technology offers. Is technology doing what Birkerts suggest (loss of wisdom) to people’s social lives? Maybe social interaction and communication skills are becoming less important with the new ease of technology, making peoples social and communication skills shallower and less meaningful.
Texting and chat rooms are now a huge form of communication. With cell phones people are now able to carry on conversations from almost anywhere, at any distance and at any time. This seems like it would be a good thing. First it makes communication much more efficient, allows for more social interaction, and can promote relationships. But what if it really is hurting instead of helping. Texting is now more common than phone calls; it’s quicker and allows people to hide behind text. Where people once had to practice carrying on real life conversations, texting offers relief from possible awkward situations. If something uncomfortable comes up, people can just stop texting; they don’t have to try ending the conversation. This can lead to poor communication skills, because little effort is put forth practicing communicating in hard situations.
Nicholas Carr, author of “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” notices a different developing trend caused by the Web, “The more they (literate types) use the Web, the more they have to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing.” (Carr par. 5) He is saying that the ease of sites like Google and Spark Notes is making reading for extended periods of time harder and harder. It seems that this same principle may be true for communication. Like skimming over different texts, one can skim over different conversations in chat rooms, never fully committed to one. This possibly leading to weak skills on carrying on lengthy talks, similar to reading long books or articles. Carr suggests that this inability to read leads to stupidity or at least being less competent to find information. Could these chat rooms could do the same? If people rarely carry on in deep conversions how could they develop vertical thinking? As Birkerts suggests, personal reflection and resonance is a big key to gaining wisdom. But without others to bounce ideas off of, wisdom is hard to grasp.
Caring on conversations is important, but the context of the conversation is equally if not more important. Particularly true with teenagers, the conversations revolve around shallow self-center garbage. Since they have access to this all the time there is little effort put forth to have a meaningful talk. When this technology was not around, people had to either write a letter, or call a person up. This made for more meaningful conversations because access to talk was not always present. Someone wouldn’t write a letter to a friend saying you were just “hanging ‘round doin’ nothing,” as is so common now with the internet. Technology has made communication something that people do when their bored, just to entertain, not gain depth.
Technology is a great time-killer, but also offers a false sense of a social life. Sites like Face Book and Myspace allow people to have friends and a “social life” with out ever leaving their computer. There are lots of people with hundreds of on-line friends, but they don’t know half of them. They just like the idea that they are popular. In order to have a social life individuals must go out and do stuff with others, not just sit around blabbering to people about how bored they are. With out real life interaction, it seems hard to call these on-line friends true friends. Relationships are built off of past experiences together. This is hard to accomplish on-line, some people manage to meet on-line, get engaged on-line and first see each other on their wedding day. Although these sites can help spark relationships, healthy relationships occur off the computer.
Texting has had a huge impact, the U.S. Census Bureau found that text messaging sent on cell phones more than doubled from 48 million in December 2007 to 110 billion in December 2008(Is Texting Destroying English Language).This rise in text must have an effect of communication. Beth L. Jokinen, author of Is Texting Destroying English Language said, “With so much texting, it's bound to impact all the grammar and spelling educators spend valuable time teaching.” While this easily could be true could it have a even bigger impact. Without the ability to communicate clearly and intelligently there could be some bigger consequences. If people begin using “Text language” for normal talking, a trend that is on the rise many things could be in harms way. Saying “Lol” and other chat room words makes for shallow communication. Without meaningful conversations, new ideas made be bouncing thought of each other will become scarce. The innovation that has made the past century may slow leading to a bleak future.
Texting also can lead to addictive habits. Teenagers especially have a tendency to over use this new technology. A very common symptom of people who over text is a loss of sleep; because they don’t want to miss a text. Many teenagers are becoming sleep deprived because of this. The director of the Oakland, Calif.-based Public Health Institute's Center for Research on Adolescent Health and Development says sleep deprivation is linked to memory and concentration problems, anxiety and depression, moodiness and hyperactivity ( W h a t ' s t h a t ' t a p t a p t a p ' i n t h e n i g h t ? ; T e e n s ' t e x t i n g c a u s e s s l e e p p r o b l e m s). If sleep deprivation is link to all these problems then there must be an impact on their social life as well. Being moody, tired and depressed must make socializing hard. It is almost ironic, the desire to be in constant communication may lead to depression, which leads to isolation. So by over socializing it may be possible to become anti-social.
Admittedly these sites do offer some good. They can help people’s social lives, but if only used correctly. The way I see how to use these site appropriately is to do two things, first use it to spark relationships. People can meet lots of people on web sites (like E Harmony a dating site), but you don’t continue your relationship on the site you go out and get to know them in real life. The other way it can be used for healthy relationships is by carrying on an already established relationship. If one already know someone well then it’s easier to have meaningful conversations on-line, because you know them. But relationships based around the computer can never be strong. Another way that sites offer good is to enable far away relatives or friends to communicate with each other. These sites can make people feel a lot closer to far away relatives and friends because they can carry on conversations whenever you want with them, and keep in touch with their life. The big key to using this technology, like almost anything, is moderation.
My perspective may be different from the average American because I use these technologies little. So I may not have first hand experience, but I have observed my friends partake in these technologies. I am not saying they are brainless robots, but I am concerned that this life style could lead to a loss in the future, with poor communication skills and possible weak relationships; life may not seem as fruitful. In the end, these trends will not end the world, but certainly technology like texting and chat rooms are not an activity to overindulge in.
Works Cited
Birkerts, Sven. "The Owl Has Flown." 1994. Making Sense: Essays on Art, Science, and Culture. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. 28-34. Print.
Beth L. Jokinen. McClatchy - Tribune Business News. Washington: Dec 28, 2009.
Carr, Nicholas. "Is Google Making Us Stupid." The Atlantic July-Aug. 2008. The Atlantic Wire, July 2008. Web. 28 Feb. 2010.
Jackie Burrell. Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Ill.: Nov 1, 2009. p. 25
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