Recently a friend called me “old school” because I go to the public library to rent movies rather than finding them on some random streaming website; I also go there to rent books for non-scholastic reading. However I’m not sure if I really deserve the term old school. Yes, I go to libraries often. Unlike Leslie Knope, I think libraries are excellent and I hope they never go away. But I don’t do this because I’m averse to technologies such as online video streaming or e-readers. I often catch up on TV shows by using sketchy, probably illegal streaming sites. I own and frequently use a Kindle. It’s just easier and cheaper for me to do things the old school way. So for me, the question of where digital texts fit into my life doesn’t have a black and white answer. I’m no defender of technology by any means. I have especially strong views about the damaging effects of social media, but otherwise I find many uses for digital texts and think I have benefited from the knowledge I’ve gained from them—even if they do occasionally suck away my time. But is it a bad thing that engaging in digital texts sometimes sucks away my time? Carr suggests that people today probably read more than they did in the 1980s when everyone just watched television all the time, yet he still has a problem with the kind of reading we do online. In response to the idea that people no longer engage in deep reading because of how reading has changed in the digital age, I would like to suggest that many people still read deeply, but it has to really interest them. I will read a long article on a topic I enjoy, but I will skim something that interests me less. I don’t see a problem with this. So no, I don’t think Google is making me stupid. However I wonder at Carr’s idea that the inability to engage in deep reading suggests a person is stupid. There are many kinds of intelligences—linguistic being only one of nine if you subscribe to the theory of multiple intelligences—and perhaps some are strengthened and encouraged by use of digital texts. Others may not even be affected by technology. In any case, I have been able to utilize digital texts to do things such as catch up on presidential primary debates I missed on TV or research a new idea for a short story right when the thought comes to me. Just the other night I purchased a book on my Kindle at 11:00 pm and stayed awake until 4:00 am reading it. I am better able to explore my real interests because of the technology I have at my fingertips. In his response to Carr, Steven Johnson suggests something similar when he says, “And the speed with which we can follow the trail of an idea, or discover new perspectives on a problem, has increased by several orders of magnitude. We are marginally less focused, and exponentially more connected.”
In conclusion, here is my advice to anyone wrestling with this issue:
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Anna SharpBelmont writing major who is about to become a Real Adult™ and still owns like 12 coloring books. Archives
May 2016
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