Amanda Singh
Summary of the “The New Literacy”
In Clive Thompson’s recent work, “Clive Thompson’s the New Literacy”, he praises digital technology for giving this day and age a writing revolution. Thompson refers to Andrea Lunsford’s, a writing and rhetoric professor at Stanford, evidence from a large project called the “Stanford Study of Writing”. In this study, Lunsford concludes that we are in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven’t seen since Greek civilization. Many people think have come to the assumption that technology has replaced carefully written essays and texting has made language into a “bleak, bald sad shorthand”. Lunsford has refuted this bemoaning and has said that technology isn’t killing our ability to write, helping us to expand and push out literacy in bold new directions. She points out that students almost always write for an audience which gives them a different since of what creates good writing opposite of students who had to write in class essays because it had no audience but the professor (no purpose but a grade).
Another important thing was that Lunsford’s team found that students were astonishingly adept at what rhetoricians’ call kairos-which means assessing their audience and adapting their tone and technique to best, get their point across. My own view is that technology does make students able to bring ideas to the audience more apparent and comprehensible. Also it is a plus side that using technology makes the process somewhat shorter and less stressful. It’s quick and to the point. Our ideas do not fail to get to the point because it’s more personal and less analyzed. Students adopt their tone and technique to get their point across. This discussion should matter to us because technology eases the process of writing. We benefit greatly. Thompson’s ideas respond to those who those who think that technology is ruining scholar’s grammar and language. They say that technology is to blame; Facebook encourages narcissistic blabbering, video and Powerpoint replaced carefully written essays. I can see somewhat from their viewpoint. Students on the internet trying to focus can be distracted and pulled from their work. Texting can also be distracting as well. Students would need to be able to manage their time doing the work their teacher tells them too.
In conclusion I think that technology does help students give out their ideas and talk better to their audience.
Welcome!
Welcome to our Eng 100 Blog “Conversations Beyond the Classroom”! The title of this blog refers to the community of active readers & collaborative learners we are creating by sharing our academic writing for Eng 100 with each other + a larger group of students, instructors, academics, and just about anybody who chooses to follow our blog! When you write and post your reader responses here (and, later, as you write your essays for the course), I encourage you to use this audience to conceptualize who you are writing for and, most important, how to communicate your ideas so that this group of academic readers and writers can easily follow your line of thinking. Think about it this way: What do you need to explain and articulate in order for the other bloggers to understand your response to the essays we’ve read in class? What does your audience need to know about those essays and the authors who wrote them? And how can you show your readers, in writing, which ideas you add to these “conversations” that take place in the texts we study?
As students of Eng 100, you will use this blog to begin conversations with other academic writers on campus (students and instructors alike). We become active readers of each other’s writing when we comment on posts here. And, best of all, we are using this space to share ideas! We encourage you to use this blog to further think through the topics and writing strategies you will be introduced to this quarter. As always, be sure to give credit to those people whose ideas you borrow for your own thinking and writing (you should do this in the blog by commenting on their post, but you will also be required to cite what you borrow from your peers/instructors if and when it winds up in your essays. More details on that later…).
Finally, keep in mind that writing to and for this audience is a good way to prepare for the panel of readers (faculty at WCC) who will be reading and assessing your writing portfolio at the end of the quarter. We hope that as a large group of active readers, we can better prepare each other for this experience. But, in the meantime, let’s have fun with it! I am really excited see how far we can take this together!
--Mary Hammerbeck, Instructor of Eng 100
As students of Eng 100, you will use this blog to begin conversations with other academic writers on campus (students and instructors alike). We become active readers of each other’s writing when we comment on posts here. And, best of all, we are using this space to share ideas! We encourage you to use this blog to further think through the topics and writing strategies you will be introduced to this quarter. As always, be sure to give credit to those people whose ideas you borrow for your own thinking and writing (you should do this in the blog by commenting on their post, but you will also be required to cite what you borrow from your peers/instructors if and when it winds up in your essays. More details on that later…).
Finally, keep in mind that writing to and for this audience is a good way to prepare for the panel of readers (faculty at WCC) who will be reading and assessing your writing portfolio at the end of the quarter. We hope that as a large group of active readers, we can better prepare each other for this experience. But, in the meantime, let’s have fun with it! I am really excited see how far we can take this together!
--Mary Hammerbeck, Instructor of Eng 100
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