From Bards to Blogs

Considering my two English classes this semester are Shakespeare and Electracy, this chapter speaks to the contradiction that is my semester. At the same time, I am taking an architecture class, which has ties to classical history, but has emphasis on digital design in today's world. My architectural portfolio class stresses the creation of both a print and a digital portfolio for job security and graduate school applications, and my final class, which is a drawing class, stresses the importance of becoming fluent in the relationship between pen and paper.

This entire semester is a confusion.... or at least a response to the cultural change that computers and digital media have granted us.

Probably the most interesting argument in this chapter (at least to me) is the dual position that blogging grants us-- the print tradition and the oral tradition-- and its connection to the writings of Plato.

Since the invention of the printing press, our "literate" culture has been a solitary act-- true, we read and participate in class discussions, we read and join book groups-- but reading is something done alone. It is a very personal and private activity, suggested by the "quiet" signs in libraries and study halls across the world.

Before mass print, we were an oral culture. Not many people were literate-- texts were read out loud for social interaction and discourse, news traveled by word of mouth and took years to reach other countries and parts of the world-- if, at all.

The change from the oral culture to the print culture across the world created a mass change in our society-- pamphlets (and literacy) spread the ideas of Protestantism, liberty, free speech, and human rights. We changed from a widely monarchical society to a world full of republics-- emphasizing that all men are equal, and later, that all women, races, and walks of life were equal. Without print, the call for a widespread unity of thought and idea was not possible, and today's society probably would not even exist.

We have now transitioned to a hybrid between print and oral tradition. With the internet, we are reading and writing more than ever before, however, this is not the private culture we have associated with literacy in the past.

Most blogs not only allow, but actually encourage comments from readers. Sites like Facebook and Twitter allow people to share their thoughts on everyday life as well as sites and articles they have found with their friends and family, while places like Stumbleupon and Digg allow us to share our thoughts with the general public, people with shared interests, and complete strangers.

With this transition to a oral (or shared/typed/liked?) type of interaction with our literacy, I am guessing my main question is....

What type of societal change is in store for us???