I just closed my eyes again. . .

Lydia McDermott, my good ole poetry friend, and I have started a project to turn a few of our poems into an interactive, hypertexty comic-book website, complete with pertinent scholarship from the good ole field of visual rhetoric. We're learning Dreamweaver, a program of website generation, and scouting locations for complementary videos/photo-essays.




I'll be writing a handful of posts to log our progress and to share ideas with the class and a wider audience (Rob Strong).

Yesterday, I was helped by three separate, incredibly eager employees of Ohio University (not counting my GAship-toting, wonderful fiancee, Megan, who brought me a bag of pretzels while I watched Hardball). First, I reaped (rept sounds better here) the benefits of the Shangri-La that is the Faculty Commons.

Pounding free coffee and beginning to shake, with excitement over the project of course, I sought the services of one Mike Roy, whom I'd once seen spend over an hour teaching an interior design professor a program on one of the 58-inch screens in what is truly God's library.


(Before I go overboard with OU love, I have to include my disdain for a particular salary-sucker in the registrar's office who continually points out the error of my bureaucracy-bypassing ways without glancing up from her game of Minesweeper. She is NO Mike Roy).

So, Mr. Roy navigated me through the OU website in search of a tutorial for aforementioned Dreamweaver. My roommate Dave had suggested that such tutorials were so badly attended by the intellectually-curious student body that the administration had begun offering custom, individual training.

Boon!

While we were searching (and finding), Barb Duncan, formerly of the English department, brought us Nestle's Crunches. I felt like Seinfeld in First Class while all the Elaines toiled in the 80 degree heat of Coach library.

"More anything?" "More everything!"

Eventually, Mike found me the correct course, and my webship set sail.

Later, I would be helped by a zealous reference librarian who instructed me in the Byzantine art of Boolean searches. He was wearing the same yellow IZod polo I sport in late Augusts, and he had my cowlick. This doppeldaver was emblematic of every reference librarian with whom I've ever come in contact (comparable even to the incomparable Lorraine Wochna, whose very name has become synecdochic for zest).

After getting what I'd wanted from the man, I attempted to scurry three or four times, only to be given one more delightful hint about archives and microfiche. Trained trouble-shooters, reference librarians lust for the chase of a challenge; having shot the intellectual buck, they bludgeon it with "one more thing."

But neither Mike nor Phillip was the real star of the day. That honor goes to Sarah in the CSC lab (and her imaginary friend, Garrick, but we'll get to that). To make a protracted story petite, said Sarah somehow moved two meetings she had in order to properly instruct us in the ways of Dreamweaver. She set us up in a private lab, gave us Kit Kats (my headache today is thanks to such repeated generosities), and briefly, before we objected, wrote us into her will.

Now, Dreamweaver is a $150 program, and the University has limited licenses to offer Her students; but Sarah basically gave us unlimited access to the ten-hour tutorial (Lydia and I brilliantly shortcutted through about a third of it in an hour or so).

This computer opera is hosted by a man I'm deeply in love with--Garrick Chow.


I've strained my Roget's seeking synonyms for "dulcet" to describe Garrick's voice. Honeyed. Euphonious. Golden. Even Dream-weaving. He let me into his web-designing life, sharing his personal way of arranging folders, his easy sense of cyber-humor, his almost maniacal love of high-end teapots.

Oh Garrick, take away my worries of today.
And leave tomorrow be-hi-ind.

In an hour, Lydia and I have another rendezvous with Garrick (sigh), followed by meetings at both Rollerbowl and our local neighborhood Applebee's.

My next post may shed light on such things and will not spare the details of my Mesquite Grilled Chicken Supreme Pepper Jack Nachos Con Carne Deluxe, hold the onions, and how they relate to Gunther Kress and Scott McCloud.

I look forward to seeing you again with my text.

Is Literate Lives Readable?

Literate Lives in the Information Age: Narratives of Literacy from the United States by Cynthia L. Selfe and Gail E. Hawisher (Erlbaum, 259p.) is a strange kind of history book with a strange way of arguing.

Ostensibly, its project is to catalogue the oral histories of twenty computer users, analyze their different paths to proficiency, and come to some conclusions about the importance of what Selfe and Hawisher call “literacies of technology” (2). The authors’ stated goal is to “[trace] technological literacy as it has emerged over the last few decades within the United States” with a focus on “reading, writing, and [the exchange of] information in online environments, as well as the values associated with such practices—cultural, social, political, and educational” (2).


As they lay out their case studies in each chapter, however, they include general histories of the time periods in which their participants came of age, and targeted histories of computer technology, as well (they detail, in a typical chapter, Watergate, the emergence of Atari, and a particular person’s path through graduate school in the ’70s).

Selfe and Hawisher write, “[W]e hope to emphasize the importance of context—how particular historical periods, cultural milieus, and material conditions affected people’s acquisition of the literacies of technology” (7).



This braided structure, though, has the unintended effect of taking attention away from the subjects. And, the self-evident nature of the above quotation is indicative of the book’s mostly unchallenging way of arguing; the authors’ claim that circumstances affect the way people learn is as obvious as it is reiterated.

That said, many of the oral histories Selfe and Hawisher include are compelling. They attempt to give us a cross-section of computer users, including the stories of people from different generational, gender, race, and socioeconomic backgrounds.

The group of 20, though, are mostly writing instructors; their experiences attaining literacies of technology are almost uniformly positive, so the authors admit that their sample should not be seen as representative: “we quickly realized that only a limited number of people were willing to share detailed, and revealing, life-history narratives—especially in connection with technology use” (24).

The book, then, lingers on specific stories, but its arguments seem hamstrung by the fact that the oral histories are not emblematic. Selfe and Hawisher discount their own evidence and so can only argue what has already been proven.

The authors are involved in a very intriguing project, though, and should be forgiven for its necessary complications. The innovative feature of the book, for instance—its attempt at co-authorship with its own subjects—is both a pleasant surprise and a limitation.

They write, “[W]e also slowly came to the realization that the project we had undertaken was no longer our own. It belonged, as well, to the people we interviewed and surveyed—their words and their stories were continual reminders that they had claimed the intellectual ground of the project as their own” (13).

This allegiance to the subjects is admirable, but it reins in authorial voice, leaving some ideas uncommented on. Midway through the book, a woman tells that her daughters were harassed by someone they met in a chat room (103-104); the authors move on. Later, a woman mentions how her computer mentor died of AIDS; the authors move on:

“‘He was my best friend and he did die of AIDS a few years later.’ Thus, for Janice, her friend’s computer expertise in building a 386, ‘with a tiny hard drive,’ literally enabled her to own a working computer during this time” (176).

I asked myself during these moments if the collaborative process kept the authors from responding to what their participants were saying. Does collaborative writing dull personal response? Relatedly, does it keep our most provocative arguments at bay?





Clearly, the voices of the participants, and not the authors, are strongest here. But, despite the methodology, Selfe Hawisher do offer some welcome analysis and prescription.

In Chapter One, for instance, which “defines and exemplifies the definition of a cultural ecology and the role such a concept assumes in relation to people’s lives and their acquisition of digital literacies,” Selfe and Hawisher include stories that challenge our notions of contemporary literacy. The oral history of Damon Davis, a student who struggled in class but excelled at designing websites, gives us a taste of what they value. They write, “Damon chose not to subscribe [. . .] to the conventional print literacy values and practices” (54).

As I’ll detail later, subsequent chapters also draw a distinction between print literacy and literacies of technology; Selfe and Hawisher argue for an increased focus on the latter.

I should mention that Chapter One includes a particularly good capsule review of the 1980s as it seeks to contextualize the school experiences of those born in the late ’70s. In fact, most of the history included in the book is well-rendered, and the short inclusions of the history of computers read nicely and sometimes shock. Selfe and Hawisher write, “[S]ales in [the computer] industry went from $750 million in 1977 to $475 billion in 1983” (39).




These sections remind us of one of the goals of the book, stated in the introduction: “Before our cultural memory of this important time faded entirely, we wanted to document the period during which these machines first wove their way into, and altered, the fabric of our culture” (6). Certainly that statistic and the others they include force the reader to remember how recently computers were not at all ubiquitous.

In Chapter Two, Selfe and Hawisher include the stories of three women—Mary, Paula, and Karen—born in the 1960s, and remind us again of the radical changes that computers have made:

“We suspect that with this generation, for the first time in our history, literacy practices became inextricably and irrevocably tied to computers and one’s ability to make them work” In their words, “This chapter analyzes the importance of gender and class in shaping literacy values but also considers the critical choices people make in departing from common cultural expectations” (26).

The chapter explores the barriers the three women had to face in coming to the technologies of literacy. There is a focus on the fact that computers were not often used in schools, and Selfe and Hawisher highlight how even those whose educations preceded wide use of computers need to be trained: “If we define literacy as the power to enact change in the world, we cannot—must not—ignore the women, and men, who struggle to come to literacy in the information age” (82).

This provocative moment defines literacy differently than anywhere else in the book but gives us insight into the agenda of the authors. Literacy is activism, here. Technologies of literacy, certainly valued, are about agency outside of traditional ways of learning and communicating.

Chapter Three follows this agenda, introducing the idea of “technological gateways” (26). For the authors, these are progressive “sites and occasions for acquiring digital literacies but vary across people’s experiences and the times and circumstances in which they grew up” (26). The story of Carmen Vincent, a Native American woman whose long employment history brought her to increased computer literacy, allows Selfe and Hawisher to exhibit the ways in which “technological gateways” open unexpectedly.

They focus on barriers and, perhaps too easily, triumphs, writing, “[this case study] demonstrate[s] how racism and poverty, literacy and illiteracy, money and access to technology are linked in the complex cultural ecology that characterizes the United States of America—and how inventive individual people can be in shaping the conditions under which their access to technology can work most effectively” (107).

Chapter Four holds much of the same but does include a debate about the ways computers unify us versus the way they divide us. In one of the rare checks on the “computers are great” parade in this book, the authors include the skepticism of Tom Lugo, who says, “I hate—this is one reason why I don’t think I’ll ever use the Web for a lot of research—I hate just staring at the screen. I want to have something in my hands” (123).

Selfe and Hawisher, though, compare Tom to another woman, Melissa, writing, “Whereas Tom’s use of computers often signals to him that he is apart from people, Melissa participates enthusiastically in online worlds, constructing community and meaningful relations through written, online exchanges” (128). The authors seem to side with Melissa.

Later, they write of “the narrow bandwidth of the alphabetical” (208), indicting not only traditional print literacy, but words themselves (as opposed to the visual rhetoric Kress highlights). During this indictment, they champion online communication.

I see their point, but I’ve never experienced a webpage that has more cultural “bandwidth” than, say, Hamlet. To me, their argument that print literacy no longer appeals to students makes me wonder about shallow students not “narrow” words.



In the most interesting set of oral histories, three black women from the same family but of different generations describe their experiences with computers. Like in chapter four, things in the world of Chapter Five are not all rosy. The authors write, “Although these stories should, in an ideal world, outline a narrative of promise, of steadily improving conditions for the practice of literacy in general, and digital literacy, more specifically, they do not” (133).

The eldest relative never finished high school, and while her niece succeeded brilliantly in computer learning, he niece's daughter, Yolanda, attends a technologically unsatisfactory school in South Carolina. That fact allows the authors to foreshadow the following (tame) conclusion from Chapter Seven:

“[E]ducators, certainly those who teach English composition only in its more conventional forms, will need to change their attitudes about literacy in general, and they will need additional technology resources so that they can work more closely with students to learn about the new [. . .] media literacies [. . .]” (209).

The authors do well to include pertinent statistics about the struggles of rural schools, and the lack of training that many teachers suffer from. And they stress that the availability of computers does not cure a technology gap: “One reason that Yolanda’s English and language arts teachers have failed to provide her instruction in digital literacy could have to do with their own lack of professional development” (157).

The theme of Chapter Six is that, in Deboarah Brandt’s words, “Literacy is always in flux” (181). To illustrate this, Selfe and Hawisher include the stories of three women who came of age in the sixties. These stories help them to draw a parallel between movements of social change and revolutionary movements of literacy.

I need to mention that Brandt, Gunther Kress, and Paulo Freire (even though he is mentioned only once) are the dominant critical voices underneath the text. Brandt’s own oral histories—especially Literacy in American Lives—are models for this work; Kress’s focus on visual rhetoric strengthens the authors' ideas about the value of new media as compared to print literacy; and Freire’s philosophy of a decentralized classroom influences Chapter Seven: The Future of Literacy.

Selfe and Hawisher (let's call them Hawisher and Selfe for once) finally ask the big questions near the end of the book. Where are we going and How do we get there?:

“In the next decade what will the term literacy mean, especially within online environments? What new kinds of literacy practices will characterize those students now preparing to enter and graduate from our nation’s schools? How will these graduates communicate over the globally extended computer networks now distinguishing 21st century workplaces? And how will these networks continue to transform, or not, these graduates’ ordinary everyday literacy practices?” (183).

To answer these questions, the authors include the reflections of two writing instructors with advanced degrees and two incredibly gifted teenagers. Needless to say, these oral histories are not representative of common computer users; the fifteen-year old, Brittney, reports that she takes Spanish online, checks her stock portfolio, looks up word derivations, updates her school's website, and, on a slow day, writes a hagiography or two (194).

Clearly, Selfe and Hawisher want to show us the best of what can be done on the Internet if young people have the appropriate training. Their extreme examples of people with vast technological literacy in this final chapter help them foreground a kind of Utopia in which over-achievers plug their massive, pubescent brains into 34-inch Macs and shame the rest of us book-learners:

“[I]t is clear that [the participants of this chapter] consider the reading and composing skills they acquired informally in electronic environments—literacies marked by the kinesthetic, the visual, the navigational, the intercultural; by a robust combination of code, image, sound, animation, and words—to be far more compelling, far more germane to their future success than the more traditional literacy instruction they have received in school” (205).

This is the book's strongest point. But it troubles me. It undervalues a literacy—reading--marked by the imaginative. It suggests that without all stimulation, there is no stimulation. And it unrealistically relies on the example of an astoundingly bright student who has already mastered baseline literacies.

Certainly we have to value literacies of technology, but their valuation seems a bit wide-eyed, a bit reactionary. I, for one, jaundiced as I am, still find germane the jaundiced page of an old paper-back.

And that's why I need to learn, as Selfe and Hawisher suggest that all teachers need to learn from their technologically-adept students. They quote Freire to emphasize that point that writing instruction needs to stretch:

“[T]he teacher-of-the-students and the students-of-the-teacher cease to exist and a new term emerges: teacher-students with students-teachers. . .They become jointly responsible for a process in which all grow” (210).




Literate Lives, though badly bogged down by truisms, concludes thankfully with something more akin to Freire. Selfe and Hawisher move beyond their (oft-repeated) suggestions that race, class, and gender play a part in who we are to argue instead for nuanced teaching. Reminiscent of Dickie Selfe, they remind us that access to computers is not a cure-all, that “[t]he specific conditions of access have a substantial effect on the acquisition and development of digital literacy” (227).

And, drawing on their admittedly limited sampling of oral histories, they call passionately for teacherly awareness of digital literacies and, more importantly, awareness of “the increasingly complex global contexts within which these [. . .] literacies function” (232).

This is by no means a great book, but Selfe and Hawisher valuably ask us to remember how quickly computer technology has developed, how thrillingly it opens its gateways, and how, chillingly, those opportunities remain out of reach for so many.

Awesome

Updated Proposal and Abstract.

That Dang Thing: Computer Literacy and the Elderly

Things have changed since, in 1999, M.J. Cody published “Silver Surfers: Training and Evaluating Internet Use among Older Adult Learners.” Recent figures suggest that computer use has risen to 25% among older populations; new discourse communities like seniorpeoplemeet.com have emerged; and Microsoft and other companies have launched programs to help seniors become technologically savvy.

My presentation will focus on these new developments, and on computer literacy among the elderly in the 21st Century, particularly among widows and widowers. As we might expect, research has shown that computer literacy can counteract loneliness and depression, and aid in the bereavement process. As Gatto and Tak write in their article “Computer, Internet, and E-mail Use Among Older Adults: Benefits and Barriers,” online activity often leads to “connectedness, satisfaction, utility, and positive learning experiences.” These feelings must be preceded by computer literacy, however, and despite advances the barriers to such literacy for elderly people are still numerous.

These barriers—“frustration, physical and mental limitations, mistrust, and time issues” (Gatto and Tak)—might be remedied, I argue, with some old-fashioned product placement; those seeking to help older users—especially widowed users—become active members of lively Internet exchange need only to look for ways to package their information in recognizable terms. I argue that medical professionals, local news sources, and church groups can be conduits of computer-education services, thereby combating computer illiteracy and mistrust of technology. Theirs are the organizations that engender trust, and they can be the proverbial spoons full of sugar that help the technological medicine go down.

To anchor my study of computer literacy—and to define what that term means for my particular context—I survey the scholarship of Cynthia Selfe and Gail Hawisher as well as numerous works on senior studies and technology. I also explore websites geared toward helping the widowed. Analysis of sites like widowsorwidowers.com and the aforementioned seniorpeoplemeet.com provides an understanding of how seniors engage with the Internet. The benefit of such communities is apparent upon first glance; one user of seniorpeoplemeet.com reports, “I love this site!! It's so easy to use!! I'm not so shy anymore!” Accessibility of the kind noticed by that user should be repeated in browsers and applications, and those modifications will aid in the spread of computer literacy. On top of suggestions to combat mistrust, then, my presentation argues that practical changes will help seniors and the widowed to feel more comfortable on the Internet.
Many elders achieve computer literacy by ginger steps; the leaps I outline in my presentation, though, are integral to a feeling of connectedness that can bring folks toward a sense of solace, independence, and achievement.


This presentation focuses on developments in computer literacy among the elderly and the hindrances to that development, particularly among widows and widowers. Research has shown that computer literacy counteracts loneliness and depression, and aids in the bereavement process, but barriers for elderly people are still numerous. In this presentation I survey the work of literacy scholars Cynthia Selfe and Gail Hawisher as well as numerous articles on senior studies to provide context for my assertions that supportive communities and web-design changes are necessary to encourage Internet use among a wider group of seniors. I look to sites like widowsorwidowers.com and seniorpeoplemeet.com as models for these design changes. Such discourse communities also provide an invaluable understanding of how seniors engage with the Internet and develop a feeling of connectedness online.

Abstract

This presentation focuses on developments in computer literacy among the elderly and the hindrances to that development, particularly among widows and widowers. Research has shown that computer literacy counteracts loneliness and depression, and aids in the bereavement process, but barriers for elderly people are still numerous. In this presentation I survey the work of literacy scholars Cynthia Selfe and Gail Hawisher as well as numerous articles on senior studies to provide context for my assertions that supportive communities and web-design changes are necessary to encourage Internet use among a wider group of seniors. I look to sites like widowsorwidowers.com and seniorpeoplemeet.com as models for these design changes. Such discourse communities also provide an invaluable understanding of how seniors engage with the Internet and develop a feeling of connectedness online.

That Dang Thing: Computer Literacy and the Elderly

Things have changed since, in 1999, M.J. Cody published “Silver Surfers: Training and Evaluating Internet Use among Older Adult Learners.” Recent figures suggest that computer use has risen to 25% among older populations; new discourse communities like seniorpeoplemeet.com have emerged; and Microsoft and other companies have launched programs to help seniors become technologically savvy.
My presentation will focus on these new developments, and on computer literacy among the elderly in the 21st Century, particularly among widows and widowers. As we might expect, research has shown that computer literacy can counteract loneliness and depression, and aid in the bereavement process. As Gatto and Tak write in their article “Computer, Internet, and E-mail Use Among Older Adults: Benefits and Barriers,” online activity often leads to “connectedness, satisfaction, utility, and positive learning experiences.” These feelings must be preceded by computer literacy, however, and despite advances the barriers to such literacy for elderly people are still numerous.
These barriers—“frustration, physical and mental limitations, mistrust, and time issues” (Gatto and Tak)—might be remedied, I argue, with some old-fashioned product placement; those seeking to help older users—especially widowed users—become active members of lively Internet exchange need only to look for ways to package their information in recognizable terms. I argue that medical professionals, local news sources, and churches can be conduits of computer-education services, thereby combatting computer illiteracy and mistrust of technology. Theirs are the organizations that engender trust, and they can be the proverbial spoon full of sugar that helps the technological medicine go down.
To anchor my study of computer literacy, I survey the scholarship of Cynthia Selfe and Gail Hawisher as well as numerous works on senior studies and technology. I also explore websites geared toward helping the widowed. Analysis of sites like widowsorwidowers.com and the aforementioned seniorpeoplemeet.com provides an understanding of how seniors engage with the internet. The benefit of such communities is apparent upon first glance; one user of seniorpeoplemeet.com reports, “I love this site!! It's so easy to use!! I'm not so shy anymore!” Accessibility of the kind noticed by that user should be repeated in browsers and applications, and those modifications will inspire senior use. On top of suggestions to combat mistrust, then, my presentation argues that practical changes will help seniors and the widowed to feel more comfortable on the Internet.
Many elders achieve computer literacy by ginger steps; the leaps I outline in my presentation, though, are integral to a feeling of connectedness that can bring folks toward a sense of solace, independence, and achievement.

Paper Proposal Draft

That Dang Thing: Computer Literacy and the Elderly

My paper studies computer literacy among the elderly, especially among widows. Drawing on the book Older Americans and Computers by Bonny Bhattacharjee and the article “Older Computer-Literate Women: Their Motivations, Obstacles, and Paths to Success” by Rita L. Rosenthal, I question the motivations of some programs that seek to bring computer literacy to the elderly and offer suggestions that focus on familial, medical, local, and religious uses of the Internet for older users.
Recent figures suggest that computer use has risen to 25% among older populations (Gatto and Tak, “Computer, Internet, and E-mail Use Among Older Adults: Benefits and Barriers”); women are now using computers as much as men if not more, and confidence is on the rise. However, the poor, minorities, and widowers and widows often have little or no access, and little or no help attaining the skills they need. I focus on that last group because less research has been done on bereavement (loss of social grounding) as a barrier to computer literacy than on class and race concerns; I also have two widowed grandmothers who are sporadic computer users, and I wanted to better understand their particular connections to the Internet.
As we might expect, studies have shown that computer use can counteract loneliness and depression, aid in the bereavement process, and help elders attain health information. As Gatto and Tak write, use often leads to a feeling of “connectedness, satisfaction, utility, and positive learning experiences.” These feelings must be preceded by computer literacy, however, and the barriers to such literacy for elderly people are numerous.
What my paper focuses on primarily are those barriers Gatto and Tak identify: “frustration, physical and mental limitations, mistrust, and time issues.” Mistrust is of particular interest here because it points to an education problem, a problem, for widows and widowers, that is exacerbated by newfound individuality. It might be remedied, I argue, with creativity, patience, and some old-fashioned product placement; those seeking to help older users become active members of lively Internet exchange need only to look for ways to package their information in recognizable terms. I argue that families of the elderly, medical professionals, local news sources, and churches should promote computer-education services to combat computer illiteracy and mistrust of technology. These are the organizations that engender trust and can be the proverbial spoon full of sugar that helps the medicine of computer lessons go down.
Using S. Fox's Older Americans and the Internet and M. Hilt's and H.J. Lipschultz's “Elderly
Americans and the Internet: Email, TV, Information and Entertainment Websites,” I offer user-friend solutions to the frustration problem, as well. Perhaps most importantly, though, I lobby for computer applications that cater directly to the needs of those who are easily alienated by information overload.
Many elders achieve computer literacy by ginger steps; these steps, though, are integral to a feeling of connectedness and can bring folks toward a sense of independence and achievement.

Additional Banks/DMAC question

Banks writes the following which I think connects to the DMAC video: “The construction of Black people and other people of color as non-technological and therefore irrelevant in the design and construction of technological tools continues even into the era of the Internet, even as those selling new technologies are quick to market a world of multicultural possibility”

“If things like the authentic trope can be disrupted resisted or remixed into demi-humorous animated arguments or quasi-academic pieces of new media that remixes those terribly sneaky and tacit racist tropes easily by relying on the very foundation of new parataxis like structures and the importance of delivery and remixing, great ok I’m all onboard Macs and flip cameras for everybody.
If on the other hand new media is used to replicate the same racist tropes in new dynamic ways, well bollocks to that. If we use new media to replicate old designs of oppression and undervalue what people bring to the table by opening up institutional space just wide enough to get new toys but do not go about actively sharing those toys or reproduce racist tropes like the ones described here then I have had enough of authentic to last the rest of my life. I don’t need a new way to see it and I can resist those things like I’ve always resisted and other racist technologies that were rammed down my throat, like graduate admission forms that made me put down only one ethnicity or English-only education.”

I think both of these points are argued with strong rhetoric, but I need more convincing examples of technological racism than graduate admission forms in order to really see their points. Can anyone help?

Further Discussion of Banks and Blackmon

I want to draw our attention to some key passages in the articles we read for today. I didn't much discuss the main thrust of Blackmon's article in my post, but her argument about technology in the classroom and finding a comfortable space online connects directly to my thoughts.

She writes that her students have often reported feeling a “virtual loss of cultural affiliation” (96) when using technology. She continues:

"The course that I have described here originated from my reaction to a student survey which revealed to me that African-American students in one of my classes felt alienated by technology and cyberspace. Even more important than their fear of technology, some of them seemed to feel that there is some kind of conspiracy that keeps them in their marginalized positions in cyberspace in much the same way that minorities have traditionally and historically been oppressed [. . .]" (100).

Though her narrative of classroom success seems a bit rosy, she details ways in which “students shared stories about online comfort zones as places where they could discuss those things that they were too afraid or ashamed to discuss in the real world” (95). I see this as a 99% positive thing, but 1% of myself wonders if the problems identified online are being addressed in the real world that often ignores them?

I've long felt that InstantMessaging communication, for instance, allows people to say things they would never say in real life. Users thereby (sometimes) create disingenuous, cyberally-inebriated personas that don't always translate in face-to-face (skin-to-skin) relationships. Thoughts?

Speaking honestly of honesty, I need to include a bit of Banks's thought on censorship. He uses the term in a broad way, meaning in the following that entire languages are censored and devalued. He sees Blackplanet working against that (capital C) censorship:

“Black participation on the Website also begins to show the ways cyberspace can serve as a cultural underground that counters the surveillance and censorship that always seem to accompany the presence of African Americans speaking, writing, and designing in more public spaces—spaces that seem to consistently say to them that no matter what traditions they might bring to the classroom, the workplace, or to technologies—these spaces (and the written English that accompanies them) are, and will continue to be White by definition” (69).

Curiously, Blackplanet is itself heavily censored. If my experience on the website tells me anything, it's that a big part of orality--cursing--is certaily curbed on BP. Many, many users write "a ss," "shyt," et al. to get around this. That said, Banks's point about censorship writ large is still well taken.

He also writes that "[t]here are no parts of the planet that are inaccessible because they are too far from home, or reachable only by way of endless rides on convoluted, barrier-maintaining bus systems." This use of a recognizable city-planing metaphor suggests that the internet helps us transcend physical limitations (Blackmon, though, goes so far as to question whether the internet reinscribes "ghettos" (95-96)).

Banks, too, has his cynicism about technology. He writes, “The construction of Black people and other people of color as non-technological and therefore irrelevant in the design and construction of technological tools continues even into the era of the Internet, even as those selling new technologies are quick to market a world of multicultural possibility” (72).

While Blackmon identifies the problem that constructing oneself as technological often means implicitly constructing a white persona, Banks points out the above problem and calls for internet spaces that foster oft-devalued expression. Authentic expression.

Of course, the DMAC video questions the whole concept of authenticity. We'll watch it in class and formulate a collective response, dig?

I Emerge! I am. Primordial goo. . .

drips off my limbs, and out the stew I rise toward beach and branch and blogosphere. More to come perhaps. First, shelter, roasted meats, and a code of laws.