The main idea that caught my eye in the article HyperTapestry by Kim MacQueen was the question as to whether or not literate people perceive the events of their lives linearly as in literary works, or more as pictures or a web site. That can be taken in so many directions. It makes me wonder if there might have been a better or more concrete way of learning and thinking, but not good enough. The Bayeux tapestry was made in the late 1070’s. According to the article this would be a time when people were thinking like web pages, maybe really simple web pages. It was only four hundred years later that the printing press was invented. I don’t think everyone became literate all of the sudden when that happened, but I’d say around that time more people started thinking in that linear style MacQueen talks about. Now, after almost six hundred years of printing presses telling us how to think, the internet has come. The written word can deliver a massive amount of information, and the internet exploits this. The leap forward is that it exploits every other media available as well. This could be a good thing or a bad thing. It means people will be exposed to much more information, but will it effect their thinking when they are not planted in front of a computer?
These ideas and the article relate to our course topic in the sense that if our reading and writing reflects how we think, than I think the internet is changing both simultaneously.
3 comments:
I like that you compared the tapestry to the internet. When I first read the article I missed the idea that they are so similiar. The author of the article found books and literature to be misleading, because they didn't allow students to fully understand the tapestry as it was understood when it was woven. Hypertext can really allow someone to surf through the tapestry, and make connections that books do not allow.
Yeah I know what you mean. Maybe, the way people thought back then was more rational since it was more focused in the present. Maybe it was healthier, mentally. Who knows? Either way something had to be wrong with it, because that's not the way we think now. Or is that too close-minded? I think we'll still be fine if we aren't near a computer. We're fine when we're not near books aren't we?
I don't know if I neccessarily believe it, but I heard this theory that in the 2040's we're going to transcend our technology and live forever. I'm sure many people will be angry if that happens. I won't be one of them though. I'll take that! :p Or maybe we'll be able to choose when we die and just not have diseases. I don't know. It's just some crazy theory. By the way, you have nice writing style. It was a nice read.
"I think we'll still be fine if we aren't near a computer. We're fine when we're not near books aren't we?" - I want you to read that aloud to yourself, and if it doesn't hit you, read it to a professor. Just a test. In my opinion we're worse off without the books. On the other hand, I'll be pretty darn sad when we don't have high speed internet anymore.
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