Reading Response to Birkerts

On my in class essay "On the New Literacy" I focused mainly on the idea that technology is the main source for students' lack of knowledge for writing. Clive Thompson states that technology is the main reason why students don't have much attention span towards their writing and don't care much for what their writing about. I stated that it doesn't depend on the student it depends on who is perceiving the story. If students were given the chance to have a variety of professors look at their writings then I propose that students grades in writing would be better because every teacher has their own way of grading and has thier own way of looking at each students personality and their concept of writing. Every student has their different ways of writing and thinking and has their own perception of writing. Many people have written articles and research paper on the use of technology and if and when it gets in the way of everyday activities. I focused mainly on the fact that students should be given a chance to have their writings looked at by more than one professor before accusing technology of "getting in the way of students academics."


Clive Thompson gave an alaysis stating that technology is to blame for students academics and Andrea Lunsford a professor and rhetoric at Stanford University conducted a study from 2001 to 2006 collecting a variety of students writings from in class essays to e-mails, class assignments, journal entries, blog posts etc. She found that students writings came from outside of class and not in class. Clive Thompson states that students shouldn't have access to technology in school because it is to blame for their writing scores. On one hand, some do believe technology has been the main source for students school work and bad grades because some students focus more on the internet, like myspace and facebook, twitter etc. and less on their homework. On the other hand, some believe that technology has been good for the everybody and people are grateful everyday for technology because without it, a lot of us would be out of jobs and wouldn't have the internet for information in our writings to make our stories better. Andrea Lunsford found that students write more than any generation before us because of technology. Students write everyday from texting, myspace, facebook, twitter, e-mails, blog posts, etc. Even as little as updating your status is a haiku form of writing, we read and absorb information everyday.

Sven Birkerts is a critic and book reviewer who writes frequently for the New York Times Book Review, the Atlantic Monthly, and the New Republic. Birkerts has taught creative writing and composition at Harvard University, Benninton College, and Emerson College. He is currently the author of six books of criticism, such as "The Gutenberg Elegies." Birkerts states in "The Owl Has Flown" that "The lack of larger perspective hobbles the mind, leads to suspiciousness and wary conservativism" (p. 31) Birkerts is stating that if one doesn't have much of an audience the author is going to find the situation very difficult and find that nobody gets the opposition of making radical changes in their writings. Basically if students have more of an audience their writings could improve based on opinions rather than just one opinion.
I believe that technology has provided the ability to beable to write books, articles, essays, and has affected the media, in a good way, and without it the media and schools would be in trouble. I think that if technology didn't exist students would be at a loss and the media couldn't possibly be as good as it is today.

Although students have the tendency to abuse technology it continues to make a positive affect on the everyday life of the human population. I find that technology is very beneficial to reading, writing, and the media. Birkerts changes the way I look at technology, writing, and education based on the fact that writing cannot be determined good or bad based on the way just one professor looks at it, and you have to look deeper into writing and avoid skimming and find a way to break down sentences when they don't make sense and find the true meaning of whats being said.