Current mood:	thoughtful
Current music:	Idyllic Music Podcast

Reading Response #1: Autobiography of a Techie

Caveat
I admit I feel a little apprehensive about this first post, and that has mainly to do with my status as a person who's not part of the rhet/comp department. I've read precious little scholarly discourse about rhet/comp. Furthermore, I'm not sure what degree of initiation into the rhet/comp discipline is assumed. I guess I'll do my best. :)

It’s Just a Megabyte
I was particularly interested in Selber's and Kitalong et al’s essays. I acutely sensed the need for the development of a critical technological literacy when teaching English 112 last semester. I chose the "Cyberspace and Identity" and unit to supplement multiple-source essay one. When teaching the essays in the unit, I found that my students were very resistant (or apathetic) when I asked them to think critically about technology and how it affects their lives. They were especially vocal in denouncing Sherry Turkle's argument that, when multi-tasking in particular cyberscapes, the self exists as a group of overlapping but separate fragments that can be cycled through. According to Turkle, "each of these activities takes place in a 'window,' and your identity on the computer is the sum of your distributed presence" (WARAC 277). My students were adamant that Turkle was “going way too far” and “reading way too much into” technology. This reaction, of course, revealed the “instrumental view” of technology that Selber mentions, where users of technology either accept or reject technology because “it is simply a neutral tool employed to understand experience and solve problems” (11).

Domo Arigato, Techno-Auto-Bio
One way I tried to approach this issue was by focusing, when facilitating full-group discussion, on the students’ personal experience with technology. I found that many of them used social-networking programs like Facebook and MySpace, and that a few of them even used blogs (the bloggers were slightly more reflective and critically-minded when discussing technology, most likely because of the reflective nature of blogging itself). This helped somewhat, but I was still met with considerable resistance and a disturbing degree of apathy. I suspect that assigning the technology autobiography before any of the reading in the chapter would have increased the effectiveness of the students’ discussions. Particular questions on Kitalong’s list, such as “whom do you identify as being most technologically ‘literate’ in your life?” and “do you think there are social consequences or potential impacts on your lifestyle that depend on your technological capabilities?” would perhaps get students moving toward a critical literacy as defined by Selber. If I were to assign the TA, I might add a few more specific questions about the technologies many of our students tend to use frequently (such as Facebook). As evidenced in Kitalong, technology is inextricably intertwined with economics. Since I also taught the “What’s Happening at the Mall?” unit in 112, I might ask students to write a combination technology autobiography/consumer autobiography (TACA!) to get them thinking about the socioeconomic consequences of consuming technology, and about being a consumer in general.

(I wrote way more than I was supposed to! I’m sorry.)

This Week’s Study Hall Podcast  (COMING VERY SOON)
I do a little more personal reflection on computer courses that focus on functional literacy only, critique GeekBrief TV’s recent “How to be a podcaster” episode, and muse over critical perspectives on electronic music and the music industry. And I’ll play some music.