Jon on "The New Literacy"

In “The New Literacy” by Clive Thompson ideas about the new generation of writing are discussed. He starts off with the view of the opposing side stating that facebook and texting has dehydrated language into “bleak, bald, and sad shorthand.” (John Sutherland, English professor of the University of London) Thompson then goes on to back up his opinion with the five year long research of Andrea Lunsford with the project she calls the “Stanford Study of Writing”. She is a professor of writing and rhetoric at Stanford University. Lunsford has collected 14,672 pieces of writing ranging from formal essays to blog posts and chat sessions from 2001 to 2006. In her research she has discovered that young people today write more than any other generation stating “ I think we’re in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven’t seen since the Greek civilization”. Now im sure the other point of view would say that texting lingo would come out in papers of young people today, but out of all the formal essays she collected from her first year students not one had “text speak”. She says the biggest difference about our writing in this generation is Kairos. Meaning that we assess our audience and adapt to get our point across, rather then just writing for a teacher, in search of a good grade. Writing for an audience gives us a better connection to the reader and gives us more meaning in our writing.

Although I do agree that facebook and texting may dumb down some of our language and formal writing style, I think that a good education can even it out. It is very important to separate those two worlds and to know when and when not it is appropriate to bring that style. I never thought about the amount that our generation actually writes, its really stunning when you stop and think about it. I’m sure the average person texts, emails or goes on facebook a lot more then they talk on the phone. The world is changing with the rise of social networking, our generation is the first to experience it and its being embraced by older and older generations. My grandma has a facebook, think about it. Are writing now is said to be about “ … persuading and organizing and debating” Thompson explains. We target the audience in a way that relates to them personally rather than a blunt opinion. We want to persuade the reader to agree with us, and debate with those that don’t. I personally believe that this generation is in the “ … midst of a literacy revolution…” and I am excited to be a part of it. Obviously we still need to be taught the proper way to write a paper, but with the new “cool direction” Thompson states , we can create a whole new style of writing and I think it has already begun. I just can’t wait to see where writing will be in another 20 years.