In his recent work, Clive Thompson, supports the research of Andrea Lunsford, Stanford University professor, who believes that literacy today is making a comeback through technology. Lunsford found that “the young people today write more than the generation before them did.” It was said that students write more now because they have an audience than their professor and aren’t writing for a grade but for a more social aspect. John Sutherland opposes Lunsford’s argument by saying, “Facebook encourages narcissistic blabbering, and texting has dehydrated language into bleak, bold and shorthand.” Lunsford disagrees; in her research she has not found one peace of academic writing from her students that contains text talk. Also stating that before the Internet Americans rarely wrote anything, that wasn’t job or school related. Before writing was either considered good or bad but today’s youth has adapted one of the most important factors of all. Lunsford team found that the students had become acutely proficient at accessing their audience and changing their writing style so they may get their point across as best as possible. As Lunsford said “We are in the middle of a literacy revolution.” Now a whopping 38 percent of writing takes place outside of a classroom.
My own view is that technology is here to stay no matter what our opinion of it is. I agree with John Sutherland that text language has leaked into classrooms, but that is merely a matter of good teaching whether it shows up in the students writing or not. Technology can enhance how a student performs in class as well; research has become available at the click of a button because of the internet, and windows allows students to type, check spelling and revise without touching a pen to paper. Blogging allows people to share thoughts and ideas, and critique one anothers writing, also getting to know your audience before producing a piece a writing for them. What I see is an opportunity for greatness in new literacy. But the reality I see is technology can be more of a distraction. You may use the Internet for research but the next page over is always Facebook, or Myspace, and your cell phone sitting right next to you. The samples of work Lunsford took were from driven, high achieving students, with rehearsed study habits. Technology takes a different effect on the average youth of America. Teenagers are amazing multitaskers but whose honestly to believe that a teenage girl is more interested in an essay on George Washington than the hunky guy who just sent her a message. I believe writing has become a more popular way of expressing yourself, especially for people who think they need to be heard. “Statues update for the last 10 minutes: I just ate a bad cupcake, it was awesome!” one point for the author for knowing the audience, but subtract one point for attacking her audiences every nerve with the persistent updates on; lack of excitement in the authors life. Technology is not a literary infection, but a distraction, if used appropriately technology is a great alley for students but the overuse of the social aspect is a student’s worst enemy.