Birkerts summary

In his essay, Birkerts suggests that reading has become more of an art than a normal routine. Birkerts claims that people in this age do more skimming, going from one site to the next without allowing the words to actually sink in. People don’t put as much deep thought in to reading as they did in the past. One reason for this is because there is simply too much to read. In this article, Birkerts points out that “Quantity is elevated over quality.” In today’s society, there are things to read all around us and if we sat and took the time to put a lot of thought into the things we read, then we would miss out on something too many things; whereas in the past there were very few sources of reading available for people so there was more time for deep thought to be put into things that they read. Also, reading is no longer the mainstream method of receiving information. Sadly enough, the television took its place. This all results in the fact that there are fewer experts out there. Now, there is a vast amount of people that have a common knowledge of the world, where as before there were fewer people who knew more information. Birkerts ties all of these ideas into the conclusion that reading isn’t what it used to be, people have manipulated it in ways that don’t allow much thought to be put into it, and because of that, it is becoming more of an art.