This past week the Toronto Star reported on the reinvention of libraries in the City of Toronto. Though the article does not delve into the deeper issues of knowledge organization, it illustrates how libraries have been evolving to remain relevant within their communities.

Library 2.0: Libraries are Toronto’s Living Room, Playground, Even Concert Venue, Writes Christopher Hume

Cheers,
Natalie

Refashioning the writing space for the elementary school student

Commentary #2~ Kelly Kerrigan Section 65A

What does the writing space look like today?

The writing space has undergone many changes in technology, from stone to papyrus to manuscript to computer screen. “Each writing space is a material and visual field, whose properties are determined by a writing technology and the uses to which that technology is put by a culture of readers and writers” (Bolter, 2001, p. 12). Bolter discusses how recording, organizing and presenting text is now done with a word processor and the Internet. One might see this as the modern take of the wall of a public bathroom stall. There are thoughts to ponder, to take away, and others to merely disregard. Sifting through these thoughts can take a moment or a few trips. It is our prerogative to decide what’s worthwhile.

Most adults are aware of changes to our current writing space, but what does that mean for the elementary school student? “Our culture has chosen to fashion these technologies into a writing space that is animated, visually complex, and malleable in the hands of both writer and reader” (Bolter, 2001, p. 13). For a parent of an elementary school student today, this image of the computer and online writing space as being malleable could provoke major fear for their child. This is especially true if the parent has never used the internet during their secondary or post-secondary education years. As a teacher, I have come across many parents who are opposed to using the internet as a writing space. For the children that I teach, their generation needs to be taught how to use this space appropriately and to their advantage, for this is their codex!

Bolter argues that the writing space is a cultural decision. Our current use of the internet as a writing space is a refashioning of the printed book. That being said, do we try to differentiate within this writing space? Do we as readers and writers tend to shun those rants and raves on weblogs and prefer instead those who have posted a document? As if those who took the time to post a document are much more competent in their thoughts than those who write in the common forum or wiki. Teachers must help students discern what is appropriate, but also help them use these spaces effectively.

For the elementary teacher and student, the forum and wiki are great spaces for students to develop their writing skills (McPherson, 2006). Collaboration within these contexts also provides an excellent space for skill development. “Unlike much of the individualized writing required in school and the real world, writing entries in a wiki demands that students be taught writing skills that emphasize negotiation, cooperation, collaboration, and respect for one another’s work and thoughts” (McPherson, 2006). One could imagine the wiki as the technology replacing the bathroom stall!

How does the changing writing space affect literacy?
As Bolter states, “literacy is, among other things, the realization that language can have a visual as well as an aural dimension, that one’s words can be recorded and shown to others who are not present, perhaps not even alive, at the time of the recording” (p.16). Within a wiki, students can use different mediums to enhance their message. “… Students can use wikis to insert music, graphics, video, and photos in their writing and to communicate meanings that were once inaccessible or not fully expressed through the printed word” (McPherson, 2006). This has a huge effect on the overall literacy of a group of students. For those who struggle with writing assignments or with conveying meaning in their work, using a multimodal approach to complement their writing can foster student achievement in literacy.

Research has shown that these new technologies being employed in the classroom challenge the traditional views of literacy (Jewitt, 2005). The technologies that create a new writing space enable a new level of literacy for elementary school students. What it means to be literate in the 21st century is very different from previously set standards. Unfortunately, students are caught between what is written in the curriculum and what is real. Teachers who embrace the new literacy standards are often criticized or held back from trying out new ideas, such as wikis; While older generations of teachers force their students to maintain the literacy levels they were once held to. The refashioning of the writing space for today’s student population involves new technologies, including the use of online writing spaces. All teachers need to embrace these technologies in order to maintain a high level of literacy for their students.

References

Bolter, Jay David. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print [2nd edition]. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Jewitt, C. (2005) ‘Multimodality, “reading”, and “writing” for the 21st century’,
Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 26(3), 315–31.

McPherson, K. (2006). wikis and student writing. Teacher Librarian, 34(2), 70-72. Retrieved from Academic Search Complete database on November 4, 2009.

Hi all.  I thought I’d create a wiki where people could add reviews about their favourite reads, either books, magazine, graphic novels, maybe even web articles.  I am pretty open.

I am hoping to get this wiki operational so that I can use it in school next year as part of a reading club for grades 7-12.

Have a look and add a contribution if you like.

Rocking Reads

If you like to read in French, there is this site as well Juste pour lire.

My brief look at how yellow journalism evolved during the penny press era in response to social, market/economic and technological developments in the late 19th Century is posted here at the wiki site.

Commentary #2 – In response to Michael Wesch’s video, “Information R/evolution” (Module 4)

Appropriately “hyper” for the purposes of framing hypertext and the changing technologies of writing and archiving information, Micheal Wesch’s Information R/evolution is a dynamic interplay of text technologies that incorporates both the hypertext discussion of Jay David Bolter and the organization discussion of Walter Ong. Wesch speaks to the evolution of the pre-typographic notion that information is “a thing… housed in a logical place… where it can be found” and how we have now moved towards a place where technology affords the ability for anyone to create, critique, organize and understand. Information R/evolution touches upon two interesting developments supported by the hypertext environment of our technological world: the nature by which information is stored and the nature of authority.

Information R/evolution starts out with images of the typewriter, standard filing cabinet and card catalogue. This is intentional as each of these three objects were, for many years, definitive symbols of the way by which information was recorded, stored and retrieved. In unpacking the information evolution, these images quickly transform into those of word processing programs, blogs and search engines. Wesch suggests that it does not take an expert to attend to organizational tasks; rather, we are all responsible for the tagging, bookmarking, categorizing and otherwise organizing of information. The organizational affordances of technology are illustrated in the video and echo Walter Ong’s discussion about categories and lists and how they create meaning out of space, impressing through “tidiness and inevitability” (Ong, 2002, p.120). Wesch illustrates this revolution as a true transcendence of place with regards to the means by which information can be rethought “beyond material constraints”. The ability to store information simultaneously in multiple places is not only crucial to the way information is stored but also crucial to the speed at which information is retrieved. Bolter (2001) further discusses this issue in his study of hypertext and cites hyperlinking as the process by which the reader can “continue indefinitely…through the textual space…throughout the Internet” (p.27). An interesting facet of Wesch’s video is that he does not rely on lengthy text to illustrate his point, rather, he demonstrates visually the remediation of print by modeling the organizational affordances of hypertext on a single computer screen, devoid of the paper trail that previously defined information technology.

The nature of authority is touched upon in Information R/evolution and it is suggested that the nature of modern typographic culture has broadened the constraints of previously established information authority (academics, librarians etc.). Information R/evolution raises the issue of how people, either for personal or academic purposes, come to find the information they are seeking and what format they are ultimately presented with. Simply put, “together, we create more information than experts”, is a powerful truth that highlights not only the responsibility of those posting on the web to categorize their information, but also the fact that authorship is seemingly more open. The boundaries of expert and non-expert were more defined in a chirographic and early typographic culture whereby there was an entire process surrounding how one became an author and therefore, an authority. Wesch encourages the viewer to think about authority in the context of this information revolution. While there exists scholarly access points through university libraries, Google Scholar etc., the mainstream user relies on search engines such as Yahoo and Google in order to find definitive sources of information. The breadth of information allows the viewer to view not only authoritative sites (National Geographic, BBC, etc.) but also collaboratively edited sites (Wikipedia) and personal sites (parenting blogs, personal interest sites, etc.) thereby creating a multidimensional approach to any given topic.

However, Wesch indirectly highlights the flip side, which is the uncertainty of the information found. The access itself may be much easier by being able to use one’s personal computer to access library catalogues and search engines rather than searching, in person, through an onerous card catalogue, however, the expanse of the web does lessen the power of established authority. Wesch cites Wikipedia as an example by stating “Wikipedia has 15 times as many words as the next largest encyclopedia, Encyclopedia Britannica”. While this is a seemingly simple statement, it has much larger ramifications for the growing debate about authority on the web, as Wikipedia is a collaboratively created encyclopedia that can be openly edited. More powerful than this statement is the fact that Wesch uses a live screen clip showing himself editing Wikipedia in “real time” and then adding one more person to the tally of the 282,874 contributors that appeared at the time, illustrating the very fluid and “living” nature of information on the Internet.  While effective in drawing forth questions about authority and research, I would be interested to see Wesch explore, more closely, the nature of how one conducts research through a similarly styled video.

Bolter speaks of the “breakout of the visual” and in that spirit, Wesch shows that the dominating visual message of Information R/evolution can be just as powerful as written prose exploring the same topic. Wesch’s visual inspires reflective thought about the evolution of information but also the current revolution taking place in terms of information organization, conducting research and the nature of authority.

References:

Bolter, Jay David. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print [2^nd edition]. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Ong, Walter. (2002) Orality and literacy: The technologizing of the word. London: Methuen.

Wesch, Michael. (2007). Information R/evolution . Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4CV05HyAbM

“Few people will deny that the cinema has become one of the most powerful of influences in modern society. It is necessary, first, to recognize the twofold aspect of the cinema as an educational force. On the one hand, it is an instrument, one among many others, for achieving certain definite results: for example, the vivid presentation of facts and ideas which it is desired to impress upon children’s minds; the giving of knowledge which could be only very inadequately depicted in words or by static presentation; the representation of growth and movement; the simplification of complicated processes. It has also a second aspect: it is a method by which the human mind can be affected and directed”.

When I was searching the UBC library, I found the above sentences from Barbara Low’s article in contemporary review journal. I really liked her ideas about cinema; they seems to be correct and clear. Meanwhile, she wrote them eighty four years ago! Yes, I was also shocked when I found her article published in 1925 on the old paper. And after 84 long years, what should I add to her thoughts for Cinema?

The power of cinema is indisputable. Since the beginning of cinema, a little over a hundred years ago, it has captivated audiences. We want, badly, to watch. And this power seems unique to film. As the philosopher Stanley Cavel remarks “the sheer power of film is unlike the powers of the other arts” (McGinn, 2005).

The arrival of cinema at the close of the nineteenth century immediately excited public imagination.  Cinema can be considered as the illusion of movement by the rapid projection of many still photographic pictures on a screen. In fact, no one person invented cinema. In 1878, under the sponsorship of Leland Stanford, Eadweard Muybridge successfully photographed a horse named “Sallie Gardner” in fast motion using a series of 24 stereoscopic cameras. The experiment took place on June 11 at the Palo Alto farm in California with the press present (Clegg, 2007).

picture of “Sallie Gardner”

In 1893, Thomas Edison and his chief engineer Dickson successfully demonstrated the Kinetoscope, a motion picture system that enabled one person at a time to view moving pictures. Two years later, Lumiere brothers used the cinematograph to project moving photographic pictures onto a screen to a paying audience for the first time in a Paris cafe. Their machine was light, neat and versatile, serving as printer as well as camera and projector.

The standard Cinématographe            Auguste and Louis Lumière

This was the beginning of a long journey. By 1914, several national film industries were established. Films got longer and story telling, or narrative, became the dominant form. As more people paid to see movies, the industry that grew around them was prepared to invest more money in their production, distribution and exhibition. Large studios were established and special theatres built (National Media Museum). In fact, the early histories of film lie in the rise of consumer culture.

Cinema has been an important means of shaping public opinion in its history. In England the Committee on Public Information produced such films as “The Kaiser: The Beast Of Berlin”, and Charlie Chaplin made several propaganda films, including one promoting British war loans. Cinema was also influential in wartime France. In 1917 Griffith filmed “Hearts of the World” in France, showing realistic battle scenes and the mistreatment of civilians by Germans, which reportedly boosted recruitment in the U.S. (Nebeker, 2009 ).

Lots of people thought that cinema could advance progress toward mass literacy. They believed that technologies such as cinema would radiate a utopian promise of ultimate democratic enlightenment. Edison, for instance, believed that cinema would bring about the perfection of education. He said that “I intend to do away with the books in the school….When we get the moving pictures in the school, the child will be so interested that he will hurry to get there before the bell rings, because it is the natural way to teach, through eyes” (Naremore, Brantlinger, 1991). In 1925, a headmaster of a school with 300 pupils, ranging from seven to fourteen years of age, stated that he has found the cinema of the highest value as an adjunct in imparting instruction in general science, geography and history (Low, 1925). He also reported “children remember what they see, though they forget what they hear.” However, the following years proofed that those initial ideas were very optimistic.

For instance, let’s consider movies’ effects in Hawaii education system. Since the 1930s, Hollywood has embraced Hawaii as a sultry paradise in film classics such as Bing Crosby’s “Waikiki Wedding”, Elvis Presley’s “Blue Hawaii” and classic World War II movies such as “From Here to Eternity”. Even today, more than 100 film and TV shows have been shot in Hawaii. Hawaii has two official state languages: English and Hawaiian. Throughout the last century as more and more Americans and British settled in the islands and developed movie industry and lots of jobs in this field were created, the everyday use of Hawaiian declined. Later, speaking Hawaiian was even seen as a deterrent to American assimilation, thus adult native speakers were strongly discouraged from teaching their children Hawaiian as the primary language in the home. This attitude remained until the early 1970s when the Hawaiian community began to experience a cultural renaissance (Grant, Bendure, 2007). It seems that, from time to time, cinema can affect process of reading/writing in an unexpected ways.

Effects of cinema on different classes of societies should not be ignored at all. Jacobs (1967) believed that the power of cinema has been a major problem of the social revolution it reflects; for one thing, to persistent pressure for restriction of content and presentation, not only for ideological purposes of control over forces of influence and persuasion, but on the part of religious, parental and educational groups concerned with effects upon the young.

In England, in the majority of 1950s war films, the role of middle class of society in winning the war was heavily emphasized. The main reason was due to fear that middle class of society had an alliance between upper class and worker class. The great Victorian invention, the middle class, had always affected to despise both these other classes, although remaining ready to allow the upper class to rule and the working class to work as long as its own class position as backbone of England, remained undisturbed. The promises made or implied by a people’s war seemed to offer consolidation of that position and to have improved along with improving the conditions of working class (Dixon, 1994).

According to Bolter’s (2001) concept of remediation, each technology claims to be superior to the one it sets out to remediate. This was also valid for cinema. In 1930s in Soviet Union, Stalin began to perfect the techniques used by Lenin in the civil war of deploying non literary modes of mass propaganda. Soon it followed more effectively by the fascist regimes in Italy and Germany, learned how to use the inventions of new century to solve the problems of the old. The dark forests of oral communication, which 19^th century governments had sought to open up with the written word, were now invaded by devices which bypassed print altogether. Later as some kind of peace was achieved, so the technological developments of the era, especially the cinema, were pressed into the service of the totalitarian state (Vincent, 2000).

According to Henderson (1992), cinema and its effect on the rise of a celebrity-based culture in this century can in part be attributed to America’s change-over from a producing to a consuming society.  It also has to do with the shift in our cultural perspective that occurred in the late nineteenth century. The essential power of the cinema lay in its specificity. Cinema is both the space of isolation and the space of shared experience and its presence in our culture is significant (Harvey, 1996).

Power of cinema can also affect cultural identities of youth and young adults in different societies. In the mid 1950s, the gradual relaxation of the Hollywood production code and the growth of independent filmmaking brought to the forefront a whole series of American movies which openly explored taboo breaking subjects about sexuality, crime, and the use of drugs. One series of movies causing a heated public controversy dealt with the social problem of juvenile delinquency. Films like The Wild One, with Marlon Brando in 1953, directly confronted the issue of postwar youngsters’ crime and gang life, initiating cycles of teenage exploitation films often called juvenile delinquency movies.

In the U.S., these successful film cycles about the misbehavior of rebellious post war baby boomers sparked a wider controversy about the increase in juvenile crime, the failing educational system, and the loss of family values in American society. The movies only increased the anxious inquiries from different parts of the society. What is so interesting about these 1950s juvenile delinquency movies is that they could stir up such a heated debate across various groups and organizations. Everyone from the average audience to the U.S. Senate, including leading journalists, intellectuals, politicians, and religious leaders, was moved to raise their voices about these movies’ effects on endangered core social values. This situation, where various moral guardians express their concern over key values, often signals a society wide moral panic. The controversy and moral panic were not restricted to the U.S. In the U.K. and other European countries, a wider public debate addressed juvenile delinquency and the influence of imported American movies (Biltereyst, 2007).

Despite a century of development cinema, with a huge industry, is still a young event. Cinema was not invented. Nor was it precisely a process of evolution. Rather it was the realization of a conception that had been clearly envisioned for centuries before. Edison, Dickson, Paul, the Lumieres merely chanced to be the ones privileged to add the last elements to the building that had been foreseen and in the making for many generations (Robinson, 1996). Perhaps, it is better to say that movies are not documents of their time; they are feelings of their time. Its effects on culture, reading/writing, mass literacy, politics of the societies can not be ignored. In general, emerge of cinema at the end of the nineteenth century initiated a movement from text culture to visual culture societies.

Let me finish what I started with some sentences from Barbara Low (again!) about cinema written eighty four years ago. “It is, therefore, very much worth while to consider to what extent this extremely powerful force of the cinema may help or intensify different attitudes”.

References

Biltereyst, Daniel. American juvenile delinquency movies and the european censors, in youth culture in global cinema, edited by Timothy Shary and Alexandra Seibel, University of Texas press, Austin, 2007.

Bolter, Jay David. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print [2nd edition]. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Clegg, Brian (2007). The Man Who Stopped Time. Joseph Henry Press.

Dixon, W. Winston. Re-viewing British cinema, 1900-1992, State University of Newyork Press, Albany, 1994.

Grant, K. Bendure, G. Hawaii, Lonely Planet. 2007.

Harvey, Sylvia. (1996). What is cinema?, in Cinema: the Beginnings and the future, edited by Cristopher Williams, University of Westminster press. London.

Henderson, Amy, (1992). Media and the Rise of Celebrity Culture. OAH Magazine of History, Spring 1992.

Jacobs, Lewis. The rise of the American film. Teachers College, Columbia University, New York, 1967.

Low, Barbara. (1925). The Cinema in Education: Some Psychological Considerations. Contemporary Review, November, 1925.

McGinn, Colin. The power of Movies. Pantheon Books, New York, 2005.

National Media Museum. http://www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk/pdfs/cineHISTORY.pdf

Naremore, James. Brantlinger, Patrick (1991). Modernity and mass culture, Indiana University Press, 1991.

Nebeker, Frederik. Dawn of the electronic Age: Electrical Technologies in the Shaping of the Modern World. John Wiley & Sons. Newjersy. 2009.

Robinson, David. (1996).  Realising the vision: 300 years of cinematography, in Cinema: the Beginnings and the future, edited by Cristopher Williams, University of Westminster press. London.

Vincent, David. (2000). The rise of mass literacy: reading and writing in modern Europe. Pility Press, UK.

I do admit, I love Steven Jobs!  Here is a clip about a new book on his presentation secrets.  Note that he is called a master storyteller (back to our oral roots?) and that he uses visuals (slides) to create maximum impact (the breakout of the visual?).  This seems like a perfect example of multimodal communication where our use of visuals is allowing us to return to orality.

Secrets of Steven Jobs

It’s a shame the book does not actually include interviews with Steve Jobs.  (I wonder if the book is available in an electronic format?) 🙂

My husband works for Enquiro and they do market strategies for search engines.  The are a small Kelowna, BC company but all of their business is large US corporation and the major search engine players.  The recent reading by Bolter and Kress made me think of the connections to what this company has to offer.  One line of Enquio’s business is eye-tracking research – they capture where people look on a screen and create an image of it.  I have taken part in these studies and have seen the images of where by eyes have looked.  Very interesting technology and very powerful for the company’s to utilize.  If you are interested take a look.

http://www.enquiroresearch.com/eyetracking-report.aspx

Language as Cultural Identity

Russification of the Central Asian Languages

Pier Borbone asserts that “there is no obligatory relationship between language and writing: per se, every language can be represented with any graphic system, even systems originally created for other languages – if necessary with certain adaptations.”  (Borbone, 2007)  He further theorizes that “the decision to adopt a certain kind of script depends to a large degree on other considerations, not having to do with the language itself, and that the choices of script made by different peoples and nations are an interesting clue to cultural, political and religious aspects of their history.”  (Borbone, 2007)

The former Soviet Union provides an interesting case study when looking at cultural and political implications of using an already existent script for historically and culturally rich but very different languages which already had been using a different script.  Specifically looking at the adoption of the Cyrillic alphabet to the Central Asian and Far Eastern languages, we can examine the Russification of these particular languages and cultures. 

With the creation of the new Soviet Union came many challenges.  One of the major challenges was to create an identity and somehow unify over 100 different ethnic groups.  A systematic policy of Russification was adopted by the early Soviet government but it was by no means a new development.  Russification dates back to the 16^th century with the conquest of Khanate of Kazan and other Tatar areas.  At its early stages, Russification mostly involved Christianization and implementation of the Russian language as the sole administrative language.

The Cyrillic alphabet was created by St. Cyril and his brother St. Methodius, who were Byzantine missionaries and were sent to convert the Slavs to Christianity.  The original alphabet was known as Glagolitic from which modern day Cyrillic evolved.

Glagolitic alphabet

Cursive version of the Glagolitic alphabet

http://www.omniglot.com/writing/glagolitic.htm

 1918 version

The names of the letters are in Russian.

http://www.omniglot.com/writing/cyrillic.htm

Languages written with the Cyrillic alphabet

Abaza, Abkhaz, Adyghe, Archi, Avar, Azeri, Balkar, Bashkir, Belarusian, Bulgarian, Buryat, Chechen, Chukchi, Church Slavonic, Chuvash, Dargwa, Dungan, Erzya, Even, Evenki, Gagauz, Ingush, Kabardian, Kalmyk, Karakalpak, Kazakh, Komi, Koryak, Kumyk, Kurdish, Kyrghyz, Laz, Lak, Lezgi, Lingua Franca Nova, Macedonian, Mansi, Mari, Moksha, Moldovan, Mongolian, Nanai, Nenets, Nivkh, Old Church Slavonic, Ossetian, Russian, Ruthenian, Serbian, Slovio, Tabassaran, Tajik, Tatar, Turkmen, Tuvan, Tsez, Udmurt, Ukrainian, Uyghur, Uzbek, Votic, Yakut, Yukaghir, Yupik

http://www.omniglot.com/writing/cyrillic.htm

In the early centuries, the Christian missionaries had difficulties in converting eastern Slavs to Christianity due to language barriers.  The western missionaries were using Latin and the eastern missionaries were using Greek but both were foreign to the Slavs.  St. Cyril (827-869 AD) developed the Glagolitic/Cyrillic script which made the conversion process much simpler.  The brothers modeled Glagolitic alphabet on a cursive form of Greek.  The Glagolitic alphabet evolved into Old Church Slavonic which “was used as the liturgical language of the Russian Orthodox Church between the 9^th and the 12the centuries.” (Blech, 2008)  Currently the Russian Orthodox Church uses Church Slavonic which appeared during the 14^th century.  There are some speculations that the Old Church Slavonic may have been invented by St. Kliment of Ohrid based on the Glagolitic alphabet. 

The current form of the Cyrillic alphabet came into being in 1708 during Peter the Great’s westernization and secularization campaigns.  The newly modified alphabet was known as grazhdanka.

The 1917 Russian revolution paved the way for the inception of the Soviet Union in 1922 which united several republics under one umbrella. After 1922, the authorities decided to eradicate the use of the Arabic alphabet in Turkic and Persian languages in the Soviet-controlled Central Asia, in the Volga region, including Tatarstan, and in the Caucasus. 

This drastic change was well thought out because it detached the local population from the exposure to the language and writing system of the Koran.  This served a twofold purpose of curbing religious activities and further separating the local population from their ethnically closer groups in other Middle Eastern countries.  As well it prevented the “formation of alternative ethnically based political movements, including pan-Islamism and pan-Turkism.”   (Absoluteastronomy, 2009)

A very effective way of accomplishing this was to “promote what some regard as artificial distinctions between ethnic groups and languages rather than promoting amalgamation of these groups and a common set of languages based on Turkish or another regional language.”  (Absoluteastronomy, 2009)

The new alphabet was inspired by the Turkish alphabet and was based on the Latin alphabet.  However, in 1939-1940, the policy changed and it was decided to change Tatar, Kazakh, Uzbek, Turkmen, Tajik, Kyrgyz, Azeri and Bashkir languages and make them use variations of the Cyrillic alphabet.  It was claimed that the switch was made “by the demands of the working class.”  (Absoluteastronomy, 2009)

In the Soviet Union the Latin alphabet was first officially introduced in Soviet Azerbaijan in 1925 13, and a “Unified Turkic Latin Alphabet” for all the Turkic languages of Soviet Central Asia followed between 1927 and 1930. In the second half of the 1930s the policy was changed, and a campaign began to introduce, in place of the unified Latin alphabet, several Cyrillic alphabets somewhat different for each Turkic language. For instance, the Cyrillic alphabet for the Uighur language consisted of 41 letters – the Latin one being of 32. (Winner, 1952)

Since the Soviet government decided that a nation was defined by the existence of a language, a language had to be selected each time it was decided that there was to be a nation.  This activity produced considerable problems.  One of the major ones was the fact that dialectic differences had to be accentuated between the populations of a single linguistic area.  Each nation was constructed on the basis of difference. 

The most ludicrous case was the separation created between Tajik and Persian.  The Tajik used literary Persian as their written language.  There exists a perfect comprehensibility between the literary languages current in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan.  However, in their daily lives the Persian speakers of Central Asia use dialects which vary considerably.  The relationship between Iranian and Tajik Persian is similar to the relationship between Persian French and Quebecois.  Russian linguists had to formalize and fix differences and to invent a modern literary Tajik language.  Instead of taking one of the existing Tajik dialects as their standard, they created an artificial language which combined characteristics from different regions.  They kept the phonological system of Old Persian, but adopted grammatical variations which highlighted the difference with Iran. 

Uzbek was also severely manipulated.  It was linked with Kazakh and Tatar which have the least similarities with Uzbek.  Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan were quick to adopt Latin script, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan delayed the switchover, and both still use Cyrillic.

The situation is different for the Turkic-speaking peoples of the Soviet Union. The use of vari­ous modified Cyrillic alphabets, in this case with variations for the Azeri, Kazakh, Turkmen, Kyrgyz languages, was the norm at the time of the break-up of the Soviet Union. Nowadays the vari­ous independent states each go their separate ways: in Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan a modified Latin alphabet is used, while in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan the Cyrillic ones are still used. Obviously to some extent these choices reflect the political relationships that exist, or are desired, with Russia and Turkey.

The 20th century is one in which national languages have rapidly developed and increased in number. If we speak about European national languages, they have increased nearly threefold (from 16 to 50) in something more than 100 years. In Central Asia, if only the Turkic language writing systems are taken into consideration, the unified literary language (Chagatay Turkic) developed into 30 different literary languages.

Ong asserts that “more than any other single invention, writing has transformed human consciousness.” (Ong, 2000, p.77)  He further states that “writing establishes what has been called ‘context-free’ language  …  or ‘autonomous ‘ discourse, discourse which cannot be directly questioned or contested as oral speech can be because written discourse has been detached from its author.” (Ong, 2000, p.77) 

The result of this manipulation of languages was loss of local languages and cultures.  The official policy of sending Russians to non-Russian speaking republics resulted in the local population adopting Russian language and culture while Russian people did not learn local languages or partake in the local cultures.  To do so was considered backward.  When non-Russian speakers moved to another non-Russian republic, they learned Russian instead of the local language.  For example 57% of Estonia’s Ukrainians and 70% of Estonia’s Belarusians claimed Russian to be their native language in the 1989 Soviet census.

Patterns of linguistic and ethnic assimilation (Russification) were complex and cannot be accounted for by any single factor such as educational policy. Also relevant were the traditional cultures and religions of the groups, their residence in urban or rural areas, their contact with and exposure to Russian language and to ethnic Russians, and other factors.

There is strong evidence to suggest that language was viewed as the first attack in the government’s Russification policy because it is very closely tied with who we are, individual identity and the identity of a group.  Changing a language eventually brings about changes in culture and thinking.  Changing a script in a particular language to another aligns that language and culture with the dominant culture.

References

Absolute Astromony: Exploring the Universe of Knowledge. (2009)  Russification.  Retrieved October 3, 2009, from http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Russification

Allworth, A. Ed. (2002).  130 Years of Russian Dominance, A Historical Overview . Duke University Press. Retrieved October 2, 2009, from Google Books http://books.google.ca/books?hl=en&lr=&id=X2XpddVB0l0C&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=use+of+cyrillic+alphabet+in+central+asia&ots=-95SLd9pSF&sig=QTiOnWJkrczLApCu-d6ffsl9aEM#v=onepage&q=use%20of%20cyrillic%20alphabet%20in%20central%20asia&f=false

Blech, A. (2008) The Russian Orthodox Church: History and Influences.  Retrieved October 23, 2009, from http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/creees/_files/pdf/curriculum/CREEES-developed-units/russian_orthodox.pdf

Bodrogligeti, A. (1993). Dissolution of the Soviet Union: The Question of Alphabet Reform for the Turkic Republics.  Azerbaijan International, 1.3, 16-17.  Retrieved October 28, 2009 from http://azer.com/aiweb/categories/magazine/13_folder/13_articles/13_sovietunion.html

Borbone, G. P.(2007).  Choice of Script as a Mark of Cultural or/and National Identity. Retrieved October 18, 2009, from http://www.stm.unipi.it/programmasocrates/cliohnet/books/language2/02_Borbone%201.pdf

Burghart, D. L., (?/) In the Tracks of Tamerlane: Central Asia’s Path to the 21^st Century.  Retrieved October 5, 2009, from http://ndu.edu/CTNSP/tamerlane/Tamerlane-Chapter1.pdf

Eurasia Insight. (2006)  President Ponders Alphabet Change in Kazakhstan.  Retrieved October 24, 2009, from http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav111706b.shtml

Omniglot: Writing Systems and Languages of the World. (2009). Retrieved October 27, 2009, fromhttp://www.omniglot.com/writing/glagolitic.htm

Omniglot: Writing Systems and Languages of the World. (2009). Retrieved October 27, 2009, fromhttp://www.omniglot.com/writing/cyrillic.htm

Ong, W. J., (2000). Orality and Literacy.  New York:  Routlage.

Winner, T. G.(1952).  Problems of Alphabetic Reform Among the Turkic Peoples of the Soviet Central Asia, 1920-1941. The Slavonic and East European Review, 76, pp. 133-147.

Hi Everyone,

My research project is at

ETEC540/2009WT1/Assignments/ Research 

Project/SilentReadingImpactingLiteracy 

At the beginning of his book, Bolter (2001, p.xiii) states, “At present, however, it seems to me that the computer is not leading to a new kind of orality, but rather to an increased emphasis on visual communication”.  While it is true that we are seeing an increase in visual modes of representation, we are also seeing an increase in the availability and usefulness of speech recognition technologies.  Perhaps the “pendulum” is also swinging back towards a new kind of orality (Bolter, 2001, p.xiii).

Speech recognition, also known as voice recognition, converts speech to text and allows users to verbally direct their computer to perform specific commands. With the use of a microphone (either an external one or one internally built into the computer) words dictated are reproduced into a word processor document.  Speech recognition allows the user to verbally specify punctuation, spell out acronyms, move the cursor, format texts, change fonts, save files (and more), all without touching the keyboard.   Errors can be corrected by speaking the name of the word which is incorrect and then saying “correct that”.   This will produce a list of words that closely match and one simply needs to speak aloud the number of the line that the correct word is on, followed by “click ok” and the word is corrected. 

 Speech recognition technologies are extremely beneficial for people with learning disabilities and those who are physically disabled.  A relative of mine, who was paralyzed from the neck down in a motorcycle accident, is able to dictate and send emails and update his Facebook page by using speech recognition. This technology could also help young children learn to read and write by allowing them to see on a computer screen, their spoken words turn into written words.  Cavanagh (2009) found that “Students who use speech recognition are writing more, writing independently, spelling correctly, using longer words, using more complex written language and writing thoughts that have never been written before”.   Another advantage, for people of all ages, is the ease of translating conversations, interviews, notes and other information into a word document, enabling easy access to all sections of the material.

 With the use of speech recognition, we will no longer be restricted by the speed at which we can write or type, but by the speed at which we can produce and form ideas and thoughts within our minds.  Speech recognition would allow us to reduce distractions and keep our minds on what we are saying.  This would be like a “funnel” which according to Ronald Kellogg (1989) is, “an aid that channels the writer’s attention into only one or two processes”.  By removing the desire to edit while speaking, speech recognition allows for the uninterrupted flow of ideas into words.

 Clearly there are some valuable advantages to the use of speech recognition technology, however, is it simply another method of getting our thoughts into words on a document, or does it alter the way we write?  McLuhan’s (1994) expression, “The medium is the message”, seems to say that as dictation is a different medium than writing, each would create a different final product.

 Gould, Conti, and Hovanyecz, (1983) research found that participants performed at least as well when dictating to the listening typewriter as they did when writing.  John Gould’s (1978) experiment found that after considerable experience with dictation, participants were 20-65% faster at dictating than at writing similar quality compositions. 

 As stated by Willard (1997), “Speech and writing are fundamentally different; people seldom speak as they write, or write as they speak (unless they are preparing a written copy of a speech)”.  When dictating and using speech recognition technologies, one might have the tendency to speak more formally, in a style more ‘suitable’ for writing.  If, the typically more informal style of conversation is used, this would change the style of writing produced.  However, speech recognition is generally used to get main ideas and thoughts onto a word document, with most users then editing and re-writing sections of their original draft.

 Dictation and writing are different, but effective methods to get words on ‘paper’.  As Gould (1978) states, “Composition is still the fundamental skill necessary for quality writing, and method of composition is of secondary importance”.  Each individual’s writing style is different; therefore, it will be up to the individual who uses the speech recognition to decide if and how it changes and defines their own personal style of writing.

References:

 Bolter, J. D. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print [2^nd edition]. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

 Cavanagh, C.A.  (2009). Speech Recognition Trial Protocol.  Closing the Gap, 26(5), 8-11.   Retrieved from:

 Gould, J. D. (1978). How experts dictate.  Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance. 4(4), 648-661.

 Gould, J., Conti, J. & Hovanyecz, T. (1983). Composing Letters with a Simulated Listening Typewriter. Communications of the ACM , 26, 295-308.  

 Kellogg, R. T. (1989).  Idea Processors: Computer Aids for Planning and Composing Text. Computer Writing Environments: Theory, Research, and Design. Ed. Bruce Britton and Shawn Glynn. Hillsdale, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. 57-92.

 McLuhan, M. (1994).  Understanding media: The extensions of man.  Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

 Willard, E. (1997). Technical Speaking? Automatic Speech Recohnition and Technical Writing.  Cal Poly State University.  Retrieved from: http://saoki.site0.com/poly/stc/essays/ewillard.html

Here’s an interesting article about Google’s global library project.  It certainly makes our Bolter readings very relevant.

Click here….

It's a special time here in Oaxaca

Hello my virtual friends.Please visit this link to read my research paper on punctuation

Take care

Dilip

      The dawn of the printing press not only changed the realm of writing, it also fostered a crucial change in human thought process and learning. The evolution of the written word into a mass-produced, evenly distributed visual work promoted a cultural shift from oral to visual dominance. Walter Ong provides important insights on the cultural shift and provides thorough examples to validate it. However he falls short of providing an adequate theory for the physiological changes within the human brain. This does not necessitate that he is incorrect, but rather that more information could be provided. The visual shift occurring in our culture has not always been met with enthusiasm. In fact, there is a form of backlash against the visual stating that it cultivates a lack of intelligence. Ong’s central message indicates a move from the oral to visual realm. Yet it can also be theorized that the shift is actually a return back to the visual. The theory we accept is minor in comparison to the interchange of the two realms, which will provide major implications for western culture and self-consciousness.

      The printing press is the technological advancement that ushered in the cultural swing of oral to visual. Ong argues that the letterpress situates words in space and locks them in place forming a visually appealing work. The printing press also allowed access to works en masse and was structured in a manor more easily read than that of manuscripts written by hand. Marshall McLuhan (1962) suggests that a technology, such as the printing press, creates changes in our thoughts and expressions. In other words, the new technology changes our consciousness. Ong (1982) uses numerous examples as evidence for the advancement of the visual cultural shift theory. The creation of lists, indexes, and even our own axioms indicate our move from oral to visual. Ong’s references to different cultures and examples are extensive and confirm that a shift had occurred, but Ong lacks physiological evidence as to why a change had taken place in human consciousness.

       The human brain is divided into two sides, the left and the right. Studies of patients with split brain provide us with insights into how the brain works. Their findings suggest that the left portion of the brain is responsible for speech, abstract thinking, logic, and numeracy. The right portion of the brain deals with spatial recognition and facial recognition, suggesting that the right portion of the brain is more visually oriented. Leonard Shlain confirms this theory in his book the “Alphabet Versus the Goddess: The Conflict Between Word and Image”: “The right brain is nonverbal. … It comprehends the language of cries, gestures, grimaces, cuddling, sucking, touching, and body stance. Its emotional states are under little volitional control and betray true feelings through fidgeting, blushing, or smirking.” (Shlain, 1998, 18-19). Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Blink”, argues that cognition based on the visual is faster and more accurate than cognition influenced by words or logic (Gladwell, 2007). Therefore, the rapid change in our culture due to new technologies could cause us to use the rapid, more accurate side of the brain for processing new information. The theory suggested here has fascinating implications particularly for the fast paced world of the 21st century. Our reliance on visual images could be due to our need to get information at a more rapid pace.

       Visual perception may be a more powerful tool for incorporating information than oral. The New Encyclopedia website further demonstrates a visual dominance due to the fact that visual perception is multi-channeled, whereas auditory perceptions are mono-channeled. “The eye can absorb that many different things at once without confusion or overload, but the ear’s inability to take in multiple soundtracks — multiple dialogues — at the same time is further evidence of the greater power of visual perception compared with perception of aural (word-based) communication” (New Encyclopedia, 2008). The invention of the printing press created a basis for visual uniformity causing the shift in a need for multichannel communication.

      As Ong suggests, culture and perception have shifted from orality to the visual. However, Ong provides numerous examples of intellectuals who revolted against the use of writing, but no examples of those who revolt against the cultural shift from auditory to visual dominance. Lester Faigley, professor of English at the University of Texas, provides some of the major criticisms of the visual shift in his keynote speech presented at the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of Writing (1998 Conference) entitled “Technology and Literacy in a Wired Academy”. He attests that many scholars are researching the thoughts of images encroaching on written territory: “Barbara Maria Stafford has examined how current attitudes toward images were formed in eighteenth-century England, when educated people began associating images with ignorance, illiteracy, and deceit” (Faigley, 1998, pg. 4). Images were also seen as creating a loss of intellect. This can be seen in Williams Wordsworth’s poem, “Illustrated books and Newspapers”, in which he stated new technologies creating images that foster a lack of intelligence and a move backwards instead of forwards in intellectual discovery. Wordsworth indicates his apprehension of image based culture while trying to hold onto the auditory traditions:

 “Back towards caverned life’s first rude career.

Avaunt this vile abuse of pictured page!

Must eyes be all in all, the tongue and ear

Nothing? Heaven keep us from a lower stage!” (Wordsworth)

 Could the shift from oral to visual perception be a return to the visual? Ong (1982) suggests that the change occurs but does not necessarily reference whether the shift is a return to the visual or a new conceptual change. Harold Innis suggests that it could be a return to the visual. “the discovery of printing in the middle of the fifteenth century implied the beginning of a return to a type of civilization dominated by the eye rather than the ear” (Innis, 1951, p. 72). It is true that before written text many visuals were used in order to indicate meaning. Different cultures have used picture images to facilitate communication. However, in western culture, it is clear that manuscripts contained visual images as well as text, suggesting perhaps that the shift was from visual to oral and back to visual. The New Encyclopedia’s section on visual culture also asserts that change could have had a visual starting point. Similar to the creation of the printing press, the technological advancements in image making changed our cultural outlook. “The development of photography meant that a mass image-based culture could begin to emerge again, after visual culture had been overwhelmed by verbal and literate culture. To be sure, many innovations in drawing and painting had been achieved, and images had figured widely in the pre-photographic age; but they depended on the skill and perception of the image-maker.” (New Encyclopedia, 2008). Yet, what is more vital at this point is what this shift does to and for our culture.

      The shift to a visually dominated culture has its implications for how we perceive ourselves as well as how we learn and interact. The focus, as suggested by Ong, indicates that we are more independent but with the realization that we do not have to be. The technological advancements will change how we read, what we focus on (ourselves vs. society), and the world of academia. Hyperbooks and easily accessible mass media images, and videos will help shape our understanding. What is important to recognize is that the shift in our cultural perceptions is crucial to our understanding. Yet we are only now recognizing the interplay or relationship of the written word and the visual realm. The physical method of reading will shift along with our thoughts of writing conventions. The possibilities of this interplay will have a momentous effect on our current cultural belief system.

 References

 Faigley, Lester. (1998) Technology and Literacy in a Wired Academy. Address. Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of Writing. Minnesota, Minneapolis. Retrieved from http://writing.umn.edu/docs/speakerseries_pubs/Faigley.pdf

 Gladwell, Malcolm. (2007). Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking”. Back Bay Books.

 Innis, Harold. (1951). The Bias of Communication. Toronto: U of Toronto.

 McLuhan, M. (1962).  The Gutenberg galaxy: The making of typographic man. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

 Ong, Walter (1982) Orality and Literacy. London and New York: Routledge.

 Shlain, Leonard. (1998). The Alphabet Versus the Goddess: The Conflict Between Word and Image. New York: Viking, 1998.

 The New Encycopedia. (2008). Visual Culture. Retrieved on 7 Oct. 2009. Retrieved from http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Visual_Culture

 Wordsworth, William. “Illustrated Books and Newspapers”. The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth. Ed. E. de Selincourt and Helen Darbishire. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1958.

For a more visually appealing wiki post, please continue to the ETEC 540 wiki.

Early Pictographic Communication: Pictographic art from Minnesota shows how Native Americans communicated with one another (jacehgn, 2009).

Icons and symbols are everywhere. Throughout history, icons and symbols have a vital role as a communication tool. In their most simplified forms, they are recognizable and often, comprehensible images and visuals; in their most complex forms, they exist as a series of abstract lines to complex strokes that bear meaning in languages not understood by all. An examination of icons and symbols throughout history and through different cultures will reveal its implications for visual literacy and education.

Starting With Semiotics

In linguistic terms, the icon and the symbol are derived from three semiotic modes developed by philosopher Charles Sanders Pierce, a key figure in semiotics (Chandler, 2009; Huening, 2004). According to Peirce (in Chandler, 2009), the symbol does not represent the object; therefore, one must learn and become familiar with the relationship to the object. Examples where symbols are found include the national flags of each country and the languages with alphabets, punctuation and words. Conversely, the icon resembles, imitates, or represents the object to which it bears similarity. Examples of icons include portraits, scale models, metaphors and sound effects. With semiotics, ‘pure’ icons do not exist and is influenced by an element of cultural convention. Historically, iconic forms have evolved towards symbolic forms (Chandler, 2009).

History

Early evidence of the communication and expression of human thought can be seen in graphical transcriptions such as those found in notched markings in bones during the time of Homo erectus, at least 412,000 years ago. Stone and bone markings from the era of Homo sapiens sapiens, about 100,000 years ago, convey more evidence of symbolic thinking. Cave art from southern France has also provided proof of pictorial communication displaying symbolic references (Fischer, 2001). The appearance of the horse in the cave art could provide one of the earliest representations of the icon in use.

Most early writing systems that once existed are currently extinct and its origins are not very clear; however, writing systems remain one of society’s most versatile means of communication (Fischer, 2001; British Museum, 2009). Symbolic writing is apparent in the Balkan region about as early as 6,500 years ago, where graphical marks and impressions were stored as information into clay tokens that could be easily baked and preserved (Fischer, 2001). By 4,000 B.C.,  small clay “envelopes” called bullae were used to potentially enclose the clay tokens. Markings and impressions on a bulla would enable one to decipher its contents without breaking it open (Fischer, 2001; Ong, 2002). An earlier known writing system was developed approximately 5,000 years ago in the Middle East, with other scripts invented in Egypt, India, China, and Central America. While each system was developed independently of the other (Ong, 2002), each performs the same basic function – to provide a visual means of recording language (British Museum, 2009).

Other symbolic and pictographic writing systems include the Chinese characters that are also used in Japanese writing. Although Chinese writing is considered logography, one must learn to recognize and learn the meaning of each character. Some more visual examples of recording language include Native American pictography, which conveys complex communication using drawings of specific objects that could be articulated by speech (Fischer, 2001; Ong, 2002). Fischer’s (2001) example of an Abnaki hunter in Maine explains how a birchbark scroll with a drawing could be left outside a wigwam, where the scroll depicts “a man in a canoe and a deer, with a man on foot pointing at a squiggle, and a snow-shoed man pulling a sled” with the translation: “I’m crossing the lake to hunt deer, turning off before the next lake, and won’t be back until spring” (Fischer, 2001, p. 19).

Literacy

The history of the movement from icon to symbol conveys the human need to move from a simplified means of communication to one that is more complex, one that is understood by a deeper meaning. Ong (2002) asserts that writing is a deeply interiorized technology that can be understood by observing its past with orality. Coulmas (1991) further argues that “writing was not invented for literary purposes, but its invention made literature possible – certain kinds of literature, anyway – and it also made possible a whole range of other complex communicative activities not found in non-literate societies” (p. 4).

Queen Elizabeth as Icon and Symbol: Profile of the Queen on a Canadian coin (Devan_Not_Devil, 2009).

Icons, by their semiotic definition, generally have the characteristic of being universally understood, whereas symbols can become lost in translation. However, both icons and symbols do not necessarily need to possess meaning to those who are literate. For instance, the profile of Queen Elizabeth on Canadian coins holds both iconic and symbolic meaning. As an icon, her profiled portrait shows that she is indeed Queen Elizabeth; however, as a symbol, her appearance on the coin suggests a deeper meaning that can be conveyed by Canada’s political, economical and historical ties to the Commonwealth. To an individual who is new to Canada or does not live in the country, the profile would represent that of a woman who is seemingly important yet whose importance bears little to no meaning, with her relation to the image on the reverse side of the coin drawing confusion. Apart from this example, signs and languages composed of symbols can also challenge individual understanding of the object being represented.

Education

The use of pictographic icons and symbols enabled individuals to decipher meaning visually and allegorically. If one could recognize the image being portrayed, there was a chance that the message could be understood (Fischer, 2001; Ong, 2002). Ong (2002) asserts that pictures serve as aide-memoires, or a means to help the memory. This suggests that to learn the code and meaning of a symbol, one must commit it to memory.

Throughout history, writing served as a way to remain organized and keep wealth and power. In ancient Mesopotamia, mostly boys learned how to make a tablet and use a stylus in order to write basic cuneiform and learn thousands of Sumerian words. With enough training, the students could become scribes and thus, members of a privileged social class. Before the advent of mass education in the nineteenth century, literacy was reserved for the wealthy and privileged (British Museum, 2009).

More recent and emerging applications of icons and symbols in education can be found in developments such as the semiotic web, gaming literacy and other applications in informal learning. Gee (2003) observes the prevalence and significance of visual literacy in textbooks today, where more images are part of the content, next to the words. He describes these texts as being multimodal – going beyond words to convey meaning (Gee, 2003). Furthermore, with the existence of multimodal content, students are introduced or led to discover new ways of reading and writing. Education has gone beyond print and moved to the realm of computing, where the output of the monitor consists of numerous symbols (or icons, in computing terms) laid out in a graphical user interface. Learners are often expected to understand the meaning of symbols and icons without context. One example is the Sugar user interface on the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) computer, which was specially designed to meet the needs of children and uses icons to represent the user and his or her collaborative environment (OLPC, 2009).

OLPC's Sugar Interface: Changes to the layout of the Sugar interface - how does this affect users? (curiouslee, 2008).

In today’s modern world, Gee (2003) argues, people need to be more active and literate in different semiotic domains. Marcus (2003) further outlines the existence of these domains as part of the user experience in computing and indicates that basic Chinese has about 3,000 signs that have developed over millennia while software developers have designed two to five times the number in a few years, with the downside to many of those signs being poorly designed and illegible. Icons and symbols are now found in a variety of platforms from desktop computers, mobile devices to vehicle systems. In 1974, the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA), developed a system of 50 symbol signs for use in transportation hubs like airports and at large international events. AIGA’s development of the symbols shows the possibilities of education using the semiotic domain with application of what Gee (2003) refers to as “internal and external design grammars”, where principles and patterns are identified through observation of social practices. The purpose of developing such a system was to provide a system of signs that “communicated the required range of complex messages, addressed people of different ages and cultures, and were clearly legible at a distance” (AIGA, 2009).

Conclusion

Over time, icons and symbols have provided the literate and illiterate with visual representations to convey meaning.  Today, icons and symbols are used more widely for environmental uses like wayfinding, in user interfaces, and for communicating information to a more universal audience. Their existence in the semiotic domain demonstrates the need for a well-designed, standard of symbols and icons that can simultaneously address the requirements of the audience for more direct comprehension and learning.

References

AIGA. (2009). Symbol Signs. Retrieved from http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/symbol-signs
Chandler, D. (2009). Semiotics for beginners. Aberystwyth University. Retrieved from http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/sem02.html
Coulmas, F. (1991). Writing Systems of the World. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
curiouslee. (2008). OLPC Sugar User Interface 2007 – 2008. [Image]. Retrieved from the Flickr Creative Commons: http://www.flickr.com/photos/curiouslee/3106900826/sizes/m/
Devan_Not_Devil. (23 May 2009) Coins. [Image]. Retrieved from the Flickr Creative Commons: http://www.flickr.com/photos/fatime_cn/3558308140/
Fischer, S. R. (2001). A History of Writing. London: Reaktion Books.
Gee, J. P. (2003). What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. In UBC ETEC 510 Custom Course Materials. New York: Palgrave MacMillan.
Huening, D. (2004). Symbol, index, icon. The Chicago School of Media Theory: University of Chicago. Retrieved from http://csmt.uchicago.edu/home.htm
Jacehgn. (2009, February 23). Hegman Lake Photograph. [Image] Retrieved from the Flickr Creative Commons: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7236407@N08/3316972736/sizes/m/
Marcus, A. (2003). Icons, Symbols, and Signs: Visible Languages to Facilitate Communication. Interactions, May 2003. Retrieved from the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) Portal.
One Laptop per Child. (2009). Laptop Interface. Retrieved from http://laptop.org/en/laptop/interface/index.shtml
Ong, W. J. (2002). Orality and Literacy. London: Routledge.
The British Museum. (2009). Writing. Retrieved from http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/themes/writing/introduction.aspx

Long before there were computers in most of our homes, there was Mithila Art in homes of what is now India and Nepal. Originally, this folk art form mainly consisted of lively murals painted on the walls of homes in rural villages. But it was much more than simple art for art’s sake. “Mithila painting is part decoration, part social commentary, recording the lives of rural women in a society where reading and writing are reserved for high-caste men” (Arminton, Bindloss & Mayhew, 2006, p. 315). This was art that gave a voice to powerless rural women as a communication technology.

Historical and Cultural Context
This art form acquired its name from the kingdom of Mithila where it originated around the seventh century A.D. At that time, the region was a vast plane located primarily in what is now eastern India as well as in southern Nepal. However, the cultural center and capital of the region was in what is now the city of Janakpur, Nepal only 20 kilometers from the Indian boarder. Janakpur is of course the home of Janakpur painting while the town of Madubandi, India is home of paintings of the same name. Mithila art consists of both kinds of paintings of which Madubandi are more common.

It is said that Mithila art was born when King Janak commissioned artists to create paintings at the time of the marriage of his daughter, Sita, to the god Lord Ram. This might have to do with the fact that most Madubani paintings are created during festivals celebrating marriages and births, religious and social events and ceremonies of the Maithil community. Others say that, “Its original inspiration emerged out of the local women’s craving for religiousness and an intense desire to be one with god” (Janakpur Women’s Development Center, n.d.). However it actually began is not clear, but what it became after being passed down through many generations surly is.

“Mithila is a wonderful land where art and scholarship, laukika and Vedic traditions flourished together in complete harmony between the two” (Mishra, 2009, 4). This harmony was uncommon during this time in many other regions in southern Asia as well as the rest of the world. The general attitude toward artists in this region is one of utmost respect and they were even compared with gods. That could be a major reason why women in ancient Indian society, whom were traditionally regarded as much less significant than men, adopted Mithila art as well as other art forms as not only a communication technology, but as a means for empowerment as well.

“Picture writing is perhaps constructed culturally (even today) as closer to the reader, because it does not depend upon the intermediary of spoken language and seems to reproduce places and events directly” (Bolter, 2001, p. 59). The murals were originally painted during important community events as a kind of subjective snapshot as well as social commentary. This was a positive way for rural women to have a voice and to be heard.

Implications for Literacy and Education
In a communicative context, ‘literacy’ is commonly defined as “the ability to read and write” where to ‘write’ is defined as to “mark (letters, words, or other symbols) on a surface, with a pen, pencil, or similar implement” (Oxford University Press, 2009). So although most Mithila artists were not literate in phonetic writing, they were exceptionally literate in picture writing. As with oral communication, this type of literacy served to bring people together and strengthen their communities. “As we look back through thousands of years of phonetic literacy, the appeal of traditional picture writing is its promise of immediacy. By the standard of phonetic writing, however, picture writing lacks narrative power” (Bolter, 2001, p. 59). The “narrative power” of which Bolter refers to, is the ability of phonetic writing to convey detailed information from a first person perspective.  Unfortunately, this ability also has a tendency to actually distance those in communication rather than bring them together as in picture writing.

Bolter goes on to write that, “Sometimes, particularly when the picture text is a narrative, the elements seem to aim for the specificity of language.  Sometimes, these same elements move back into a world of pure form and become shapes that we admire for their visual economy” (2001, p. 63).  This explains the duality of this art form as both a communication technology and an aesthetic art form.  Another perspective of visual communication technologies is that, “Display is, in respect to its prominence and significance and ubiquity, the analogue of narrative” (Kress, 2005, p.14).  So while Mithila paintings perhaps lacked the ability to convey a first person narrative, they narrowed the gap between the composer and her audience in a beautiful visual mode of communication.

For the Maithil artists, the ability to express their desires, dreams, expectations, hopes and aspirations to their community in (picture) writing through their painting was most likely much more valuable than communicating detailed information to outsiders by means of phonetic writing.  “Unlike words, depictions are full of meaning: they are always specific.  So on the one hand there is a finite stock of words—vague, general, nearly empty of meaning; on the other hand there is a n infinitely large potential of depictions—precise, specific, and full of meaning” (Kress, 2005, pgs.15-16).  The meaning they conveyed through their art was unmistakable and accessible to all. In this case, picture writing literacy did not lead to phonetic or alphabetic writing literacy.  It did, however, require education.

As all writing is communication technology, Mithal art required education to master the particular tools, materials and techniques of this unique style of picture writing. Most of these artists were not formally educated and were illiterate in the ways of phonetic reading and writing. But they did have to learn about the range of natural hues that could be derived from preparations and combinations of clay, bark, flowers and berries as well as how to fashion brushes from bamboo twigs and small pieces of cloth (Mishra, 2009).

Conclusion
Although Mithila art did not directly lead ancient India to a conventional sense of literacy nor to formal education of the masses, it did give a voice to the voiceless. As a communication technology, it provided something for those artists that was and remains a critical element of their society: a heightened consciousness. As Ong writes, “Technologies are not mere exterior aids but also interior transformations of consciousness, and never more than when they affect the word. Such transformations can be uplifting. Writing heightens consciousness” (2002, p. 81).

Mithila art still exists today, but unfortunately has been commercialized with the introduction of tourism.  Much of what this art form and communication technology was and did for these people has been lost.  Most pieces are painted on paper and many are of scenes made-to-order that have nothing to do with Maithil culture, although selling their artwork has proved an increasing source of income and has in turn improved their quality of live.  With the support and guidance development organizations, groups are now promoting the consumption of Vitamin A, voting, safe sex, and saying “no” to drugs to their communities (Janakpur Women’s Development Center, n.d.).  So although it has changed considerably over many generations, Mithila art is still a meaningful communication technology.

References
Armington, S., Bindloss, J., & Meyhew, B. (2006). Lonely Planet: Nepal. Oakland, CA: Lonely Planet

Bolter, D. (2001). Writing Space: Computers, Hypertext, and the Remediation of Print. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Janakpur Women’s Development Center. (n.d.). Retrieved October 3, 2009, from http://web.mac.com/nadjagrimm/iWeb/JWDC/Welcome.html

Kress, G. (2005). Gains and losses: New forms of text, knowledge, and learning. Computers and Composition, 22, 5-22. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science

Mishra, K. K. (2009). Mithila Paintings: Past, Present and Future. Retrieved October 4, 2009 from Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts. Web site: http://ignca.nic.in/

Mithila Art – Madhubani Painting and Beyond. (n.d.). Retrieved October 3, 2009, from http://mithilaart.com/default.aspx

Ong, W. J. (2002). Orality and Literacy. New York: Routledge

Oxford University Press. (2009). Ask Oxford. Retrieved October 10th, 2009 from http://www.askoxford.com/

When it comes to writing and reading, literate cultures have never had so much choice as in today’s day and age of “hypertext”.  We are faced with the choice of being captains of our own textual ships or to sit back and be taken on a journey of discovery by trained professionals that are bound by a pre-determined itinerary.  As Bolter (2001) outlines we are entering or perhaps are already in the “late age of print” and are moving towards a remediation of print just as we have seen in the past with the advent of the printing press.  With each “remediation” there are losses and gains.  One of the strengths of the current remediation to “hypertext” is the associative capacity of the technique.  Traditional print has been described as being highly linear, patriarchal, domineering, subordinative and “non natural” given that humans naturally think associatively (Coover, 1992).  There are critics of hypertext such as Birkerts (1994) and Coover (1992) that contend that the “meditative immersion” that can only come from a master author taking the reader on a journey of discovery is something that hypertext cannot reproduce.  Whether the author is truly dead, as Foucault and others claim, and society will choose to rest control back from the corpse like grip of the author or continue to give up their control and instead be lead on a journey designed and planned by the author still remains to be seen.

Bolter (2001) makes the argument that contemporary authors have already made the transition from the purely linear writing structures, such as those seen in scrolls and codexes, to a more associative writing system.  “In a modern book, the table of contents (listing chapters and sometimes sections) defines the hierarchy, while the indices record the associative lines of thought that permeate the text.” p.34.   Footnotes and endnotes have also been argued as being associative in nature.  However, this argument applies very well to text books and scientific writing.  Where the objection falls flat is when it applies to poetry, prose and novels.   Hypertext has been promoted by technophiles as being truly revolutionary in it’s ability to link ideas that are connected but different.  Thus the reader has been given the unique opportunity to explore ideas and concepts in an almost infinite flow of information. However, despite this freedom, Birkets (1994) contends that the avalanche of choice and information that is now at literate societies’ finger tips can lead to confusion.  As Coover (1992) states:

Navigational procedures:  how do you move around in infinity without getting lost?  The structuring of the space can be so compelling and confusing as to utterly absorb the narrator and to exhaust the reader.  And there is the related problem of filtering.  With an unstable text that can be intruded upon by other author-readers, how do you, caught in a maze, avoid the trivial?  How do you duck the garbage?  Venerable novelistic values like, unity, integrity, coherence, vision, voice, seem to be in danger.  Eloquence is being redefined.  “Text” has lost its canonical certainty.  How does one judge, analyze, write about a work that never reads the same way twice. p.2

The domination of the author’s will upon the reader is one of the arguments held against the more traditional form of writing.  This imposition of will is exclusive in nature whereas electronic writing is inclusive (Bolter, 2001).  Hypertext is also touted as being far more than writing in having the capacity to incorporate multi-media components such as video and audio files.  But just as all traditional writing starts out from an associative source so to does the author of hypertext confine the writing and associative links into some resemblance of order.  Thus the author’s will is still felt by the reader/writer of hypertext.  So whether modern day texts have already incorporated elements of associative thinking is really a moot point as hypertext continues to be organized and structured by the author.

One of the most vocal critics of electronic writing is (Birkerts, 1994).  Birkerts (1994) argues that the ephemeral nature of the electronic word has been described as essentially “weightless” and thus phenomenologically the word is less than absolute.  The power is turned over from the author to the machine.  Authority now rests not in the hands of an informed and educated author but in the more esoteric computer thus conferring power to a less accountable author.  One could make the argument that in the current age of collaborative writing, especially as applied to hypertext, accountability of the author cannot occur.  Who does one question when erroneous or outright falsehoods are identified in a collaboratively developed , hyper-textual document?  Who defends the ideas and concepts developed and published in a collaboratively developed, electronic medium?  Birkerts (1994) argues that one of the most significant losses that occurs between the remediation from print to hypertext is the general loss in detail.  The electronic author does not necessarily have to weigh their words but the words simply spring forth in a torrent of information, a veritable flood of information that threatens to drown the reader.   Berkerts (1994) asks the question, “…when trained reader encounters skilled writer, will that reader ever achieve that meditative immersion that is, for me, one of the main incentives for reading?”

Like a surfer that can, with training, learn to surf the monstrous super waves, perhaps consumers of hypertext can learn to navigate the wave of information that is as far away as a click.  There could be a place for both forms of writing.  Traditional print may remain in a form that allows the author to guide the reader on a journey, very much like a cruise ship, placing ones mind in the hands of the  professionally trained captain/author,  resigning themselves to a planned itinerary and destination but trading choice for guidance.  Those that choose to compose and read hypertext can rest power from the captain and steer their literary boat wherever they will however with this freedom comes with the tendency to lose ones way.  Whatever the decision the reader/writer has choice and that “can make all the difference”.

References

Bolter, Jay, David. (2001). Writing Space:Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print.  (Second Edition). Lawrence Erlbaum Associations, Publishers, Mahwah, New Jersey, London.

Birkerts, Sven. (1994).  The Gutenberg Ellegies:  The fate of reading in an electronic age.  A Fawcett Columbine Book, P

Coover, Roberts (1992)  The end of books. Downloaded from http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/09/27/specials/coover-end.html on November 1st, 2009.

Walter Ong describes writing as a means of transcending space and time; an external process which reflects the interiorization of thought. Based upon Aristotle’s plot structure, the linear pattern, arguably contrary to the natural flow of the thought process, became the accepted format for written works. As one scholar expresses “…the writing space itself has become a hierarchy of topical elements” (Bolter, 2001). While writing for a print publication demands the creation of a hierarchical format, the discipline of that structure is contrary to the creative process. One idea suggests another and writers struggle to capture the idea in a fixed format before it slips from the consciousness.  “A writer today may still begin with a jumble of verbal ideas and only a vague sense of how these ideas will fit together….he may organize by association rather than by strict subordination” (Bolter, p 33).  The traditional format of a print publication acknowledges the artificiality of the structure. The table of content s reflects the hierarchal format dependent upon a linear process while the index incorporates the associative process. One author who rebelled against the unnatural structure imposed by traditional format is Julio Cortázar. In contrast to the plot structure outlined by Aristotle, his novel Hopscotch reflects the patterns inherent in actions and thoughts; a mosaic rather than a linear process.

Hypertext, the ability to expand beyond the linear limitations of written text, enables the reader to interact with the printed word.  Two years before the term “hypertext” was used and decades before the term was commonplace, Latin American author, Julio Cortazar created what can be considered a literary hypertext in his novel, Hopscotch. A labyrinth structured novel, Hopscotch proffers an invitation to the audience to be read either in the traditional linear format or following a zigzag path. The latter format allowed the reader to deconstruct meaning of the novel based on the readers “own preoccupations, experiences, imaginings and desires…”  (Rix, 2007). The reader participates as an accomplice in the creation of the story, which will vary depending on the path the reader takes.

Contrary to the accepted conventions, the narrative resembles a montage incorporating narrative interspersed with seemingly random information bits– newspaper fragments, scraps of literary theory, definitions and commentaries. Cortázar utilized a break with traditional readership and invited the reader to intervene and get involved in the construction of the story.  Thus the interpretation of the novel, the meaning of the text, is “to be found in the reader’s response, which has been stimulated by the text” (Yovanovich, 2005).  The participation of the reader enables the personalization of the text to self interaction and demarcates the hypertext interaction.

Termed a primitive hypertext, Hopscotch incorporates one way links between the two narrations which occur in Paris and Buenos Aires and the miscellaneous chapters.  The users ability and freedom “to re-arrange, re-combine and even abandon any specific text at any time”  (Rix, 2007) demonstrates the acceptance of Hopscotch as hypertext. Much discussion has been given to the impact of Hopscotch as a “codex hypertext”.  The impact of Hopscotch as a paper hypertext would be lost if it were in electronic format. Formatted electronically, Hopscotch would appear to be linear in nature, with no anchors and no external links. The hypertext process inherent in codex Hopscotch would be rendered useless on the computer (“Hopscotch as a Hyperbook,” n.d.).

In a deliberate challenge to established cultural norms, Hopscotch seeks to “transcend the schemes and constructs of culture…”  (Alazraki, 2005).   Cortázar argued ideas and words should not be bound by the constraints of traditional codex.  Jaime Alazraki quotes Cortázar  “ ‘I’ve always found it absurd…to talk about transforming man if man doesn’t simultaneously, or previously, transform his instrument of knowledge’”  (Alazraki, 2005).

Hypertext reflects the authenticity Cortázar presents in Hopscotch, the use of associations rather than categories, the viability of the readers response and choice in determining an individual reading experience. In contrast to the linear structure expounded by Aristotle, Julio Cortázar’s Hopscotch introduces the reader to a non-linear pattern of reading. Published years before the incorporation of digital technologies into daily life, Hopscotch exemplifies a “hypertextual literature”.

Works Cited

Alazraki, J. (2005). Toward the last square of Hopscotch. In H. Bloom, Julio Cortazar (pp. 2-26). Philadelphia: Chelsea House.

Bolter, J. D. (2001). Writing Space: Computer, Hypertext and the Remediation of Print. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Hopscotch as a Hyperbook. (n.d.). Retrieved October 28, 2009, from http://elab.eserver.org/hfl0119.html

Rix, R. (2007). Julio Cortazar’s Rayuela nad the Challenges of Cyberliterature. In C. a. Taylor, Latin American Cyberculture and Cyberliterature (pp. 194-206). Cambridge: Liverpool University Press.

Yovanovich, G. (2005). An interpretation of Rayuela Based on the Character Web. In H. Bloom, Julio Cortazar (pp. 101-148). Philadelphia: Chelsea House.

I created a video which I will embed as soon as it finalizes. Having some technical difficulties as the program continues to freeze.

The telegraph can actually be considered the grandfather of the data superhighway – the telegraph operated on a digital format (on/off mode).  (Lubrano, 1997, pg. xiv)

Ancient writings and pictograms of civilizations long gone are forms of communications that existed and provide clues to the intricate workings of a society.  As a rule, these forms of communications have long been abandoned by cultures which now fill history books.  These inscriptions, like most primitive dialects, were only effective in reaching those peoples that encountered and could interpret the material.  The ability to distribute knowledge was limited to the geographical location of the text.  Ancient writings, employed for knowledge transfer, have impacted all societies to some extent; if only as the result of cultures colliding in an increasingly smaller world.  As with most messages, these writings were created to transfer the thoughts and knowledge of a society.  It is this desire to “spread” the word is that is in essence the arching goal of communication; achieve a faster and more efficient means to transfer the message.  Amazingly, this desire to expand knowledge was not always embraced.  Much like the history of the Internet, prior desires to communicate across space and time are filled with progressive steps and changing literacy. 

 Literacy is defined as the ability to read and write.  Reading, as described by Ong is the conversion of a text “to sound, aloud or in the imagination, syllable-by-syllable”.  (Ong, 1982, pg.8)  Imagine if text could exist in the form of finite signals and codes that could be “read” by a viewer and transcribed or transmitted for others to see.  Imagine the origins of distance communication and the impact upon societies isolated by time and geography.  Thus begins the story of telegraphy.  

  Telegraphy, as detailed by the Encyclopaedia Britannica is “derived from the Greek words tele, meaning “distant,” and graphein, meaning “to write.”” (Encycopedia Britannica, 2009).  While we normally identify the telegraph to be an electromagnetic based system of transmitting dots and dashed (Morse code), this belief is flawed.  Telegraphy existed long before in the simplest forms of distance communications.  Early forms of telegraphy, describe in Iliad, included smoke and fire signals used to communicate during daylight and night times.  

 Fire signals were used extensively by watchers and scouts.  Unlike other signal types, they did not normally serve to transmit orders but were instead used to convey simple messages, and they were considered to be quite valuable in this role. (Russell, 1999,  pg. 146)

 The earliest forms of telegraphy employed a simplistic code as a means to articulate the message.  Often times, due to the geographical limitations and rudimentary technology (i.e. blanket, fire and fresh grasses) of the telegraphy, the message was pre-arranged to define only important events such as ‘danger’, ‘victory’ or a ‘summons’.

Without Sound. make Signals

Image downloaded From Flickr 28 Oct 09

Another form of visual telegraphy that impacted society was signal flags used mainly by government and mariners worldwide.  The optical telegraphy or semaphore is “is an alphabet signalling system based on the waving of a pair of tower constructed or hand-held flags in a particular pattern.” (Croft, Unknown)  Used extensively by the French government during the French revolution, and by naval fleets (still employed by use of hand held flags), the semaphore system provided distance communications thru a series of sequential stations that conveyed the messages.   As the alphabet was the “code” of semaphore, the message could be as complex as required to effectively convey significance and importance.  Given these new advances in complexity of the transmitted message through the use of the alphabet, limitations did exist including the time to record the signal and retransmit to the next station and the requirement to have a constant vigil for incoming signals.   The semaphore system was eventually abandoned as a “law was enacted imposing jail sentences and stiff fines (up to 10,000 francs) on “anyone transmitting unauthorized signals from one place to another by means of the (Chappe) telegraph machine.” (Neuman, 1996).  Besides fears of rising public opinion, the semaphore system “required extensive manpower and was expensive to operate.  Stations were seldom more than eight miles apart and were subject to interruption due to adverse weather conditions.”  (Lubrano, pg. 10)   

Communications

Semaphore flags in background.  Electrical Bolt symbolic of electric telegraphy.

Picture curtisy of http://navalcommunicator.com/index.html

In addition to the prehistoric visual telegraphy, audio telegraphy was used to gap distances beyond line-of-sight.   In Africa, drums were (and still are) commonly used as a means to convey messages across distances to both humans and gods.  Among the Ashanti people of Ghana, two styles of drumming: signal and speech exist for communications purpose.   Communications by drumming employs of two drums, one high tone and one low tone, which is used to “to mimic the highs and lows of the local Twi language, a tonal language.” (Wilson, unknown)  

As society’s reliance on rapid communications grew, better technologies were developed.  The geographically limiting visual and audio telegraphy was remediated by the faster methods.  Research and trialing of electronic signaling was wide spread.  As Nonenmacher reports:   

The science behind the telegraph dates back at least as far as Roger Bacon’s (1220-1292) experiments in magnetism. Numerous small steps in the science of electricity and magnetism followed. Important inventions include those of Giambattista della Porta (1558), William Gilbert (1603), Stephen Gray (1729), William Watson (1747), Pieter van Musschenbroek (1754), Luigi Galvani (1786), Alessandro Giuseppe Antonio Anastasio Volta (1800), André-Marie Ampere (1820), William Sturgeon (1825), and Joseph Henry (1829).  (Nonnenmacher, 2001)

In 1884, Samual Morse, with his assistance Alfred Vail trialed a telegraph line between Washington and Baltimore, transmitting the now famous message “What hath God wrought?”  (Today in History, 2007)   Morse and Vail had developed the technology to allow the required break in the electrical current; pauses in electrical current which provided the foundation for the code.   Remediation of visual by electronic telegraphy had begun, resulting in sweeping changes in communications methods. 

The electrical telegraph transformed society by achieving the goal of increased efficiency and effectiveness in communications.  Long distance communications within short timeframes reduced the size of a country and connected nations.  This increased speed was not the only change; the language of telegraphy was also transformed. “Morse Code”  was credited to Samuel Morse, but his assistant Alfred Vail is suspected of perfecting the code that exists still today.   This code is an alphabetic language created with the use of “dots and dashes [corresponding] to letters and punctuation in the English language. This cipher, which is still widely used today can be equated as to an early form of digitization, as all words, numbers and punctuation are comprised of two “dot” and “dash” symbols.” (Kanderovskis, 2007)

Electronic telegraphy influenced society in much the same way that the Internet influences society today.   From this birth of rapid, long distance communications, the foundation for standardization of journalistic style and mass communications began.  Information could be gathered, reviewed, transmitted and distributed across a nation with little effort.  Local papers began to focus more on national affairs and less on local opinion.  This flow of information affected all aspects of society; resulting in an increased awareness to national and international affairs, within shorter timeframes.  Even fiscal policies and practices were affected.  Yates argues:

the telegraph encouraged the growth and efficiency of markets by reducing communication time and costs and that it encouraged the growth and vertical integration of firms by forwarding the emergence of national market areas to absorb local and regional market areas.  (Unknown)

The telegraph linked businesses across a nation and across international boundaries.  Through the electronic telegraph, society was provided a venue to share and prosper; but like the Internet, the venue was not accepted by all.  “Russian Czar Nicholas I was likewise terrified by the telegraph’s potential to spread information. Fearing that the broad use of the telegraph would prove “subversive,”^” (Neuman, 1996) Nicholas refused to conduct business with Morse to create an effective communications system across Russia.  This fear of progress resulted in substandard communications for the military during World War I.    

Progress in communications, specifically electric telegraph affected all institutions: political, social and governmental.  “Embassies connected by telegraph to their home foreign ministries …long used to operating on their own, increasingly received instructions about pressing issues from their home office.”  (Papp, Alberts, Tuyahov, 2002)  Financial markets could deal in commodities and set prices at a national vice local market.  Distance and time melted away first with smoke, progressively advancing technology towards each dash and dot transmitted across the vast electrical lines; the earth successively reduced in size.  Access to national and international events resulted in the standardization of journalistic reporting and realization that ‘others’ existed outside or the local confines.  This path towards ‘globalization’ in communications, while benefiting many, resulted in some fears concerning the spread of knowledge and public opinion.    From an internet of electrical lines with dots and dashes, the desire to communicate to all people at all places would drive the next generation to find the internet of ones(1) and zeros (0) and remediate the electrical information highway.      

References

Croft, J.  Semaphore Flag Signalling System.  Retrieved online 21 Oct 2009 from the World Wide Web: http://www.anbg.gov.au/flags/semaphore.html

International Code of Signals.  (2009).  In Microsoft Encarta.  Retrieved 15 Oct 2009 from the World Wide Web: http://ca.encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761563724/international_code_of_signals.html

Kanderovskis, K.  (2007).  Telegraph.  Retrieved 19 Oct 2009 from the World Wide Web: http://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/telegraph.htm

Lubrano, Annteresa. (1997). The telegraph: how technology innovation caused social change. New York: Garland Pub.

Library of Congress, (2007).  Today in History.  May 24 What hath god wrought?  Retrieved Oct 18, 2009 from the World Wide Web: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/today/may24.html

 Neuman, J.  (1996).  The media’s impact on international affairs, than and now.  Retrieved 10 Oct 2009 from the World Wide Web: http://www.ndu.edu/inss/books/Books%20-%201998/Information%20Age%20Anthology%20-%20Sept%2098/ch18.html

 Ong, W.J. (1982). Orality and literacy: The technologizing of the word. London: Methuen.   

 Papp, D.S., Alberts, D.S., & Tuyahov, A.  (2002).  Historical impacts of information technologies: An overview.  Retrieved 18 Oct 2009: http://www.ndu.edu/inss/books/Books%20-%201998/Information%20Age%20Anthology%20-%20Sept%2098/ch02a.html

 Russell, F.S., (1999).  Information gathering in classical Greece.  Ann Arbor University of Michigan Press.  Retrieved 18 Oct, 2009: http://www.press.umich.edu/pdf/0472110640.pdf

 telegraph. (2009). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved October 24, 2009, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online 19 Oct 09 from the World Wide Web: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/585850/telegraph

 Wilson, B.  (Unknown).  The drumming of traditional Ashanti Healing Cermonies.  Retrieved online 18 Oct 09 from the World Wide Web: http://www.ethnomusic.ucla.edu/pre/Vol11/Vol11html/V11Wilson.html

 Yates, JoAnne, (Unknown).  The Telegraph’s effect on nineteenth century markets and firms.   Retrieved Oct 16 from the World Wide Web: http://www.h-net.org/~business/bhcweb/publications/BEHprint/v015/p0149-p0164.pdf