The Meaning of TECHNOLOGY

Posted on September 15, 2011 by Lynette Manton

“The machine does not isolate man from the great problems of nature but plunges him more deeply into them.” Antoine de Saint-Exupery

For me, technology is any kind of tool imagined, made and used by humans to change their natural habitat.  It is important to include this point of view mentioned in Wikipedia: “Technology can be viewed as an activity that forms or changes culture”.  The development of new technology does influence culture, or does culture influence the development of new technology?  Whether technological determinism is indeed involved may not be part of the definition, but culture and technology are connected and expressed through text.

Lynette

 

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The Meaning of TEXT

Posted on September 15, 2011 by Lynette Manton

 

After a few days of exploring the meaning of text and looking for ways to express my definition through words, image or video, I finally found this picture.  For me, text is a representation of language and serves as a way to communicate information and ideas that allows for distance in time and space which adds an element of power.  It is ultimately a technology invented by humans that is adaptable and evolves as our needs change.  I like this picture because it shows how writing by hand has evolved to adapt to the latest tool or better, how we have adapted the latest tool to ensure the continuation of our older form of technology and in this case, added the sound of the words to accompany the action of writing.  The basic purpose of communication has not changed, even if the meaning of text has evolved to encompass a much wider definition as the array of tools has increased.

Lynette

http://www.flickr.com/photos/petahopkins/5715543298/sizes/s/in/photostream/

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テクノロジ = technology

Posted on September 15, 2011 by HJDeW

“The spoken word was the first technology by which man was able to let go of his environment in order to grasp it in a new way.” Marshall McLuhan

letters on ball

World shaped by text and technology

While searching for meaning within images, text, and technologies, I came across this quote from Marshall McLuhan. It brought together the concept of how text and technology are forever linked. It was first through the spoken word and then through the printed word that technological advances are realized. Text and technology have shaped and changed the way humans understand their environment. It continues to bring meaning to our world and our place in it.

Technology is defined with words like knowledge, art, skill, craft, technique, and method. It encompassed the ideas of teaching, creating and achieving. Each of these words brings some meaning to the concept of technology. For me, technology is about the tools that humans use to create and grasp the environment in new ways. It may be a stick drawing an image in the sand, a paintbrush outlining a character symbolizing an object, a pen crafting text on a page, or a computer creating images, text and sound, but it is all technology in the hands of the human. It is all a way to recreate and grasp our thoughts, words, actions and images, to bring meaning to our world.

Image: Vlado / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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テキストの = text

Posted on September 15, 2011 by HJDeW

“A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged; it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in colour and content according to the circumstances and time in which it is used.” Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

This quote captured my attention. It brings forward an image of words as a living being. Words are the covering skin of thought. They are full of meaning, colour and promise. They contain ideas, thoughts, and concepts that are shaped by time and context. They are not hard and unyielding, like a diamond, or breakable, like glass. They are fluid and adaptive, not static or unchanging. For me, words are text, both spoken and written.

Hand in Hand

Hand in Hand

This image I discovered, visually matches the quote. The graphic, another form of text, is of a small hand overlapping a larger hand, surrounded by colour and light.  The living skin of light that surrounds the larger hand extends outward, being shared with others. It visualizes the colour and fluidity of text, like light.  The smaller hand, encompassed by the larger one, for me, visualizes the act of teaching, the sharing of the word and text with those younger.

In all its many shapes, forms and styles, text brings meaning and ideas to life for all those who view it and understand its message. The characters used as a topic for this post symbolize the word ‘text’.  The symbols bring meaning to those who understand the language. For others, it brings frustration, until meaning is created.

Written or spoken, words are text. When written, the text is contained for all time. Unlike the spoken word, written text does not fade away with time.

 Image: Salvatore Vuono / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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Rich Prospect Browsing

Posted on September 15, 2011 by TMD

I added this to test how WordPress is handling YouTube embed code. I’ll leave it here, though, because it’s a good talk by one of my research collaborators on a subject relevant to the course. Enjoy.

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Curiosity to Technology

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Jennifer Stieda

Here is an interesting definition of technology from the European Space Agency.

“In a research and development organisation such as ESA, technology is a concept of primary importance, so by necessity the definition of the word is precise: ‘technology is the practical application of knowledge so that something entirely new can be done, or so that something can be done in a completely new way.'”

 The article goes on to talk about the transferability of technology from one context to another.  The final emphasis, though, goes to the people whose curiosity makes all that spectacular innovation possible.

European Space Agency.  (2009).  What is technology?  Retrieved from http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Technology/SEMYSRWPXPF_0.html

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High Tech Text

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Jennifer Stieda

Computer screen displaying medieval manuscriptThis quote comes from a paper I came across while I was researching Richard Mayer’s principles of multimedia learning (Mayer, 2001).  The title caught my attention because it seemed to encompass a couple of my interests:  “Multimedia Learning Gets Medieval.”  In the paper, Tara Williams describes her search for ways to use technology to help her students find a deeper connection to medieval life and literature.

“It is not only the language in which medieval texts were written that distances them from the present day, however; the process by which those texts were produced also differs radically.  Scholars often correlate the end of the Middle Ages with the development of the printing press, a signal of how critical the transition from manuscript to print culture was.  The difference between a time period during which a privileged few owned prohibitively expensive, hand-produced manuscripts and one that includes Amazon.com and Oprah’s Book Club is a difference that teachers need to address in the classroom precisely because the manuscript culture shaped the medieval experience of reading and writing so fundamentally.  This culture is chiefly responsible for several vital characteristics of medieval literary practice that I will discuss in more detail below:  that medieval readers valued retellings of well-known stories above completely original ones (which were a risker investment), that medieval reading was a shared and oral event, and that texts were expected to offer some sort of moral or religious value rather than pure entertainment.  If each bestseller cost a year’s salary or more, our current literatary values and tastes would likely shift as well” (Williams, 2009).

I think this paragraph ties in with what we have been talking about in several ways.  The importance of the printing press in changing the literary landscape is highlighted while at the same time noting the heavy influence of an oral past.  The last sentence also points to how the production of written text influenced its content.  I often wonder what parts of history we are missing simply because no one wrote it down or only wrote down what they thought was important.  Perhaps some small detail omitted would completely change our perception of a particular historical event.

Mayer, R. E. (2001).  Multimedia Learning. New York:  Cambridge University Press.

Williams, T.  (2009).  Multimedia learning gets medieval.  Pedagogy:  Critical approaches to teaching literature, languge, composition, and culture, 9, 77-95.

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Text and Technology

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Everton Walker

My initial definitions for text and technology To me, text refers to symbols designed to represent something or combined to convey a message. Technology entails any enhancement produce by a device or application to make a task easier, more interesting and productive.

OED Results

Pronunciation: /tɛkst/ Forms: Also ME tixte, tyxt(e, ME tixt, ME–15 texte, (ME, 16 (18 dial.) tex, 15 texe, 16 texed)…. (Show More) Etymology: < French texte  , also Old Northern French tixte  , tiste   (12th cent. in Godefroy), the Scriptures, etc., < medieval Latin textus   the Gospel, written character (Du Cange), Latin textus   (u  -stem) style, tissue of a literary work (Quintilian), lit. that which is woven, web, texture, < text-  , participial stem of tex-ĕre   to weave a. The wording of anything written or printed; the structure formed by the words in their order; the very words, phrases, and sentences as written.

 

Dictionary.com result

Technology : noun 1. the branch of knowledge that deals with the creation and use of technical means and their interrelation with life, society, and the environment, drawing upon such subjects as industrial arts, engineering, applied science, and pure science. The origin of these words certainly have a lot to do with their meanings. The association lies in the fact that textile deals with a pattern of weaving to make a complete product. Text in its true sense also entails the putting together symbols to come up with something rather meaningful. Technology is related to text as they both are evolving through the support and integration of the other. Technology plays a great role in text evolution and technology is dependent on text for its functions; example codes and progams. Teaching, like language should be classified as a mild form of technology. Teaching is an art that is always evolving with new strategies and resources and it surely facilitates learning.

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Evolution of Technology

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Garth

http://youtu.be/U2iiPpcwfCA

I view technology as something that has a practical application for humans.

Technology is evoluionary in two ways:
1.The use of a technology evolves to different uses as humans learn to use it. For example in the attached clip from Stanley Kubric’s movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, technology in the form of a club is used as a tool for hunting. Not shown in the clip is how man learned to use the club as a tool for gaining power by using it as a weapon.
2. Technology is also evolutionary in how it creates more technology. For example, light created from a candle creates a ‘need’ for a less temporary light source such as a light bulb. Or, oral stories create a ‘need’ for a more permanent form of communication such as ‘text’.

While I have attached a clip of a Stanley Kubric movie, I do not profess to understand most things that he put on screen. While the full meaning of 2001 is lost on me, I do think this one scene provides a good example of the evolution of technology.

 

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The Tool of Text

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Garth

Text is definitely a tool. It allows us to communicate, to express ourselves, and to share. It simultaneously has significantly personal meaning and cultural significance.

I think the easiest way to identify text as a technology is to look at how inaccessible it is to a large percentage of people. People who are illiterate, or have disabilities (developmental or physical) are excluded from using the technology. It is a pleasure to see how cybertechnology is making text accessible to more people.

Text messaging and social networking is providing an avenue for people to experience text in a positive manner. I think of a cousin of mine who can only read and write at a very basic level. He hates how frustrated he gets when he encounters text and therefore generally stays away from it… With the exception of Facebook. From my observations, he is comfortable sitting on a computer for 10 minutes to write a status update that would take the average person 10 seconds to write because no one is there to judge him. As far as his Facebook friends are concerned, it makes no difference how long, or how difficult it was for him to create the text. The important thing is that he can contribute to the conversation, and be empowered to use the tool of text.

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Information Technology

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Julie S

I think that the intersection of text and technology is tightly correlated to Information Technology but the Information Technology becomes relevent only when the text becomes understood to be information. So, in keeping with the above definition, we are then considering the application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes with respect to text. Why be concerned with text unless that text embodies information?

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The Dynamics of Text

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Julie S

Any time I think of text Michael Wesch comes to mind for his works on YouTube Anthropology. If you haven’t seen it then it is worth watching, all 56 minutes of it here. Even though YouTube is a video platform he makes compelling use of textual statements to make an intriguing commentary about how text is changing in society. This is a subtext to the core subject of YouTube, but fascinating nonetheless.

Here is a much shorter clip, less than 5 minutes, that demonstrates the power of animated text to tell a story about how text is changing in our culture through the Internet.

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLJtdMIsLG4]

The subject is information but the story is told through animated text. I like the images of old file systems, card catalogues, microfilm, and then the progression to word processing screens and finally Google. Throughout textual statements are written and changed using the successive technologies.

For me, this clip raises the question about trust in what is written when text has become so dynamic. The old dusty books we could trust because when you opened them they always stated the same words in the same order. Tomorrow you may read this post and it may have changed. In fact in five minutes you may read this post and it may have changed.

I realize that this is part of a continuum of trust. Much like the Mark’s posting of the the Black Robe story, of the First Nations people not trusting the words inked in the book, each culture in its time and place must make sense and learn to trust all over again.

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The Power of Text

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Scott Alexander

I had a hard time coming up with something for this topic. Obviously, the meaning of text is easy to look up and gather a definition but I was searching for something that was stronger than just a definition. I searched and search the Internet to find an image or a video that depicts this but to no avail. I had no trouble coming up with something for my technology definition; being a technology teacher makes the task far easier.

Then I remembered a Hallmark commercial I saw several years ago that was quite powerful in dealing with literacy. After some consultation with colleagues and some more Google searches, I found the video I was looking for. I think it depicts the power of being able to understand text and/or the powerless feelings those who are illiterate must feel our society that is surrounded by text.

Please watch:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1bmhJqUar4

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What is Technology

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Doug Connery

I found two videos that help to define technology and provides some specific examples. Like Mark, embeding these videos has me stumped, for now……, so they are links.

The first video provides a technology definition in one broad statement. The second video gives some examples from text to computers and then provides two examples that appear to be very similar, and without some background information about them, one would think neither is technology. However with some knowledge about the last example, it clearly is technology, especially with the definition of technology from the first video in mind.

What is Technology – Definition

What is Technology – Examples

The last example comes with controversy and ethical dilemmas that we as a society are currently wrestling with. The use of technology and the outcomes do push our comfort zones today, as it has throughout history.

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Text as Technology

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Mark Barrett

Black Robe Clip*

As seen in this clip from the film “Black Robe”*, text is clearly a technology – and one which people did not always have. An inherent distrust of what is misunderstood can also be seen in the clip on the part of the First Nation’s People. Writing is, evidently, a practical art, meant to facilitate communication. The future of text as a technology is changing – but have our attitudes? I’m not convinced yet that there isn’t still an inherent distrust of the changing way in which we communicate as text continues to prove to be a technology under transformation.

*I’ve tried for over an hour to try and embed the video… used HTML, googled shortcuts, read the WordPress Help page and nothing is working.  SO a link will just need to suffice for everyone.  Thanks!

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The Need for Text

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Jasmeet Virk

The reason one writes isn’t the fact he wants to say something. He writes because he has something to say.

by
                                                              F. Scott Fitzgerald

Reading Ong has made me very curious about orality and how it transitioned to literacy. That is why  I loved this quote as it reflects the fact that essence of writing grows out of orality. Text is but image of what I say – making it permanent. A commitment to what I have said . So there is no denial  or modifications. It is the   concrete version of my abstract thoughts and sounds. It is the proof of what I thought and said. In its creation the text provides that pause that lets my mind wander ahead and create more thought – which I then continue to change to words – to say and write.

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What is Technology?

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Scott Alexander

I came across this video that I thought was very useful in helping me breaking down the definition of technology. The area of the video that really pertains to this course is the section between 1:25 and 4:10 as it deals with Information Technology as well as Communication Technology; the first 1:25 is useful as well. I like the fact that he states both the pros and cons of said technology to show how technology has impacted our lives in a both the perceived positive and negative ways.

What is Technology?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEvAzKQ1FUU

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Technology

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Angela Novoa

technology

By Matt Delbridge

After searching for various definitions about the term technology I learned that all these terms do not have a unique meaning. Yet, in my search it appeared in repeated occasions the following terms: art, skills, product and construct.  For this reason my own definition about technology is “any material created by humans that has a practical purpose and/or allows humans in creating new things”. The image represents the practical purpose of technology and the idea that this term involves materials and the production of something, which always involves creativity and problem solving.

Angela.

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Text

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Angela Novoa

From the various definitions of the terms text and technology that I found during the last week I got to the conclusion that text is related to technology, as it is a type of technology. Both terms are related to the production of something. In this sense text as technology involves the manipulation of materials in order to get a product. Today, those materials could be pen and paper, but also could be a computer and Internet. Considering this, the term technology could be seen as anything that is done for, or has, a practical purpose. Text is a kind of human expression. Therefore, it has practical purposes: to communicate, to express, to share thoughts, ideas, beliefs, emotions, etc. So, text is technology and it involves the use of different materials in order to get a product, which is related to writing and communication.

References

Bolter, J.D. (2009). Writing space. Computers, Hypertext, and the Remediation of Print. New York: Routledge.

 

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Baa! Last one to the fold!

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Jennifer Stieda
Woolly Liberal Protest

"Woolly Liberal Protest" by James Clayton from Flickr

Hi everyone!

Speech always has a purpose.  We speak to communicate ideas.  Great orators know how to use silence, volume, intonation, and body language to capture their audience’s attention.  However, when you get right down to it, the words matter.  They matter a lot!  “Baa” whether spoken or written, just doesn’t resonate with me – you know?!

I’m about half way through the Ong text at the moment and what has fascinated me the most is the way people memorize songs and texts in a purely oral world.  Not having read Homer (a victim of technology’s impact on my attention span?), I’m wondering what the actual formulae for memorized passages look like – OK, sound like.  What a skill!  Can you imagine being able to tell a story like The Iliad from memory?  I can hardly fathom reading it!  But then, I’m looking at the task from a post-printing press mentality.  I’d be thinking about memorizing the thing word for word – apparently a feat not considered an accomplishment in Homer’s time, or even really considered at all.

I’m reading a story to my youngest at the moment called “The Thief.”  We just read a bit tonight about how the traditional oral tales of the gods change over time as they are passed down through generations.  The “professor” in the story has the gall to suggest that he knows the real version of the story and gloats over the fact that the story the boy’s mother told him has been debased from the original.  If I understand Ong correctly, it’s not possible to have an original oral “text” since it is told in a formulaic format.  How interesting that my school and parenting worlds should collide over something as uncommon as orality and literature…

I’m Jennifer Stieda.  I live in the beautiful semi-desert city of Kamloops in British Columbia, south western Canada.  I’m married to a very patient husband with whom I share the joy of raising two gorgeous girls, aged 10 and 12, one of whom loves to read while the other loves to talk!  Outdoor sports are my usual pursuits when not METting, including mountain biking, cross country skiing, running, hiking, camping, and canoeing.  Kamloops is the perfect place for my lifestyle since we are just hours away from the truly incredible Rocky Mountians, the coastal grandeur of Vancouver, and the orchards and fresh water lakes in the Okanagan Valley.  Not to mention having pretty nice trails right out my back door!

Looking forward to working with everyone!

Jennifer

Ong, W. J. (2002).  Orality and literacy:  The technologizing of the word. New (2nd Ed.)  York, NY:  Routledge.

Whalen Turner, M. (1996). The thief.  New York, NY:Harper Collins.

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