Do you normally write by hand or type? Did you find this task difficult or easy? Explain.
This task was fairly easy for me, as part of my everyday routine is a morning journaling practice. When I’m at work, I also use a journal to keep track of each day’s notes and tasks. I am particularly drawn to writing in cursive rather than printing; it’s faster and allows me to put down my ideas more quickly. There’s just something about the way it feels when all of the letters of a word are formed and connected by a single stroke that keeps me wanting to keep writing.
What did you do when you made a mistake or wanted to change your writing? How did you edit your work?
I don’t particularly worry about how my writing looks when I handwrite; it usually starts off very neat, but as my hand gets tired from writing, it gets messier and a bit more scrawling, at which point I have a very low attention to detail. It was fairly easy for me to change things in my writing because I was using an erasable pen. Sometimes I would erase spelling mistakes, sometimes I would cross them out, and sometimes I would just leave them. I felt like the way I engaged with my mistakes and edits were based on my mood at that particular moment in my writing process. I had to decide if I wanted to stop my train of thought, erase, and rewrite, or if I wanted to quickly cross it out and continue writing, or if I wanted to ignore it completely and just keep writing.
Did your choice of media play a part in how you edited your work?
Because I was writing, I made way less edits to my work than I would have if I was writing it on a computer. I also made a few spelling and punctuation errors, which would have been corrected immediately if I had been using a device. I associate writing in a journal as a place that doesn’t have to be perfect. On a computer, squiggly red or blue lines immediately point out any mistakes I have made, and I feel compelled to fix them. That attention to detail doesn’t exist in journal writing. When I’ve written the last word of my entry, I’m satisfied with what I’ve written and I don’t feel the need to read it over or try to change anything- I just close my journal and I’m content.
What do you feel is the most significant difference between writing by hand and using mechanized forms of writing?
I feel like the most significant difference between writing by hand and using mechanized forms of writing lies within the sharing of your writing with others. For example, if I use a notepad at work to jot down meeting notes, they will probably be full of shorthand, quite messy, and with text scattered all over the place. If I then needed to share those meeting notes with my manager, I wouldn’t walk over and hand her the teared off page from my notepad- I would type it up, fix any mistakes, edit the order, make it professional and presentable, and most likely send it to her in an email. It is also now way easier for me to share these meeting notes with anyone who missed the meeting via email. If I tried to share the notes by hand, it would be a long process of recopying the same meeting notes onto separate sheets and physically delivering the notes to the recipients, similar to how Lamb & McCormick (2020) describe the tedious and sometimes inaccurate process of sharing text prior to the invention of the printing press.
Which do you prefer and why?
I definitely prefer typing because I find that I am able to be more eloquent and precise when I type. I am a very speedy home-row typist and I am also a very fast thinker; being able to write down my ideas quickly and correctly is extremely helpful for me. I also like the accessibility of having all of my ideas neatly organized on a device that I can easily search for and locate.
References
Lamb, R. & McCormick, J. (Hosts). (2020, May 26). The invention of the book, part 1. [Audio Podcast]. iHeartRadio. https://www.iheart.com/podcast/stuff-to-blow-your-mind-21123915/episode/the-invention-of-the-book-part-63031174/
