ETEC 540 Task 1: What’s in your bag?

Hello, everyone! My name is Melissa Santo and I am a learning and development professional with 15+ years experience spanning corporate, academic (post-secondary), and non-profit environments. I have had experiences teaching, career advising, instructional designing, program developing and coordinating, volunteer managing, and mentoring.

The bag I chose to unpack is my everyday purse. It rests near the front door so that I can grab it and go without thinking too much about what I need for any particular outing. Several items are accessed on the regular including my phone, wallet, house and car keys, reusable bag, first aid/toiletries, gum, lip balm, hair clips/elastics, and sunglasses. Some other items reveal key parts about me that may not be obvious to others:

• I have two kids and a dog, as evidenced by a month-old 7th birthday party invitation addressed to ‘Piper,’ band-aids, a collection of pop tabs, a roll of green dog poop bags, a homemade leather keychain stamped with the word ‘love’ (made by one of my kids at a summer camp last year), a medical intake form for ‘Aubrey,’ a Lego-style pineapple sticker placed on my wallet by one of my kids years ago, and an abundance of old receipts that haven’t been cleaned out due to being low on the priority list.
• I have dietary restrictions (allergic to dairy, sensitive to gluten), as evidenced by the multitude of snacks (also used to satiate ‘hangry’ kids) and the reusable bag for impromptu grocery shops when I need access to things I know I can eat.
• My spouse and I love to travel, as evidenced by the wooden ‘M’ keychain inscribed with ‘Costa Rica,’ Croatian currency (kunas and lipas) leftover from a previous trip, and a makeshift travel pack of Lysol wipes.

One of the most obvious displays of text is that I arranged these items to spell out my name. Perhaps I was inspired by recent crafts done by my kids or wanted to provide a visual for how I spell my name, or maybe there was a deeper meaning. Regardless, it provided me with parameters for how to display the contents. For me, these letters are easily recognizable, which speaks to the characters I use regularly in English (with a bit of French and German).

Another example of text is the blue paper bookmark from the Optimist Club of Caledon. I received it years ago during a pop-up roadside fundraiser in exchange for a small donation during a drive between my parents’ place and home. The ink was faded and ‘flakey’ from the start, indicating a lower-quality (budget?) printing process. The side facing up has the Optimist Creed written out; these words evoke a sense of positivity, resilience, and self-compassion whenever I read them. Thus, while the item doesn’t serve a physical purpose, it will remain in my purse as a reminder to strive for optimism.

My Android phone is the most blatant form of technology visible but there are many examples of text and technology intersecting:

• The party invitation was designed on a computer, professionally printed, and then distributed and sold using a myriad of hardware and software to track its whereabouts. It also required technology to RSVP, as the preferred contact methods were email or text.
• The Canadian bank notes (now made of polymer, in comparison to the paper kunas) represent a combination of mechanical arts and applied sciences – a common theme in the definitions of ‘technology’ and similar root words – using technology to create it plus layers of knowledge application in terms of monetary supply, economic monitoring, and financial literacy. The amount shown ($32.25) was received for trading in a collection of old CDs to a store called ‘The Beat Goes On’ and the receipt is somewhere in the pile of papers shown. Before doing this I searched for each album on Amazon Music to maintain access to my music collection that stretches back to the 1990s. The money remained outside of my wallet for weeks because I rarely use cash these days thanks to credit/debit cards and online ordering.
• The Ontario Ministry of Health vaccination receipt represents the technology used to monitor and track covid rates and vaccines, plus the technology used to develop and distribute the vaccine itself. Our family had the option to choose whether or not to vaccinate, which speaks to the freedom of choice and access to healthcare we have. I am aware not every person has access to this, and despite the challenges we have across Canada, I do consider that one of the reasons my family is fortunate to live here. (Also, although it’s hard to make out, there is an appointment reminder card for ‘Waterloo Eye Care,’ indicating that I reside in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.)

Like Professor Dobson’s (2019) example, I can see from the variety of items that I, too, live in a “multiliterate, global, corporate economy” (para.11). I can see evidence of Canadian brands (MadeGood, SunRipe, Simply Protein), international brands (Burt’s Bees, Advil), and merges of language (English and French on the Band-Aid package; the umlaut accent in Pür is not an English character), representing the diversity of products available to me. I can easily access medicine, specialty foods, and other ‘niceties’ for myself and my family and recognize how fortunate and privileged I am that this is my experience.

This has been an interesting exercise to complete, and while I believe what I’ve covered only scratches the surface of text technologies I am fascinated by the connections I saw, the sentiment I felt behind certain items, and I’m excited to explore this topic further throughout this course.