“This summer I went to Japan with my husband and 3-year-old daughter we spent 3 weeks traveling around the country the flight there was took 10 hours and was kind of uneventful once he landed in Tokyo we took the train into the city and went to look for food we only spent one night in Tokyo before taking another flight to a small island in Okinawa called ishigaki we spent four nights enjoying ishigaki is a small tropical island with the most beautiful beaches and white sand and clear water we had some great food and enjoyed the relaxing atmosphere it was the perfect start to our trip as it helped us to climatize to the very warm weather that Japan had this summer after you see gaki we took a flight to Osaka Osaka was not my favorite City we visited there was too many people and it was just generally super busy it reminded me a lot of Tokyo both people crammed into smaller spaces my daughter also got food poisoning one of the nights we were in Osaka so that made it a little bit worse from Osaka we took the train to Kyoto we visited the Nara Deer Park which was exciting but also overwhelming the deer are very aggressive when they find out that you have cookies you can purchase cookies that you can feed to the deer and once the deer see that you have them they just keep following you until you give them to them it was a little bit crazy but once you got more into the Park area the deer were less aggressive and more spread out in Kyoto it poured rain the day that we were traveling to see all of the different temples but it was still a wonderful experience we spent two nights in Kyoto and then took the bullet train into Tokyo a bullet train was a highlight of the trip for my husband we had been to Japan 10 years earlier and unfortunately didn’t have a chance to take a bullet train that trip so he was very excited to take one this trip in Tokyo we explored went shopping and just enjoyed the atmosphere and the people and of course the food at the very end of our trip the last few days we spent in the Tokyo Disney area we rented we had our hotel was in the Disney Resort area and it was perfect timing my daughter has never been to Disneyland before so she left it we spent the first day traveling and exploring the Disneyland side of it and then the second day we went to Disney fee which is another Park that Tokyo Disneyland has my daughter enjoyed Tokyo see as that is where the Frozen rides are and at the moment Frozen is her favorite the lineups for the rides were crazy the big popular rides had wait times of up to 2 hours sometimes so we didn’t always wait for the rides you did have the option if you wanted to get like fast passes for some of them some of them you had to pay for others We paid for the Fastpass for the Frozen ride because that was the one ride we need my daughter would love and she’s three and waiting in line for 2 hours of the year old sounds awful after Disneyland we made our way home the flight coming home my daughter was tired and overstimulated and grouchy for the whole flight which was awful we made it home and have some wonderful memories from our summer in Japan”
1. How does the text deviate from conventions of written English?
The voice-to-text version deviates from conventions of written English because it lacks punctuation, capitalization, and clear sentence boundaries, appearing instead as one long string of words. It also includes filler words, repetitions, and restarts that reflect the natural flow of speech rather than the expectations of writing. As Gnanadesikan (p.5) explains, “Writing is generally done more deliberately than speaking, so finished written pieces are much more carefully crafted than a typical spoken sentence. Written texts can thus convey their message more precisely, adding to the sense that writing is worth more than speech.” This highlights why the raw text seems disorderly compared to conventional writing.
2. What is “wrong” and what is “right”?
There are both strengths and weaknesses in the transcription. On the “right” side, the text reflects natural word choices and includes some capitalization. However, much is “wrong”: it often lacks punctuation, shows inconsistent grammar, contains run-on sentences and misheard words, and does not use paragraphing. This gap reflects a larger truth, “writing is a transformation of language, a technology applied to language, not language itself” (Gnanadesikan, p. 4). Spoken and written language function differently, so what works in one often seems flawed in the other. Additionally, many errors stem from the variability of speech itself: “The actual sounds of language are infinitely varied, as they are uttered by different people in different circumstances” (Gnanadesikan, p.10).
3. What are the most common mistakes and why are they mistakes?
The most common mistakes include run-on sentences, missing capitalization, and misrecognition of words. These are considered mistakes because they disrupt clarity and make the text harder to read or interpret accurately. Oral expression, however, naturally contains these elements. As Ong observes, oral culture cannot be remembered verbatim, every time you tell it will be a little different (2:45). What looks like error on the page often reflects the natural fluidity of spoken communication.
4. What if the story had been scripted?
If the story had been scripted, it would likely have shown clearer organization, complete sentences, proper punctuation, and more deliberate word choice. This would align more closely with reader expectations. As Ong explains, writing is an orderly organization of thoughts (5:30), and “writing makes it necessary to think” (6:04), writing has made “talkers talk more” (6:22). Scripting forces careful planning and structure, though it also risks losing the spontaneity and personality that give oral storytelling its charm.
5. In what ways does oral storytelling differ from written storytelling?
Oral storytelling relies on tone, pauses, rhythm, gestures, and audience feedback, features that do not easily transfer to text. Written storytelling, by contrast, depends on structure, organization, grammar, and punctuation to convey meaning without the storyteller physically present. Oral stories tend to be more fluid and interactive, while written stories are more polished and permanent. As Gnanadesikan notes, “A spoken (or mentally composed) message unfolds in time, one word replacing the previous one as it is uttered. Writing arranges the message in space, each word following the previous one in a line. Writing is therefore a process of translating time into space”(p.4). Writing also gives language permanence: “Writing represents language, but it outlasts the spoken word” (Gnanadesikan, p.4), and it “extends human beings’ ability to communicate with others across space and through time” (Haas). Written words, as Gnanadesikan puts it, “remain on the page like butterflies stuck onto boards with pins” (p. 4), while oral storytelling continually changes with each telling.
References:
Abe Aboud. (2014, September 8). Walter Ong – Oral cultures and early writing [Video]. YouTube.
Gnanadesikan, A.E. (2011). The first IT revolution. In The writing revolution: Cuneiform to the Internet (pp. 1-12). John Wiley & Sons.
Haas, C. (2013). The technology question. In Writing technology: Studies on the materiality of literacy (pp. 3-23). Routledge.