The way in which people frantically communicate online via Twitter, Facebook and instant messaging can be seen as a form of modern madness, according to a leading American sociologist.
"A behaviour that has become typical may still express the problems that once caused us to see it as pathological," MIT professor Sherry Turkle writes in her new book, Alone Together, which is leading an attack on the information age.
Turkle's book, published in the UK next month, has caused a sensation in America, which is usually more obsessed with the merits of social networking. She appeared last week on Stephen Colbert's late-night comedy show, The Colbert Report. When Turkle said she had been at funerals where people checked their iPhones, Colbert quipped: "We all say goodbye in our own way."
Turkle's thesis is simple: technology is threatening to dominate our lives and make us less human. Under the illusion of allowing us to communicate better, it is actually isolating us from real human interactions in a cyber-reality that is a poor imitation of the real world.
I haven't had a chance to read Turkle's book yet, but it sounds like something I might be able to use in my composition course. The PBS Frontline program "Digital Nation" aired about a year ago, and in it she has some things to say about the way that "students need to be stimulated in ways they didn't need to be 25 years ago." (I posted in the comments under the Dumbest Generation post about this too.)
I don't know that students are changing, as much as the new digital technology makes our [societal] intellectual shallowness easier to see for what it is.
I found some of Turkle's earlier work a bit on online communities a bit, um, like an anthropology study from the 19th century - you know, the ones where the researcher sat on the sidelines and observed a society and then wildly misinterpreted what was going on.
People were shallow about social behaviour before there was twitter, they were just shallow in person. Any episode of Mad Men can remind you just how "meaningful" social exchanges like having the boss over for dinner were.
I dunno, I don't worry about the "meaningfulness" of social exchanges, just the constant state of distraction people are in. I understand an adolescent constantly checking for tweets or Facebook updates -- that's the age where peer contact is almost an addiction, and I remember spending hours on the phone, writing daily notes to put in people's lockers, and so on. What I don't understand is adults peering at their iPhones constantly, during conversations, shows, weddings and funerals, CLASSES, and so on. If you whip out a book or start doing a crossword puzzle when someone is talking to you or you're at a wedding, it's considered rude. But surreptitiously checking your iPhone every three minutes is apparently considered OK. It sucks. I always want to scream at people to put down the goddamn gadget and focus.
Shallow...yes, I was shallow in college. But I had proffies that made me dive deep. I had to or I didn't pass. (I failed more classes than I care to admit!)
And if I don't require the same of my shallow 2011ers, then I'm the one to blame, not them.
Checking your phone, texting, or taking a call while talking to someone else in person is just rude. Over time evolution will take care of this problem, as those who show a strong preference for this behaviour fail to find sex partners because nobody wants to spend time with them. But distraction is not new. When I was a TA in California in the 80's students would come in with the campus newspaper and sit in the front rows reading it during the lecture. Honestly. They had to be told this was not okay. At least these days the kids reading the paper, or whatever they're doing, are doing it more discreetly, on laptops, without rustling pages.
I had a boss (non-academic) in the 2002-2004 timeframe who was obsessed with her phone and answered it, no matter what we were doing (particularly if HER boss was calling, mostly on trivial sh*t; we was a twit, too). We'd be in group meetings that she'd be leading and off she'd go.
She was a f*cktard. [Yes, I've just used that ugly word.]
So... I gave her a list of things NOT to do with cellphones a list being circulated at that time (on-line) amongst IT folks and others). She was a little insulted. And it was intended.
In the very olden days (long before any of us), there is a legend that at a certain University that a student read a newspaper in a class and the professor beat him with his cane!
This evening, if I hear a ring of a phone in my class, I'll stop discussion, get the class real quiet, and use MY silencer: "WHOSE is that?"
[I should know better than to TRY to type a posting right before class... particularly on an issue that p*sses me off. Fortunately, there was no cell phone ringing tonight!]
I haven't had a chance to read Turkle's book yet, but it sounds like something I might be able to use in my composition course. The PBS Frontline program "Digital Nation" aired about a year ago, and in it she has some things to say about the way that "students need to be stimulated in ways they didn't need to be 25 years ago." (I posted in the comments under the Dumbest Generation post about this too.)
ReplyDeleteI don't know that students are changing, as much as the new digital technology makes our [societal] intellectual shallowness easier to see for what it is.
I found some of Turkle's earlier work a bit on online communities a bit, um, like an anthropology study from the 19th century - you know, the ones where the researcher sat on the sidelines and observed a society and then wildly misinterpreted what was going on.
ReplyDeletePeople were shallow about social behaviour before there was twitter, they were just shallow in person. Any episode of Mad Men can remind you just how "meaningful" social exchanges like having the boss over for dinner were.
I dunno, I don't worry about the "meaningfulness" of social exchanges, just the constant state of distraction people are in. I understand an adolescent constantly checking for tweets or Facebook updates -- that's the age where peer contact is almost an addiction, and I remember spending hours on the phone, writing daily notes to put in people's lockers, and so on. What I don't understand is adults peering at their iPhones constantly, during conversations, shows, weddings and funerals, CLASSES, and so on. If you whip out a book or start doing a crossword puzzle when someone is talking to you or you're at a wedding, it's considered rude. But surreptitiously checking your iPhone every three minutes is apparently considered OK. It sucks. I always want to scream at people to put down the goddamn gadget and focus.
ReplyDeleteShallow...yes, I was shallow in college. But I had proffies that made me dive deep. I had to or I didn't pass. (I failed more classes than I care to admit!)
ReplyDeleteAnd if I don't require the same of my shallow 2011ers, then I'm the one to blame, not them.
Checking your phone, texting, or taking a call while talking to someone else in person is just rude. Over time evolution will take care of this problem, as those who show a strong preference for this behaviour fail to find sex partners because nobody wants to spend time with them. But distraction is not new. When I was a TA in California in the 80's students would come in with the campus newspaper and sit in the front rows reading it during the lecture. Honestly. They had to be told this was not okay. At least these days the kids reading the paper, or whatever they're doing, are doing it more discreetly, on laptops, without rustling pages.
ReplyDeleteI had a boss (non-academic) in the 2002-2004 timeframe who was obsessed with her phone and answered it, no matter what we were doing (particularly if HER boss was calling, mostly on trivial sh*t; we was a twit, too). We'd be in group meetings that she'd be leading and off she'd go.
ReplyDeleteShe was a f*cktard. [Yes, I've just used that ugly word.]
So... I gave her a list of things NOT to do with cellphones a list being circulated at that time (on-line) amongst IT folks and others). She was a little insulted. And it was intended.
In the very olden days (long before any of us), there is a legend that at a certain University that a student read a newspaper in a class and the professor beat him with his cane!
This evening, if I hear a ring of a phone in my class, I'll stop discussion, get the class real quiet, and use MY silencer: "WHOSE is that?"
Ah, yes, Dr. Whipshitz....
ReplyDelete[I should know better than to TRY to type a posting right before class... particularly on an issue that p*sses me off. Fortunately, there was no cell phone ringing tonight!]
ReplyDelete