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Oh, Academia...
Jul. 28th, 2008 09:31 amThis week's award for "news article guaranteed to horrify me" goes to Literacy Debate: Online, R U Really Reading?
Nadia said she wanted to major in English at college and someday hopes to be published. She does not see a problem with reading few books. “No one’s ever said you should read more books to get into college,” she said.
I'm just going to choke quietly over here...
SRSLY, though, I'd find arguments for the superiority of digital literacy more persuasive if the students we got in the classroom were actually digitally literate. But not only can they not read books, they also can't "find" a word on a webpage or search using anything but basic keywords on Google. And forget being able to figure out a new program, problem-solve in MS Word or edit basic xhtml... On average, the students who have problems reading & writing at the college level aren't particularly good at using computers either.
But lest I get too comfortable on my soap box:
Cite Check
Turns out academics aren't necessarily much better at their citations than their students.
Now, for all you lit-crit people:
Darwin to the Rescue: A group of scholars thinks evolutionary science can reinvigorate literary studies
And I went to see this panel at the MLA. Neat stuff:
Literary Geospaces: Digital tools help put literature in its place
...is it possible to recreate how Londoners — authors and readers, actors and theatergoers, booksellers and book buyers, and the citizens who formed the audience for public spectacles — experienced the cultural activity of the era, the theatrical and city-street dramas? How close, for instance, did a playwright live to the tavern that's mentioned in a certain play? What did you see when you stood at Cheapside Cross to watch the Lord Mayor's Show, the annual parade that marks the mayor's swearing allegiance to the crown?
An interactive online project, the Map of Early Modern London... aims to recreate some of what Jenstad calls "the imaginative landscape of the place," its "cultural geography." This is the London not just of streets and landmarks but of births and deaths and Lord Mayor's Shows — an 800-year-old tradition — and royal progresses and rebellions.
Nadia said she wanted to major in English at college and someday hopes to be published. She does not see a problem with reading few books. “No one’s ever said you should read more books to get into college,” she said.
I'm just going to choke quietly over here...
SRSLY, though, I'd find arguments for the superiority of digital literacy more persuasive if the students we got in the classroom were actually digitally literate. But not only can they not read books, they also can't "find" a word on a webpage or search using anything but basic keywords on Google. And forget being able to figure out a new program, problem-solve in MS Word or edit basic xhtml... On average, the students who have problems reading & writing at the college level aren't particularly good at using computers either.
But lest I get too comfortable on my soap box:
Cite Check
Turns out academics aren't necessarily much better at their citations than their students.
Now, for all you lit-crit people:
Darwin to the Rescue: A group of scholars thinks evolutionary science can reinvigorate literary studies
And I went to see this panel at the MLA. Neat stuff:
Literary Geospaces: Digital tools help put literature in its place
...is it possible to recreate how Londoners — authors and readers, actors and theatergoers, booksellers and book buyers, and the citizens who formed the audience for public spectacles — experienced the cultural activity of the era, the theatrical and city-street dramas? How close, for instance, did a playwright live to the tavern that's mentioned in a certain play? What did you see when you stood at Cheapside Cross to watch the Lord Mayor's Show, the annual parade that marks the mayor's swearing allegiance to the crown?
An interactive online project, the Map of Early Modern London... aims to recreate some of what Jenstad calls "the imaginative landscape of the place," its "cultural geography." This is the London not just of streets and landmarks but of births and deaths and Lord Mayor's Shows — an 800-year-old tradition — and royal progresses and rebellions.
