Archive for the ‘google’ tag
Putting It All Together (Part IV)
Integrated reading and writing
Research and writing used to occur separately in space and time. Students would do their research in the library and then do their writing elsewhere. According to James P. Purdy in “The Changing Space of Research: Web 2.0 and the Integration of Research and Writing Environments,” the physical and temporal separation “disconnects research from writing, artificially separates the academic from the non-academic, and misrepresents how knowledge is created. This compartmentalization incorrectly leads students to believe that research and writing are wholly separate and separable, that they are uniformed by one another” (Purdy 48).
“Sorry, English Major, the Engineers Have Triumphed”: An Article by Nate Anderson
This article attempts to assess the impact of the internet on attention span in response to Nicholas Carr’s article in The Atlantic, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Carr argued that he used to be able to follow lengthy articles or narratives, but now he finds his mind wandering after a few pages. To judge the validity of Carr’s claim, The Pew Internet & American Life Project polled 895 Internet experts. Respondents were nearly unanimous in agreeing that new technologies were activating different parts of the brain but this was not necessarily “bad,” just “different.” Many agreed that authors would move away from longer to shorter texts. Kluth of The Economist said, “This will result in a resurgence of short-form texts and storytelling, in ‘haiku culture’ replacing ‘book culture.’” Some also expressed concern that lasting texts will not be produced as much as “throw-away” texts like SMS and blogs.
Anderson, Nate. “Sorry, English Major, the Engineers Have Triumphed.” ars technica 19 February 2010. ars. Web. 22 February 2010.
