Communication, Culture, and Cyberspace

Previous to this class, my concept of technology was that it is a necessary evil. Even though it helps us accomplish many tasks throughout our day, it also has its drawbacks. This class basically opened my eyes to the historical perspective of technology and showed me its future directions in a much bigger picture than I had imagined before. I like how Postman told the entire story of how technology has transitioned from a mere presence in our lives to a construct of our very own culture. He brought many points to the table which I have never considered before, including how medical technology is more important in the process of diagnosing a patient than is the communication between doctor and patient.

Wood and Smith talked more about the internet than about technology in general, but I think that they unearthed some major reasons why people act the way they do online. They talked about how the context of communication has changed because more and more of our communication is done through mediated means. I never really realized the extent to which these mediated means have affected our society. Personal relationships suffer because there is less face-to-face communication. I think that these trends are hurtful to the functioning of humanity, because they foster senses of mistrust, confusion, and deception.

This class has given me some pretty valuable experiences, especially in the blog assignments. I see the implications more clearly now of how technology lets situations become misinterpreted, and how situations are different when played out in the realm of cyberspace. With the first blog, we found out firsthand how dependent on the internet we actually are. Now just think how much harder that assignment would have been if we had to abstain from ALL electronic technology. Could you survive a day without your cell phone? Would you feel lost, alone, and depressed?
Technology fills multiple roles in our life. It’s both a footstep and a monster in disguise. As we saw with the interview assignment, younger people see the internet as part of their everyday life, whereas the elders are wary of its every function. I think the older people have a longer sight in the matter, because they have seen a greater amount of history unfold than the younger generation. However, the fact that I’m part of the younger generation makes me see the internet as a crucial part of society. If we’ve got it already, how difficult do you think life would be if it were destroyed?

I particularly found the letter blog assignment to have the most surprising result. When I sat down to handwrite a letter, I thought that it wouldn’t sound much different than an e-mail. I discovered that I have become so used to writing e-mails that when I actually wrote a letter to send through the mail, it was very formal and objective. I mean, who does that anymore? I’m sure people still do use this slower “snail mail” approach to communicate with their friends. I just think the way I do about it because I’m a college student who’s hooked to AIM and facebook. Why would I need to write a letter when I could just type an e-mail faster and find out what’s going on in my friend’s life by viewing their status on facebook?

This class has definitely enhanced my life and given me a fresh and sensible opinion about our culture and how it is influenced by technology. Both books did a very good job in explaining what is lost by the dependence we have incurred upon ourselves. I thought that Postman took much more time to read, and if I could change one thing about the class, I would take out some of the extra words and stories which Postman cited to prove his points. I loved how Wood and Smith communicated their message by defining newly coined terms to describe emerging technologies and their surrounding vocabulary. But overall, I truly enjoyed this class.