Journal #1 Response: The Evolution of Writing

The evolution of writing can be seen through a variety of disciplinary and philosophical lenses. 

In recent years, humankind has experienced what historians call a "creative boom." We now live in an "Information Age." The text stated that ideas and technology evolve in connection with each other (21). That being said, coupling images and text allows the reader to engage and form more complex ideas about what s/he is presented in the text. 

In the age of interactive media, the line between writer, reader, and text is blurred as reading becomes a less internalized practice and becomes more externally engaging via increasingly easy methods of sharing and interacting with writers and where texts are published or re-published. 

Do you feel that the increased interactivity and externality of text and other forms of recorded communication allows us to engage in more complex thoughts (25)? 

Reid, Alex. The Two Virtuals: New Media and Composition. West Lafayette, IN: Parlor Press, 2007.

Images courtesy of Shuttershock.com, dreamstime.com, and Alex Hinds Photography.

Digital Literacy Autobiography

I remember the first time I saw a computer. I was about 3 years old; my dad had just bought it to do his homework for graduate school. I remember seeing my mom get to know it. Although I was first jealous of how much time she spent on the phone, I was even more jealous of how much time she spent on the computer. I would sit in her lap and watch her as she learned how to navigate Windows 95. The first times that I really got to explore the computer was when I would send my grandma emails. I remember discovering Yahoo eCards and showing my mom and brothers. I learned how to use MySpace from friends at middle school who encouraged me to get an account. By the time that Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Weebly, and Blogger came along I was familiar enough with technology and user-created web space that I was able to walk myself through them. The nice thing about doing popular things on the internet is that my generation is pretty familiar with researching how to get what we need to completed without purchasing technical manuals or calling support lines like our parents did.

However, receiving supplementary online support can also have its disadvantages. Web sites are constantly updating and changing their policies and methods. Even information published online and updated in real-time can be outdated if it is not released by the company. However, the help websites of companies are not as user-friendly as supplementary online support can be, because they are run by tech companies, not professional writers and fellow users of the online products.

One way to limit the disadvantages of not-up-to-date online support is to research what version of the product you are using or to see when the product was last updated and compare that with when the online supplementary material was published. By making sure that the supplementary information was released more recently than the product or website was updated, you can save yourself a lot of time.

My daughter, when she was 1.5, mimicking me.

My daughter, Elia, learns to multitask. 

Welcome to Writing for Interactive Media

Hi everyone,

Welcome to my blog for Writing for Interactive Media at DSU.

I hope that you enjoy my posts. Feel free to post questions, ideas, suggestions, or general comments in the comments area.

Thank you,

Kyla Mercier