From Studyplace

Jump to: navigation, search

This page was composed by Aaron Hung on the basis for the lectures notes as they were in the Summer 2008. I want to thank him for the work. I am making some changes for the Summer 2009. The notes on the main web site for the course will generally be more up to date.

Everyone is welcome to use and edit these pages, perhaps on the basis of your own notes (since sometimes I do not follow my own notes).

Link to Professor Varenne's notes for this course.

For your reaction papers, click on the "Study" tab. You might also wish to watch a video tutorial on how to post your reaction papers on Youtube.

Readings

Ong, Walter Orality and literacy: The technologizing of the word. New York: Methuen. 1982

Discussion

Class notes

Weber

big change in the world (at least in Western Europe) happened between 1300 and 1600 with the rise of mercantilism and capitalism
Marx and Weber fought about the cause of this; Weber argued it was the dominance of Protestantism
if money used to reinvest in factory instead of spending it yourself, then you can increase your wealth
Weber saw it as an ideological movement that would change societies across thresholds
ideas used in international development studies
problem is that many countries (like Japan) as able to advance without becoming Protestant

Printing Press

requires movable type as well as paper, all of which preceded Gutenberg
needed way of producing cheap paper
next big change after the printing press would be the newspaper

Writing

small group of people (usually political and commercial leaders) were able to write
leads to social differentiation
powerful people do not really need to know how to write; they can use a secretary
if you are unable to do something, it doesn't become a disability if there is the social support that allows you to do it

Literacy

Brian Street problematizes literacy which people often use to impose their ideologies on others
some missionaries taught people to read but not to write
Goody's "domestication of the savage mind" was about the stabilization of tradition and ideas, having less chance to be "wild" (uncontrolled)
writing limits the things that people can do
Ong discussed whether Homer was illiterate, and performing to an illiterate audience
some performers today improvise their songs, depending on the audience
there is probably no "real" version of Homer's epics because it was probably performed differently each time
Ong believes that writing changes people's consciousness
we put ourselves under the control of those who write things down
are ideograms different (and better) than alphabet?

Cole

Vygotsky and other Russian psychologists tried to understand how non-Russians were thinking
they gave various examples of people who refused to answer questions in the terms that psychologists wanted to answer (e.g. if all the bears in the north pole are white, what color would be the bears if you visited the north pole?)
Cole and others tried to create a field of social psychology (including Jean Lave, Ray McDermott)
students who've attended even a year of Western schooling know the type of questions that are asked and how to answer them
questioned whether those who cannot answer those questions are "stupid"
Cole wanted to fight cognitive psychology and the idea that people who cannot respond to syllogisms are stupid

Jakobson

Varenne's page on Jakobson
phatic communication: language used to check if communication is taking place and understood
occurs in both oral and written communication, but takes place in different forms

Gus's presentation

Studyplace page
people were turning up at her website and making insensible comments about Ashton Kutcher
interested in finding out why it's happening
some commenters do not seem to be reading the post or participating in a dialogue with the post
not just spam because it is highly repetitive and commercial; looks for some financial interaction; done by automation
different types:
- looking for a celebrity
- looking for technical help
are these the same thing?
some sites are "fake", e.g. medical sites that do advertising
weak case: Internet is disrupting traditional ways that people make judgments about the truth-value of texts
V: most people are more readers than writers (e.g. letters to family); these are restricted to certain genres
V: someone will consider these blogs as "art"

Links

Books

Goody, J. (1977). The domestication of the savage mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521292425
Lord, A. B. (1960). The singer of tales. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0674002830
Scribner, S., & Cole, M. (1981). The psychology of literacy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ISBN 1583484396
Seife, C. (2000). Zero: The biography of a dangerous idea. New York: Viking. ISBN 0140296476
Street, B. V. (1995).Social literacies: Critical approaches to literacy in development, ethnography, and education. New York: Longman. ISBN 0582102219

Websites

Encyclopaedia Britannica To Follow Modified Wikipedia Model: Encyclopedia Britannica follows the Wikipedia model to allow users to edit its content. It is probably not a pure wiki model, but it is still interesting to see how encyclopedias have evolved since Diderot's time.

Technical support: A hilarious clip on the collison of literacies.

Technology, Culture, Education: Print

From Studyplace

Contents

Class Outline