Space and beyond

This week Elizabeth and I facilitate the discussion on lab space, so for the blog I'd like to extend the discussion topics for class and the readings. I am interested in physical space and its relation to human interactions. While I feel limiting the discussion to computer labs as a means of helping students write does pose some serious limits on the range of discussion, our conversation in class did delve into the human aspect of teaching (which was a pleasant surprise). Basically, we cannot assume a physical space can or cannot do this or that. Instead, the human beings USING the space help create interactions among users.
If space affects discourse, then it surely affects beliefs as well. For example, I began researching how landscape affects interaction in the context of a third world country (and this is something I am continuing to investigate). We should not assume that our space doesn't affect us, even if our spaces are so transparent we do not "see" them. We can extend these ideas to modern, urban spaces in any city, even. I am quite obviously interested in space, and the issue of computer labs and teaching serves as a nice springboard to larger issues.

Useful BUT...

The readings this week presented technology in a dated fashion. Looking at the sources used for the articles, I notice dates from the 80's and 90's. Indeed, the rapidly changing world of technology makes me feel old. Listserves are presented in a positive light, though I would argue their use has been minimal (at best) for me. It seems that every listserve I belong to always gets a message asking to unsubscribe. Others then send the same message, and soon my inbox is full. I notice I don't tend to get unsubscribed from listserves, even for organizations in which I no longer take part.
Email, of course, is a tool I use daily for personal and business issues. I do not tend to MOO, however, and I never chat. There is a live chat requirement coming up for a course I am taking, so I'll be expected to use that technology then (hopefully on my new iMAC!). I question whether advancing technology enhances learning for online courses. In some ways, of course, it does, but many of the students in the online course I am taking do not have much experience with computers. They tend to be older teachers (though by old I mean 30's and above). :) The discussion forum is filled with logisitcal questions and panicked notes about the technology not working. I notice, then, that there is a lot of tension in this course BECAUSE of technology.
Another problem with technology in online courses is the following: while taking a timed exam this summer, the power flashed off in my town. My test was lost and I had to email the professor when the power came back on, and retake the test. The remaining 5 exams were very stressful because I anticipated a similar catastrophe. In-class, paper and pencil exams never causes such anxiety. I think we have to be careful about relying too much on technology to communicate in cases like this. While cognitive needs of students are surely enhanced by technology in most cases, affective needs suffer when one worries about technology backfiring.
Bethany
Here is another great example! The spellcheck will not work for this blog.

The Human Touch

Like most history, the role of women and minorities is not highlighted when it comes to computers and writing, though this is not surprising. As inman says, "No one is safely out of reach of technologies..." (62), so it seems natural that no one (regardless of gender or ethnicity) is beyond helping establish and improve technology. Inman's inclusion of some of the more prominent accomplishments by women and minorities, however, seems like an "after the fact" attempt to include key "token" players. History, then, tends to exclude certain voices that usually get discovered later, when the world is ready. Countless anthologies and academic books come into print for the sole purpose of bringing forth lost voices. How might we apply this trend I'm noticing to today's technology situation? Surely there are voices being ignored this very minute. Who will discover them, and what will it take to do so?
The readings from the historical document provide a fitting supplement to the Inman reading because they are an actual interpretation of history, and we clearly see that some voices have been left out. Chapter 2's history of what technologies emerged when (such as the Macintosh) seems to almost leave people (human beings!) out. People, as we discussed before, are a part of technology. It's not just about the machines. Sometimes I get the sense that technology simply happened and grew between 1979-1994, as it's all too easy to forget the role of human beings. Perhaps the trend for writers to focus on the machines is an indication of technology's tendency to leave behind the human touch or connection.

Bethany

Feeling Old...

While reading Inman's piece on the Cyborg era, I realized that the history of the webbed environment as it applies to writing is arguably short enough to be traced rather painlessly. It makes me feel old to think there is a technology that really isn't any older than I am. While computers have been around for decades, the high-tech web environments at our campuses was not nearly as prevalent even at the turn of the 21st century. The computer and writing conferences that Inman mentions are further testament to the importance of computers in today's classrooms.
"The introduction and use of technologies is always inherently social in nature, making any cross-reference points based on those technologies problematic, even in the best of circumstance," (14) Inman writes. It's true that I can't say today is the age of the internet, since my pen pal in Uganda has enough trouble getting a postal letter to me. We need, therefore, to think of technology in a more focused manner. My 58-year-old father doesn't have high-speed internet (and I've threatened not to visit since I can't keep up with my classes on dial-up), yet he is in IT and works with computers at work. What age, then, is it for him? Perhaps our domestic spaces are still in the third (or second) world, while our work environments are in the first world. Or perhaps it's vice versa. What are the pros and cons of this? Should the domestic space always be a sanctuary, and are we destined (as a society) to allow web technology to encroach upon these spaces as well?
Regarding the "Computers and the Teaching of Writing" introduction... To have a "historical document" that is from 1979-1994 supports my idea that web technology is evolving so fast that something from 1994 is "history." Normally, anything that happened in 1979 or up (my lifetime almost exactly) is not old or historical, but the web environment how we perceive history and its pace.
Bethany