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10/28/2004 Archived Entry: "Gripe Blog"

Gripe Blog
No doubt this blog at times resembles a series of gripes: HEY listserv! Get your act together! What the hell is up with this? What kind of teaching is that!
Yeah, that's me.
But the thing is, when I read through some stuff, I can't help but be critical (most of the time) when the topic turns to new media/writing. No offense, if by chance, the authors I read stumble over here...
It's the Writing New Media book that's causing me some troubles right now...C.S. - respected author – is a main figure in the book. Early Computers and Writing person. Big impact on the field in ‘80s. I respect all that. But this stuff on visual literacy just isn't there yet.
Here’s one reason:
Why are the literacy folks - symbolized here in C.S.'s work - so obsessed with asking students to write "the range of different literacy practices, values, and understandings you have developed over your lifetime (from birth to now)"? For what purpose? That I remember reading X book at X time on X platform - it proves what? That I came from X background in X place? So what? And that this kind of task is so easily transferred from the Brandt strategy (narrative) to a new media strategy without considering any of the so called "new" issues to contend with is perplexing.
The other issue of course is the assumption that one has immediate understanding of one's experiences by simply narrating them. Too much Elbow here. That I recite my experiences doesn't mean I understand why/how they came to be/or not be. Barthes' Roland Barthes book provides a nice counter-response to this personal narrative; in Barthes' work, the codes which construct our experiences are too complex to easily narrate (which self am I?).
Barthes’ interest in “code” makes him a better transition point that the simple personal narrative. Missed moment here in C.S.’s work – for while she can name Jameson, Baudrillard, whoever, in passing, she does not draw from much work either implicitly or explicitly tied to the digital. Kress – ok. He’s there all the time. Is there nobody else beyond Kress worth thinking about? Is his take on the visual (still, termed as “literacy”) the only take? No, of course not.
Looking through C.S.’s other proposed visual assignments, I also wonder why the lack of specificity and direction (ain’t these the folks always hyping “purpose”)? Revise and redesign a paper for the Web…why? List ways writers take advantage of the Web to write essays…why?
Here the “whys” are more “why on earth do I want to do this” questions – not in terms of practicality (“one day you will also have to redesign a paper”) but in terms of context/situation/relevant issue/etc.
Give some meat to the assignment, C.S. Situate it around a problem. Contextualize it enough to give more direction than “write an essay.” C’mon already. And why are these assignments called “visual”? Highlight the visual as invention. You’re just not there yet.

Posted by John @ 11/01/2004 09:02 PM EST