Month: April 2020

Up until this semester, I held a close-minded disposition towards literature and the various products that are generated from it, especially written works. I used to regard literary works- copies of text printed and published made accessible to society- as mere inanimate objects, something hard-bound and concrete. To me, these were the finalized products in which their authors were certain, confident of their creation and their ‘final say.’ But, then I was introduced to a whole new perspective, completely the opposite of this previous mindset I had exhibited. I learned of the concept of fluidity and its relation to literature. The dictionary states that something ‘fluid’ is “changing readily; shifting; not fixed, stable, or rigid.” This concept, I learned, can certainly be applied to literature, and the process of publishing literary works. As a result, my previous self’s perception of literature and what goes into the process of creating the final version of a text completely transformed due to my enlightenment of fluidity. The renowned literary work Walden, written by Henry David Thoreau is a perfect representation of fluidity, and has helped influence my new perspective on literature.

Before I explain the concept of fluidity within Walden, it’s essential for me to provide some brief background information on the text and its author. Thoreau’s ambition in writing Walden was to provide a carefully chronicled account of his experience in living in a cabin he had built in the seclusion by Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts. The work itself reflects his transcendentalist outlook on life, his appreciation of simple living and nature, and the emphasis put on being self-reliant of oneself. Ultimately, Walden was a reflection of Thoreau himself and his personal growth and development during his time in seclusion by the pond. By reading his work, we are able to share in his personal findings, observations, and means of discovery throughout his journey. With this in mind, the concept of fluidity in relation to Walden makes itself present in Thoreau’s initial process of writing and publishing it which in turn, has helped inspire my new outlook on literature and the production of it.

It’s important to note that the writing process before the publishing of Walden included various revisions of its manuscript by Thoreau. Author Robert Sattelmeyer on his essay on “The Remaking of Walden” sheds light on the true extent of Thoreau’s writing process. In 1850, Thoreau had a manuscript on Walden, but it was only a form of its earliest stage in progress, not quite entirely reflecting his experiences at the pond. He later added partial revisions to this version, but didn’t revise it as a whole until 1852. By the time the final draft was published in 1854, it had undergone seven manuscript drafts, mainly partial and incomplete (Sattelmeyer 58). The revisions themselves ranged from something as simple as the alteration of single words and the deletion of sentences to something substantial, such as the introduction of new passages and chapters (Sattelmeyer 59). Although the final version was printed and published, Sattelmeyer encourages readers not to regard it as “fixed,” or concrete, because Thoreau and his work shared a correlation with each other. As Thoreau developed, so did his writing (Sattelmeyer 75). In this case, Walden resembles a true fluid text, in which Thoreau was consistently molding and shaping it into what it stands as its true form today. Walden in its fluid text edition is even open to the public now where readers are able to analyze and compare the changes and modifications Thoreau made to his work.

The concept of fluidity in connection with Thoreau’s writing process of Walden encouraged me to regard literature and its products in a new light. Fluidity is common in the everyday world; in fact, it exists everywhere in our daily lives. Fluidity in itself is a discipline, many of us have to learn not to be so rigid, be accepting of change, and be capable of dealing with the many obstacles that we encounter on a daily basis that frequently throw us off from leading “stable” lives. Literature, too, is reflective of this, it’s reflective of us as people. In this sense, literary works hold a strong resemblance to the creation of art, and ultimately, it is a type of art. Although not translated in paint and brush, it expresses the author’s wishes, their feelings, observations, and experiences, just like Walden. Due to my newfound perspective of a literary work as something not rigid and fixed, but as an evolutionary process, I’ve found a deeper appreciation for literature and the process of publishing it. The time that is required to write something that is as extensive as Walden requires trial and error. Not only that, but Thoreau’s mind was fluid in itself, constantly adapting, shifting, evolving, and finding new outlooks and perspectives that he attempted to transfer onto paper. Consequently, this new outlook has taught me to embrace fluidity in my life, rather than try and suppress it, because it was seven partially written and revised manuscripts that resulted in one of Thoreau’s greatest successes.

I’m bad at math. A lot of people are bad at math, and there are lots of reasons for that, but as an English educator I want to focus on one reason, literacy. People tend to think of the English discipline when they hear the word literacy, but there are actually many more types of literacy than people realize. Math has a literacy to it. You have to be able to understand the deeper meaning that certain sets of symbols have when placed together in order to decipher the code. I’m talking about solving an equation, but I may as well be talking about reading a complex story or poem. I’m literate enough in math to solve basic equations, but it takes a lot of mental gymnastics. I have to look up the order of operation, use a calculator, and probably phone a friend. It isn’t second nature to me because I’ve never been interested in math, so I never bothered to become really fluent in math. However, I can write ten pages analyzing a single poem just for fun. I’m the annoying English major who will obsess over why a green light is green and what that means. I understand the way the authors use motifs through their writing because I was interested in English enough to become very proficient at the skills involved in the discipline. Beyond being literate enough to understand the symbols involved with math or English, there’s also the jargon involved with those and other disciplines. It helps to have the right vocabulary to talk about a discipline. Where I’m leading this is in the title, there is a literacy to coding too. 

This is something that I knew on a surface level before we had to go home. It was while we were getting into the thick of Git Bash that I began to understand that coding in a type of literacy. My journals that are full of commands are just vocabulary lists. That made the work we were doing in class a lot less daunting. I had a real handle on things, but then we were in the middle of class when we found out that we were coming back after spring break. Starting online classes took a huge toll on me because I love learning above everything else. I want to be an educator because I’m a life-long learner. Not having classes anymore hurt, especially in this class because I didn’t feel like I had learned a lot yet. I took this class because I knew there was so much I had to learn in it. When I decided to take this class, I had several expectations. I was excited to learn more about English in the digital age because I want to be able to assure my future students that English is still useful and worth learning more about. My main expectation was to be learning about the role English takes in the technology age. I thought we would be discussing how English as a discipline needs to react to technology in order to stay relevant, current, and updated. Needless to say, it was quite the shock to find out that no one could define digital humanities, and I’m still waiting on an answer to the question, what is digital humanities? I think that the class as a whole weren’t quite literate in code enough to keep up with what we were supposed to be getting done. That’s no one’s fault, but then on top of us being behind, COVID 19 hit. Because we weren’t having synchronous classes anymore, I decided to do my own research. I realized that I knew very little about coding save for what we did in class, but from the little I knew, I could tell that coding is just another type of literacy. There are symbols, orders of operation,  I am far from fluent in any type of code, but I would say that I am really good at understanding poetry which has a ton of symbols as well. In order to approach digital humanities from a lens I might be able to understand, I combined coding and poetry. 

It turns out that I’m not the first person to think of this. There are whole books of code poetry. I read several poems from the book Code Poetry: Poems Written in Programming Languages, and I did not understand them at all at first! It turns out that there are poems in every type of programming language, not just markdown. I had to do a lot of research for every poem I read. I combined my ability to analyze poetry with the little knowledge I had and was gaining about coding, and it was incredibly challenging and fun. One some level I knew that programming languages are languages, but I never thought of them as languages that could tell stories and convey deeper meanings. It showed me that code and English can not only coexist but cooperate with one another. There is room for the literacy of coding in the English discipline, and when the two work together, the result is complex, creative, and keeping English current in the digital age.

The massive wave of technological advancement within the last two decades has spurred more than just shifts in culture and social dynamics. The entirety of the modern world (more specifically, America, but generally and first world country will do) has morphed into a society that’s nearly unrecognizable from that of the beginning of the previous century. In 1920, the radio had just been invented. Now, 100 years later, students are finding the connections between literature and technology, and how both have an immense impact on our culture, our future, and the way we think. 

If I’m being totally honest, the premise of this class confused me just a bit. In registration and the first couple of weeks of classes, I wondered what exactly was the purpose of this class. Ask me two months ago, and I would have said I’m in this class to learn about technology and literature, and how they’re related to the world we live in. While this isn’t incorrect, I realize now that there’s an ulterior motive – to change the way we, as students in this ever-changing society, think. Coming into this class as a second-semester freshman, I still hadn’t really learned just how different college English classes are from that of the ones I took in high school. In my secondary education years, English class went a little like this: read some state-mandated classic novel, analyze the dickens out of it for two and a half months, and then write an essay on it, usually some form of rhetoric analysis. Maybe there would be a multiple-choice unit, filled with generic strategies on how to pass the state testing like the Regents exam, or get a 5 on the AP. Not entirely sure why, but everything I knew led me to believe that college is just going to be a more advanced version of this – reading harder books, and more in-depth and complex essay prompts. Nothing and no one told me otherwise. 

Needless to say, this semester has been a whirlwind for me. While my view on English as a discipline changed drastically over the course of the part of the semester that we had on campus, I now feel that it’s almost entirely changed since being home. Having to switch to online learning forced me to read and think in ways I hadn’t before. All my life, I have been a hands-on learner. The kind of person that needs to have a physical copy of the text in order to fully process, read, and analyze it. I prefer in-class discussions because it allows us to talk about our ideas and converse with each other informally.  Reading and discussing on a screen just doesn’t do it for me, however, that only puts me at a disadvantage in the current situation. 

Over the past couple of days I’ve been rereading certain chapters of Walden, and I notice that he consistently forces the reader to be self-aware of their consciousness, and of their thoughts and body. He wants us, as the readers, to not lose ourselves in everyday life, but rather go through life conscious of our choices and ability to affect others. Since quarantine has started, I’ve begun locking myself in my bedroom, not coming out for hours on end because I’m studying or doing homework. I barely talk to my siblings and only really stop to eat or dawdle. But in reading Walden, I realized that it’s so easy to lose yourself in front of a computer screen, and come out dazed, forgetting who and where you are. 

Taking this English class has more than changed my view of English as a discipline, but it’s changed my view on everyday life. I now walk through my house aware of every step I am taking, and everything I say. I sat down to reread one of my favorite fantasy novels the other night, and I was constantly reminded of Walden and Thoreau’s plea to have us find meaning in everything. In rereading that novel, I came out with an entirely different point of view on the characters and their actions – they are just as unselfaware as I was. 

Before this class, I had an immature and primitive view of English. The object was to read books, analyze, and write essays. What I didn’t realize, however, is just how immensely English can change the way you think – you don’t need a philosophy class for that.

When I first saw this question, I was having a bit of trouble understanding exactly what was being asked. After a long few minutes of really thinking to myself, I think in simpler terms, this question is asking me to think about whether or not the digital aspect of this class had an effect on the way that I read and understand literature. 

When I first decided to take on this class and saw that it was called “Literature in the Digital Age,” I thought we were just going to be discussing how literature has now changed in this time of advanced technology. Although this was partially correct for some of our assignments, I could not have been more wrong when we were studying Walden, the real heart of the class in my opinion. 

Throughout pretty much the entirety of the course, we were asked to read a select chapter or essays from Henry David Thoreau’s book Walden. He talks about living the simple life in the woods. How did this change my idea of studying literature? Well, the whole entire book was online, not in paper form. To add to this online experience, classmates comments could be seen throughout the “book” as you were reading the assigned section. 

Being a person who went to a high school where the curriculum was pretty much based around technology, this whole idea of doing stuff online was not a shock to me. However, we always read our books the traditional way. So reading Walden in a non tangible form was definitely an odd experience for me. The thing that really threw me off was the comments my classmates would make throughout the book. The way I usually read is that I do not like to get any outside ideas or opinions before forming my own. Reading other’s comments while I was reading the online text was distracting to me. I basically had to come up with a new way of reading, which for some might be cool but for me, I get the most out of reading when it is uninterrupted and while I value my classmate’s ideas, it would have been better for me if they were not there while I was reading. (Yes I know you can hide them while reading, but it still alerts you to their existence and I was tempted to look anyway). 

Also, although we had some discussion in class about the book, most of the conversations took place online prior to class. It made me realize something about myself. I enjoy in person discussion so much more than online discussion. To me, when a person speaks what they feel instead of writing it, it has more impact when engaging in a discussion or a debate. I really enjoy the natural flow of a conversation as opposed to the robotic way we all write. 

Let me make this very clear, I am not trashing the convenience and luxury of doing things online. Look at what’s happening in the world right now. The fact that we are able to finish the semester online is remarkable and I am grateful for having the ability to complete my studies and not fall behind. In my opinion though, some things should be left to be done in person. 

So, how has this class changed my view of studying literature? It made me realize how much I love the feel of turning the page of a book, and the voices of others around me.

As my last blog post (can’t believe I am writing that) I would like to reflect on a topic that has been discussed many times throughout this semester, Medical Voluntourism. As part of our class collaboration for the Final Course Statement, we addressed the issue of medical voluntourism and unpacked solutions to this matter. Volunteers are attending these trips for the wrong reasons of hoping to mix medical experience with traveling to different exotic locations.  Continue reading “Solutions to Medical Voluntourism”