Reading Response 2

After reading both Elizabeth Daley's "Expanding the Concept of Literacy" and Jay David Bolter's "Introduction: Writing in the Late Age of Print", I have come to believe Bolter's findings about media-literacy hit much closer to home.  The interactive reader-writer relationship is what truly makes the new-media amazing; the reader is connected to the writer like never before.  Therefore I must refute Daley's claim that young people have been trained to take a "read only" approach to new-media, and my objection is supported 140 characters at a time.

I love Twitter.  Is it a guilty pleasure?  Yes, but the satisfaction of capturing a human-teddy-bear in a Speedo and Twitpicing it to the world remains unmatched.  And although my flock’s numbers are thin, they are regularly rewarded with clever anecdotes and absurd Hashtags.  Perhaps my forty followers look petty compared to Justin Bieber’s plus-sized posse, but they are a special audience that understands and appreciates the paradoxical nature of my tweets.  Unlike a @FOXnews or @MTVjams, I do not advertise my Twitter alias.  In fact, I take drastic measures to ensure Mrs. Rozes and President Dooley do not stumble upon my narratives on the day’s adventures.  These, to say the least, sophomoric commentaries, my Tweets, detail the inappropriate exploits of my personal life to my circle of followers.  In return, they provide me with vulgar responses and nonsensical rebuttals.  Through this magical twenty-first century networking tool, I can ridicule and harass my dearest friends from hundreds of miles away.  But underneath the absurdity and naughtiness, Twitter serves an even higher purpose. 

Every time I Retweet @PimpBillClinton or Mention an incapacitated follower, I am shaping the landscape of our twitterverse.  My feed is a twisted autobiography written by the ones I am closest too.  So you see, "read only" might be the worst way to decribe my connection with this form of new-media.  I use Twitter to communicate - it is not a one way street - I read, I write, I respond.

"Our culture has chosen to fashion these technologies into a writing space that is animated, visually complex, and malleable in the hands of both writer and reader." (Bolter, 13)

This quote from the Bolter reading epitomizes the point my use of Twitter supports.  The space is animated, forever changing, and this is exactly what attracts me to form of media like Twitter.  In conclusion, the most important part of new-media, and media-literacy, is the undefined line between reader and writer, and one's ability to walk the line.