"What is an Author?" 2.0: Social Media Version

For digital natives, living life without technology seems pretty impossible. Embarrassingly, there are times where I find myself on my computer, iPhone and iPad simultaneously. My friends and I are constantly checking Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, always talking about what others are posting. What’s important for us to realize, especially as teenagers in this social-media obsessed culture, is that once we post/send/tweet/update something online…it is permanent and out there forever. Future employers will be able to see the photos we post, the things we “like” on Facebook, and the stuff we tweet. Sure, there are ways to make accounts private, but there are loopholes and there is nothing that you post on the internet that is truly 100% private.  With the invention of sites like Facebook and Twitter, there has been an emergence of social media etiquette. One must always think before they post a comment or a photo, they must be aware that even while in the moment a certain comment could seem trivial, in reality it is something they are making public forever. We are no longer the authors of our papers, or our text messages, but we have authorship over all social media sites we choose to participate in. In the context of Foucault’s essay, “What is an Author”, does this mean that every time we decide to Instagram our lunch, or comment on a friend’s Facebook status, we are acting as “authors”? I don’t believe that you can call a photo on Instagram or a Tumblr post a work of art with you as an author, but in a way you are creating something, and presenting it to the world much like an author would. It’ll be interesting to see how my generation, who has been using Facebook since middle school, will end up using Facebook in the future. Will we try and delete our old posts? There are definitely some pictures of me during my awkward stage as a high school freshman that I don’t want my Facebook friends to see anymore. Will we begin to defriend people and edit old posts? I’m curious to see how Facebook and other social media sites alter culture for us and change what it means to be an author.

Facebook Stalking & Instagram Mocking

“I totally met this cute guy last night at this party…”

“Whats his name, I’ll look him up on Facebook?”

Above is a typical exchange between two friends. “Facebook stalking”, or looking someone up on a social networking site to get a feel of who they are, is a common thing for kids my age. Looking at a person’s social networking sites (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest) is a way to get to know someone’s personality, without actually getting to know someone’s personality. We are constantly checking the aforementioned sites: in class, at the gym, while we’re grocery shopping, and by doing so we are becoming increasingly interconnected with hundreds of our “friends” and “followers”.  Often times, looking at someone’s Facebook or Instagram feeds can lend more insight about their life, than meeting them can. Is this type of instant access making us more judge-y and less welcoming? There are times where I have been guilty of “Facebook stalking” and been quick to make judgments about someone based on the pictures they post of themselves and what they write on peoples walls. Although it seems arbitrary, what you put on the internet speaks for itself, and can make impressions on people, even if they don’t know you. Posting something on the internet is no longer something that can be carefree; everything you post has a consequence and has the potential to be seen by thousands of people. Anytime an unseemly picture of me finds its way to my Facebook, I have to think to myself what my Aunts, Uncles, Parents, and even my Grandmother, would think of it. Our lives are so public, that even things we don’t want to be seen become seen. Nothing is private anymore, and with the emergence of smartphones, anything you say or do can be recorded at any time. In a world where judging a person by their “tweets” and “instagrams” is the norm, and “Facebook stalking” is socially acceptable, Are we being too quick to judge?  

Family Holidays Spent Apart: The New Norm?

As a kid, family Thanksgivings used to mean posing for lots of pictures taken with a rinky-dink disposable camera purchased at CVS and flipping through ancient scrapbook pages looking at even more ancient photos. Holiday endings were marked by taking the aforementioned disposable cameras to the local drug store and waiting patiently for them to be developed, and then promptly mailing the doubles to far away family members. Enter Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram: causing the extinction of family holidays since their creation.  This past Thanksgiving, my bi-coastal family didn’t feel the need to reconvene in our normal fashion, meeting in Boston for a 22 person feast. Instead my family, who constantly keeps touch through Facebook and email (I’m looking at you, Uncle Mark!) spent the holidays on their respective coasts. We skyped throughout the day; as the east coast crew was taking the turkey out of the oven, the group on the west coast was devouring appetizers. Postings on Facebook and Instagram made the distance between us disappear.

                Many feel more connected through social media sites, like Facebook and Twitter. However, I feel like this false feeling of connectedness actually results in a less genuine relationship. Because I constantly see my friends from high school posting, updating their statuses and posting new Instagram photos, a phone call doesn’t happen as much as it needs to. Although my close knit high school group of friends are constantly iMessaging ‘selfies’ in a group message, I rarely talk to them individually over the phone. While there are times where this new technology has certainly helped me communicate and stay in touch, there are cases where a ‘skype’ or ‘facebook chat’ conversation doesn’t suffice. The idea of doing an interview for a potential job, while it is fiscally more responsible, is completely insane to me. There is something about seeing someone in person; it gives you a feel for their personality. Having a face to face conversation with someone, while not always possible, will in my mind always trump communicating via technology.  

Give me a designer bag, not a designer baby

Every Sunday afternoon my roommate and I go grocery shopping, and we pretty much have it down except for the cereal aisle. As we walk down the fluorescently lit aisle, eyeing the pretty much infinite number of cereal choices, it takes as awhile to choose what type of breakfast we want. At a certain point it’s kind of like, how many different choices do we need? As humans, and particularly Americans, we love having choices and especially being in power of those choices. White or wheat? Paper or plastic? Coffee or tea? No matter how menial it may be, we love having the ability to choose. As technology is advancing, it seems we may be able to control one more aspect of our life: the genetic makeup of our offspring. According to the FDA, genetic engineering is “a process in which recombinant DNA (rDNA) technology is used to introduce desirable traits into organisms”. In other words, you can choose specific genetic traits of certain organisms such as, blue eyes and blonde hair. While this sort of new age technology can have pros when dealing with genetic diseases, there are huge ethical questions to consider. Although having choices when it comes to certain things is nice, having the choice to map out a child’s genes is wrong.

This relatively new process, called pre-implantation genetic diagnosis was originally created to “screen for disease”, however now according to Dr. .Jeffery Steinberg it can be used to determine sex, hair color, eye color, etc. Steinberg is a supporter and leader of this genetic designing, where parents from all over the globe have already come the United States, because practices like this are outlawed in their home countries, to have operations to choose the sex of their baby. This is especially relevant when clients from countries like China and India, where it is considered culturally beneficial to give birth to a boy, come and use these services. Steinberg’s clientele tend to be wealthy elites, for good reason, the procedure can cost up to $45,000. Many people go to his clinic to get their embryos tested for abnormal chromosome conditions; those clients now have the possibility to cosmetically alter their embryos. One example is that a “couple may want to have a baby with a darker completion to help guard against a skin cancer”. Steinberger is a clear proponent of genetic engineering saying, “I would not say this is a dangerous road. It’s an uncharted one”.

The ability to screen for chromosomal abnormalities and prevent disease and later anguish is one thing, but to choose the cosmetic traits of your child is quite another. This sort of genetic predisposition creates a false reality for parents and puts sorts of expectations on their later children. Morally, it seems like choosing your child’s eye color and skin tone is metaling with the universe. According to Dr. Gillian Lockwood, an expert in the field, this is the equivalent of “turning babies intocommodities that you buy off the shelf”. In the UK, and other countries, sex selection is outlawed; however there is no current legislation in the US banning the practice. There is also the question of deciding which traits are considered the “best”. For example, if a couple is to have a fair-skinned, ginger, and green eyed baby, but they really want blonde hair, blue eyes, and bronze skin, is it ethical to change their future baby’s’ complete genetic makeup? Does the emergence of designer baby culture mean the extinction of some less “desirable” traits? Our cosmetic makeup is unique to each and every person, the emergence of this new technology has the ability to create a more uniform more “perfect” population, somewhat eerie of Hitler’s vision of an Aryan race.

This sort of moral catch-22 will certainly lead to ethical debates in the future. As our society becomes more technology savvy, we are only bringing these ethical dilemmas upon ourselves. In this scientific age we live in, our generation will be forced to make decisions that can change the very definition of human existence. As the possibility of robots and super humans becomes more of a reality we are becoming increasingly aware of the fact that a life quite like one in science fiction movies could become real. Call me “old-fashioned” but I think that the diversity and flaws in people are what make them beautiful and real. A world where I can choose the genetic makeup of my son or daughter is too close to the stuff of science fiction novels. Although science is incredibly important, and it’s nice to know that there is that sort of technology available, there are certain lines that shouldn't be crossed. 

"I'm in Paris and all I Want is a Big Mac, a Starbucks, and some new Nikes"

As my fellow NYU peers and I visited the college months ago with the prospect of entering into this university, we were promised a ‘global’ education. We were told repeatedly that NYU is a ‘global’ university and is unique in its goal to completely submerge its students into a global culture. In this day of age, where with the help of technology and advances in communication the globe has shrunk, being aware of the world globally is something that is valued. To be educated in the cultures of other countries is something that has become more and more important. However, as the world we live in becomes increasingly globalized, there is a simultaneous homogenization of culture. Or rather, as the globe becomes more connected, we can see a loss of unique cultures that is being replaced with more American or western culture.

                With companies like Starbucks, Apple, and most notoriously McDonalds expanding to other countries at an almost exponential rate, it is safe to say that there has been some loss of local culture in places like China and India. In China, a Starbucks even welcomes the “five million Chinese a year [who] visit theForbidden City”, an ancient Chinese palace. This sacred landmark of China, and remnants of some of the most powerful dynasties ever to rule over China, has become yet another casualty in the Americanization of cultures. The expansion of these big name American companies, while profitable for America, is coming at the price of something way more valuable: the true untarnished identity of other countries’ cultures. There was a time where traveling the globe meant experiencing other unadulterated places, getting a new and completely different experience than you have ever had before. However, now ‘traveling the world’ means going to Paris just to get the same Big Mac you can get from the drive-thru three blocks from your house.  It is truly amazing that in our global society today, where an American CEO, a Scandinavian super model, and an Indian computer technician can all be drinking virtually the same cup of coffee at the same time, we still have such pressing issues as malnutrition and high illiteracy rates in some of our most developed countries.

                The United States is practicing “cultural imperialism”, and subjecting less developed countries to its restaurants, clothing companies, and entertainment ventures. In January 2003, “American films accounted for approximately 80percent of global box office revenue”, a true testament to the homogenization of culture, where people all over the globe want to watch and enjoy the same movies. As a global society under one global culture we are not actively creating new and unique ideas and concepts, but rather “old ideas are repeated over and over again, in these media and thus culture is no longer characterized by diversity but is reduced to the repetition of a relatively narrow spectrum of forms and ideas” (Koval). With this Americanization of cultures we’ve seen the disappearance of original ideas, almost as if nothing is truly “new” or “innovative”. Although with a population of over seven billion people, there will never be such thing as “one global culture”, it seems as if we are becoming a sea of sameness- a population who wears the same brands, eats the same food, and likes the same music. That is not to say there aren’t those who are opposed to this Americanization of culture; In many places, especially in western Europe, there has been a movement to oppose the coming of US big name companies and a boycott of places like Starbucks and McDonalds. In Italy, for example, is one country whereStarbucks has yet to expand its global empire of coffeehouses. Many Europeans oppose these big name companies because they recognize them for what they are: a threat to local businesses and yet another sign of an Americanized world.

                I’m going to be honest here; I do not represent a citizen who is rallying for global change. I fully partake and am a cog in our capitalist society, I drink Starbucks every day (sometimes twice a day), I love to go shopping, and I even eat at fast food chains like McDonalds (McFlurrys while they are ticking caloric time bombs are delicious and hard to pass up). While it is easy to point out the flaws of Americanization, it is even harder to fully separate yourself from global imperialism. Although people complain about big name corporations, most of us still wake up every morning craving an egg mcmuffin and a venti-non-fat-extra-whip-pumpkin-spice-expresso-soy latte. We live in an extremely connected global society, where in the future there will be global problems that we, global citizens, will be called upon to answer. 

I learned cursive for nothing: learning in the digital age

Life is tough for a third grader. Kids are mean, the playground is a battlefield, and on top of all the other twists and turns of third grade life, you are forced to learn cursive. I distinctly remember sitting at my desk in Ms.Mahoneys classroom, wrestling with the delicate intricacies of an uppercase cursive ‘G’. So many weeks were spent struggling to perfect our cursive, being told we would employ this method of writing “all the time” and that it would eventually help us write faster. Sure, the idea of cursive was nice in theory, handwriting where you never had to pick up your pencil, and therefore would speed up the process of writing, whether you were taking notes or drafting an essay. Fast forward a few grades, to a very awkward six grade me sitting in computer class playing typing games on the computer. Gone was the need for me to be able to write in cursive, now it was important that I be able to type with a high proficiency, keeping my fingers on my home row keys, ASDF and JKL;. An evil orange plastic key cover was placed over my keyboard so I would learn to type faster and make it to the highest levels of the typing computer game we were required to play. Fast forward to present day, I am a college student, who has never written an essay in cursive (to be honest I don’t think I’d be able to write in cursive if you asked me to), and while I do type, I never keep my fingers on my home row keys as I was instructed to do by my kooky computer teacher Mrs.Veneable. For me and my peers, growing up with technology was completely normal, as we were developing our minds, technology itself was also developing. We had a learning experience like any other, because we were the ginea pigs for so many learning techniques that used technology.

                All throughout my middle school and high school careers, I constantly heard the phrase, “technical difficulties” and “were going to try something new”. Because there was always a new technology out there, there was always a new assignment to try out on us that somehow used that technology. Some things worked, and others didn’t. My senior year in high school, my Spanish teacher decided ,to bring us into the global world we were about to become a part of, as a class we’d adopt pen pals from Spain. The assignment was, once a week we were to post a video of us talking in Spanish about our personal lives and send it to our pen pals through a certain website. The Spanish “video blog” pals, then would respond with a video of them doing the same thing in English. From an educational standpoint, this idea was revolutionary in the way that students from opposite sides of the globe would be able to communicate and learn about the others life through the internet. While I was sitting in my room in Dallas, Texas I could get a first-hand account of adolescent life in Madrid, Spain, and also improve my Spanish skills. No previous generation could have ever had this sort of primary source experience; communicating face to face with a person about a topic is a completely different way of learning. In the end, our pen pals weren’t as successful as my Spanish teacher would've hoped, and we abandoned ship for other learning experiments in this new technological abyss. Trial and error with these experiments is something me and my peers have become accustom to over the years.

                In a way, teachers are reformulating their lesson plans and criteria, and testing it out on our generation. It a type of simultaneous learning on different levels; the teachers are learning about the technology and what works while the students are learning about the technology and also the course curriculum. As a result, it’s a multi-level learning process that is beneficial for all parties. In the past, teachers gave the same assignments over and over again. Now teachers and students work together to create new assignments that are challenging and innovative. Frequently, after a big project or group assignment, my teachers would hand out review sheets asking our opinions of the assignment and how we think it could be improved. The teacher/student dynamic has therefore changed as a result of technology utilization in the classroom. This new kind of learning and teaching fosters creative ways of thinking and is completely different from traditional ways of schooling used in the past.

                Today, writing an essay begins and ends using Microsoft word. There’s no need to prepare a first draft, using cursive of course, and then a second and third draft on old school notebook paper. Kids also learn to use a computer before they can learn to read so teaching typing in schools seems a bit outdated. I was in third grade almost ten years ago, in 2003, almost a millennium ago in technology years. Our rapidly evolving society is changing second by second, and learning is changing too. For generations to come to be equipped with the skills and knowledge necessary to live in such a society digital learning is a necessity (and cursive probably is not). 

The Blame Game: Games Made me Fail my Drivers Test

                There are few things more exciting to a 15 year old than the prospect of getting your license. There are also few things less exciting than sitting in driver’s Ed every Saturday and Sunday for six weeks. Drivers Ed consisted of cheesy driving movies that were at least 20 years old, an impossibly boring driving instructor, and 40 teenagers who just wanted their weekends back. It was a struggle not to fall asleep during class, and so I turned to about the only possible thing that was interesting to me back then: my iPhone and its’ games. I quickly downloaded all the top games at the app store, buying everything from Cooking Mama to Doodle Jump. I would spend hours during class playing these games, not paying attention to our teacher, but constantly achieving a new high score. Blocking out the boring old man talking about speed limits was easy when I was engaged by the small screen in the palm of my hands. I guess the joke was on me when six months later I didn’t pass my driver’s test. I’ll never know if my obsession with my iPhone and all its games can be blamed for my failure, or perhaps it was something else, but I know that because of drivers Ed I beat the whole entire game of Cooking Mama in six weeks.

               The number of games available on the iPhone is constantly expanding, and the iPhone is the perfect delivery system for games that were previously only available through other gaming consoles. If you think about it, it makes perfect sense.  Most people are glued to their smartphones, and if you have your phone with you 24/7 then in theory you would always be able to play the games you’ve downloaded from the App store. Currently gamesare the most popular category in the App store, with approximately 130,804active applications available for downloading. If you can imagine a game, it probably exists in the app store, ready for you to download it with the tap of your finger. There is literally an app for anything and everything. In addition to the game category in the app store, there is also an education category thatcontains 74,032 apps available for download, that’s almost half of the amount of games in the apps store.  When faced with the choice of playing a game or an educational app, most people would pick fun filled games any day. While good educational games may be out there, they will never be utilized enough for them to become effective.

                Fast forward from 15 year old me playing on my iPhone in driving class, to 17 year old me preparing to take the SAT. For any high school junior the SAT is what consumes you, it is essentially the most important test one will ever have to take. Yet again I saw my weekends booked, with SAT prep classes for hours on Saturdays and Sundays. And, yet again, rather than listening to my teacher I found myself distracted by my IPhone, playing Angry Birds and not listening to SAT “testing strategies”.  How could I possibly pay attention to math problems and reading passages when my IPhone and all its grandeur was literally an arm’s length away? I didn’t fail the SAT, but I’ll always wonder what my score would’ve been had I actually paid attention during prep class. These games, while some argument could be made for their educational properties, were by far a detriment to my learning in class. And I’m not alone in my in-class gaming addiction, with one-third of high school students owningan iPhone; the number of those who are distracted during school is larger than ever.

                Asking a Kid who has an IPhone to not play games during class is like putting a drink in front of a recovering alcoholic. These games are designed to be engaging and addicting, and sitting in a boring class is the perfect time to try and beat the next level or perfect your high score. There is no question that there are some educational aspects of a few select educational games. However, I cannot in my right mind agree with someone who says that there are educational benefits from playing Fruit Ninja. Games for me will always be a distraction, a way to escape from the prospect of learning. Whether it is during a lecture in college or listening during algebra class in high school, if I didn’t force myself to pay attention, I would always rather be playing on my iPhone.