Twelfth Global Studies Conference

Abstract

Is the recent advent of technology really the end of writing as we know it? It all started on Facebook. A friend posted that young people don’t know how to write anymore because digital tweeting, texting, and messaging was making them lazy, rather than deep thinkers. As a college creative writing professor and also as one who embraces all modes of composition in my writing process, I disagreed. I work best using a combination of techniques–dictating into my phone, moving to a full keyboard to fill in details, printing out the work to apply pen-to-paper edits, then going back to the keyboard . . . After my Facebook comment, the discussion got heated when a stranger (to me) wrote: “Digital communications somehow short-circuit a part of the mental processes that accompany actual pen-to-paper composition. And that short-circuiting removes some intangible part of the artistry.” Is this true? By writing digitally, are we short-circuiting ourselves? Are we less able to produce words that are as valuable or as artistic as those of the past? In this session, we will discuss some brain science on the process of writing and then talk through how to best use modes of technology to achieve compositions that are deep thinking, aesthetic, and valuable.