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I have a longstanding love affair with words. Truth be told, I can’t get enough of ‘em. I love long n’ languid complex sentences, extended metaphors, adverbs and adjectives and gerunds…oh my! I like to read a lot of words and I like to use a lot of words, and I live in constant fear that I am a member of a dying breed. I have long assumed that the pillars of eloquence have been crumbling down around us as “text speak” rapes the English language and inane Facebook status updates stunt the intellectual growth of the young. But I recently read an article by Clive Thompson in Wired Magazine that gives me new hope and urges me to see the evolution of language in a fresh light.
Thompson offers Professor Andrea Lunsford’s findings in the Stanford Study of Writing as proof that all of my worrying is for naught. According to Lunsford, “we’re in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven’t seen since Greek civilization.” Pretty bold statement for a time when updating the world about your personal grooming habits on Twitter is common practice. But apparently that’s exactly why we’re in the midst of this “literary revolution” – never before in history has so much communication occurred in writing, and never before have we been so sensitive to our reading audience. Thompson points out that prior to the Internet most writing was done only as school assignments, and only those who then pursued careers that specifically involved writing continued to write regularly once leaving the structure of school. Now most people (especially most young people) rely heavily on the written word in their social interactions. The Stanford students involved in Lunsford’s study performed a whopping 38% of their writing OUTSIDE of the context of the classroom.
When the question of quality was addressed, Lunsford and her team claimed that the writing has not suffered from an invasion of text speak. And actually, young people are exhibiting a new special skill – they are writing for their audience.
“The modern world of online writing, particularly in chat and on discussion threads, is conversational and public, which makes it closer to the Greek tradition of argument than the asynchronous letter and essay writing of 50 years ago.”
Yes, this makes total sense. I must confess that I carefully construct my own Facebook status updates, always contemplating the audience I am addressing and frequently with the hope of sparking up a dialogue with others. With every email, text and Twitter update I compose, I always consider my audience. But actually, no – wow. Huh. Come to think of it, at this point it has become second nature. I am old enough to laugh at the name “Twitter,” but I am young enough that my transition into social interaction through an electronic medium happened naturally, seamlessly, and oh-so-long-ago. I suppose resistance is futile.
I was glad to read that (according to this Stanford study) the quality of the writing of today’s young people is not in the toilet. And I was overjoyed to learn of an unforeseen side effect of social media: concision. As Polonius points out in Hamlet: “brevity is the soul of wit.” Being confined to a mere 140 or 160 characters in a tweet or text or FB status update has forced youngsters to learn to communicate effectively using only a limited number of words. For someone like me who has always erred on the side of being overly verbose, such limitation serves as constructive constraint.
So because of social media, these days we’re choosing our words carefully and we’re writing with a specific audience in mind. What an amazing writing exercise for…the entire world! It actually makes total sense: societal trends dictate how we communicate. Shakespeare’s 3-hour plays were popular in the 16th Century when there was no T.V. and no Internet and going to the theatre was a primary form of entertainment. But what if the groundlings had had access to Twitter? Or portable gaming systems? I bet Shakespeare would have quickly shaved down the length of his plays to accommodate the attention span of his audience.
I’ve been trudging through Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment these days, and it makes me wonder: what would the wordy Russians have done in today’s communication climate? Really, take any long novel (classic or contemporary) and try to fit it into a tweet. Actually, someone already had a go with Homer’s Odyssey.
So while I do not want to lose the classic form of the meaty, wordy, complex novel as part of our literary culture anytime soon, condensing great works of literature is an excellent exercise…and just good fun.
Love this.
Adding a personal touch: I have three best friends, all male, all very net-savvy.
One reads the classics, for joy. Not to say he did because some cute librarian might show up one night at the bar. Because he wants to.
The second refuses to read books out of principle. Seriously. To spite me and friend #1, he wears shirts that say “Too many books, too little time.” He recently read his first book since college, non-fiction, because he met the writer and was impressed with him.
The third refuses to read anything printed. But anything else is fair game.
All three are eloquent, well-read, super successful in their fields. They are voracious readers of sports news, facebook, music blogs. The classic reader reads New York Times every day. The book-hater reads ESPN.com and CNN.com about four to five times every day. The third will read anything forwarded to him by the first two, plus his own web visits and grad school studies.
I’m the bogey, the outsider, who reads and writes, reads about writing, writes about reading.
And let me say this – all four of us are extraordinarily creative, sharp folks. Be it on each other’s facebook walls or IM windows, we are sincerely funny, educated; we make connections, recommendations; compose arguments and break each other down…sometimes ruthlessly.
You and Thompson could not be more right – this generation’s reading and writing habits, no matter how they manifest themselves, are netting out a level of engaged minds unlike any before in history.