A Paper Presented in Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for

SC501 Survey of Research in Societal and Cultural Change

Capella University, September, 2000

By D.L. Jackson

COMMUNICATION AS A MEDIUM OF CHANGE

  Technology as a Medium of Change.

Contrary to the modern interpretation of technology as synonymous with computers, the historical interpretation addressed the current innovations of the day. During the early Industrial Age, it was looms. Jacquard received death threats regarding the invention of the loom that bears his name. Because the loom used special cards to control the pattern of the weave which made it faster and, ultimately, more economical for the owners, weavers feared the loss of employment and condemned the new technology. An interesting feature of new technology, however, is that it is usually of an additive nature in the sense that it changes an older innovation that was once new itself. A cartoon passed around in the late 1980s showed a picture of two men watching a huge earthmover. One of them commented that it was too bad that the earthmover had caused the unemployment of at least 100 men. After a slight pause, the second man sighed and replied, "Yes, but if they were using teaspoons, millions of people could have been employed." Every age has its own technological developments that change the employment landscape -- making obsolete some occupations while at the same time creating new careers.

Thorstein Veblen argued that "the machine was a leveller, a vulgarizer, whose end seems to be the extirpation of all that is respectable, noble, and dignified in human intercourse and ideals" (Lauer, 1991, p.160). Because he believed that we are all shaped by our present environment, our patterns of thought are never capable of meeting the present demands. In other words, although our habits of thought were created in the past and are continuous with us in the present, they are not competent to withstand present technological advances. William Ogburn developed this "cultural lag" theory in more detail. He established that cultural lag would be present when two variables are identified as having been adjusted in the past but, because of the change of one of those variables to a greater extent than the other, the parts then become unequal which sets up the necessary precondition of cultural lag.

Lauer puts forth the idea that there are several cul-de-sac views of technology including: (1) technology as the prepotent factor in change wherein change is explained solely in terms of technology as the driving force; (2) technology as an inexorable force in change or as Marshal McLuhan put it: "Any technology gradually creates a totally new human environment." (in Lauer, 1991, p. 164); (3) technology as the savior of all societies' ills questioned by Alan Kay of Apple Computer who has repeatedly said that any problems a school cannot solve without computers, cannot be solved with them (in Postman, 1995, p. 45); and (4) technology as the anti-Christ, a favorite of modern day Luddites who view humanity as enslaved to its technology.

One method then of identifying how technology causes change is to trace the consequences of any given innovation. Of particular interest to educators is the development of the printing press which completely revolutionized learning and may have been ultimately responsible for, among other things, the Protestant Revolution. In examining this method of identifying change, Lauer comments that technology (1) increases our alternatives; (2) alters interaction patterns between individuals; and (3) creates new social problems.

Although in many ways, it is arguable whether or not the computer is creating a changeable environment more so than the wheel, for example, or the automobile, Lauer says that the speed at which change is occurring is increasing and is hence responsible for the apparent cultural lag we are experiencing. However, this lag is quickly becoming a generational lag as there is evidence that children are now perceiving themselves differently. In her studies of children, Turkle has observed that the computer is forcing us to rethink the meaning of thinking, feeling, and of being human.

Before the computer, the animals, mortal though not sentient, seemed our nearest neighbors in the known universe. Computers, with their interactivity, their psychology, with whatever fragments of intelligence they have, now bid for this place. We met children who seemed ready to give it to them. These children defined themselves not with respect to their differences from animals, but by how they differ from computers. Where we once were rational animals, now we are feeling computers, emotional machines. (in Lauer, 1991, p. 191)

Postman (1995) offers four experiments of importance to educators wishing to re-inject vitality into public school education. The questions are historical in nature and are prepotent at various times in our history. The first asks the question: "Is it possible to have a coherent, stable culture that allows the greatest possible freedom of religious and political thought and expression?" (p. 132). The second: "Is it possible to have a coherent, stable culture made up of people of different languages, religions, traditions, and races?" (p. 135). The third: "Is it possible to provide a free public education for all citizens?" (p. 137). The fourth: Is it possible to preserve the best of American traditions and social institutions while allowing uncontrolled technological development?" (p. 139).

Historically, technological innovations were time saving devices and, while this is also true for electronic devices today as well, there is a more fundamental issue at stake. We are now looking at integral changes in our perception of the environment through a change from linear to non-linear interpretations, the notion of what it means to be digital and the ramification of 'digitalness' in every area of society. Certainly McLuhan was right to pose the question: "How does the structure of a medium alter the ways in which people 'sense' the world?" (in Postman, 1995, p. 141). We use the medium to restructure our cognitive boundaries.

The motivation behind the development of the original computers is clear -- to compute numbers faster and more accurately. It was Alan Turing who began to investigate whether computers could effectively compute text as well as numbers. He argued that if letters could be encoded as numbers, the computer would be able to process them as efficiently. That this was true opened up the development of computers as an all-purpose machine, capable of dealing with text as well as numbers.

That the digital computer was developed in the western world may have been pre-ordained because of the nature of the western world. Kosko in Fuzzy Thinking, addressed the relationship between religion and digital data. Eastern religions tend to operate around a 'balance' theme: balance of body and soul creates a healthy person. The purpose of life is to maintain that balance and/or to rectify imbalances from previous lives whereas western religions tended to be of a more dualistic nature -- heaven vs. hell; good vs. bad. From the predominant notions of saved and damned, it is a relatively simple step to conceive of a machine that uses 0s and 1s exclusively in its inner structure. There is no inbetween -- just long strings of binary code.

Shlain (1998) who has analyzed the effects of language and left- and/or right- hemisphere characteristics, believes the digital computer reinforces behaviors commonly associated with the dominant male activities of the right brain. Initially, solely through computations and simple text re-combinations, the computer made use of logical steps, algorithms, in solving problems. That it continues to influence societal change is undeniable but whether this is solely due to its all-pervasive nature or instead to the intellectual leap that allows for the manipulation of electronic bits has not yet been established.

Iconographic Representations.

With the advancement of graphical user interfaces, users are not required to understand the computing process. It is the superficial aspect that is useful -- the front-end interface between user and machine. Turkle (1995) reports one user saying, "The Mac looked perfect, finished. To install a program on my DOS machine, I had to fiddle with things. It clearly wasn't perfect. With the Mac, the system told me to stay on the surface" (online). The early personal computer modeled a technological aesthetic which, to use Ogburn's terms, created a less than satisfactory end result than that which existed initially. The Mac's interface, on the other hand, was not indicative of a cultural lag but instead posited a postmodern approach to technology suggesting the search for the process was futile as the important bit was the interface.

That we have passed from a process-oriented to a transparent society is now evident in studies done with young people. In response to questions dealing with MUD (multi-user domains) characterizations, Turkle (1995) found that a college junior described his experiences in this way:

I split my mind. I'm getting better at it. I can see myself as being two or three or more. And I just run on one part of my mind and then another when I go from window to window. I'm in some kind of argument in one window and trying to come on to a girl in a MUD in another, and another window might be running a spreadsheet program or some other technical thing for school . . . And then I'll get a real-time message, and I guess that's RL [real life]. It's just one more window. (online)

With the advent of MUDs, we have come full circle. "MUDs give me balance" (Turkle, online). We have passed through the digital age of right/wrong, black/white, zero/one to the eastern philosophy of degrees of digitalization, such that our own characterization can be digitally manipulated in various 'windows'.

In investigating the nature of communicative change, there are three distinct developments to consider: the advent of literacy, the invention of the printing press, and the transition to digital communication. In aliterate societies, successful processing of information was achieved through listening. Persons lived in close, intimate connection with their environment and with each other. Thinking was concrete and operational. (Fowler, online). "When we speak and listen, we use both sides of the brain. The left hemisphere processes the words linearly. Simultaneously, the right hemisphere evaluates speech's nonverbal clues such as body language and vocal inflection" (Shlain, 1998, p. 3). The change from listener to reader was a complex social and cultural phenomenon. It necessitated a reconfiguration of the way the brain primarily processes information -- a change from bi-hemispheric to a dependence on the skills better performed by the left side of the brain.

The left brain processes information logically and printed words are organized logically. Printed text can be broken into discrete units unlike speech because the spoken word exists only in the instant it is spoken. Afterwards, nothing remains but the memory. This logical nature of the printed word predisposes the learner to a particular type of learning -- memorization. Although Caine and Caine have shown humans capable of at least two types of memory: spatial and a set of systems for rote learning (in Baumberg, online), the traditional emphasis on memorization remains the preferred mode of teaching in many education settings.

With the development of the printing press, the rate of literacy increased. Eisenstein says that the printing press was ultimately responsible for the notion of the individual, literary property rights and, ultimately, the Renaissance movement. The printing press then became the first one-to-many communication medium. (Dewar, online).

The Gutenberg Bible was first published in 1546. Less than 50 years later, there were more than 1000 print shops in Europe. According to Waldvogel (1999), a new age was on the move, putting the individual as a responsible personality in the center of society. It was summed up in this manner:

An increasing volume of knowledge and a rapidly expanding society were the underlying forces for a better and richer human and societal interaction.

The new print system invented by Gutenberg … rapidly conquered our society.

Simple in its conception, it was based on elementary movable type which could be placed sequentially to produce words, sentences, and meaning. It used the most easily available energies -- mechanical and transport.

And in a few decades, it dramatically changed communication, learning, thinking, politics, religion, and spirituality. (online)

Waldvogel (1999) continues to compare the advent of the printing press with the new digital technologies and indicates the similarities are almost "awesome in the way we may predict our own future" (online). These included:

The new information and communication network of this century is individually targeted and is rapidly conquering our society.

Simple in its conception, it is based on individual elementary bytes, which placed sequentially, produce meaning, images, and sounds.

The system uses the cheapest available energy system -- microelectronics and microwaves.

It has already changed our way to communicate and will change our way of learning, thinking, politics, and spirituality. (online).

The networked systems of today then offer a many-to-many communication medium which enables the process of preserving and disseminating knowledge to be carried several steps further than during the time of the printing press. Today, updating knowledge is immediate and referencing becomes immediate through the use of hypertext. Along with hypertext, the use of the mouse involves a hand-eye coordination more spatial than linear and "invites the right brain pattern skills to participate in the maneuvers necessary to generate the written word" (Shlain, 1998, p. 417).

Although the computer was originally designed to aid scientists in calculations, word processing programs necessitated the use of the keyboard as the input device of choice and, although women (primarily) had been using the typewriter since the mid-1870s, men now rushed to learn how to use the device. According to Shlain, the keyboard is unique in that it, alone among writing devices, requires both left and right hemispheric activity in the brain.

The computer's unique word processing program added still another right brained talent. The geometrical moving about of phrases, sentences, paragraphs, and whole passages increased the right hemisphere's influence on the composition of writing. And there are no pages to turn in a computer, which further discourages linear thinking. 'Scrolling' with its reliance on rods and right brain pattern recognition skills, is more akin to deciphering vertical Chinese ideograms than reading horizontal alphabet text. In another trend boosting gestalt perception, computer designers increasingly build in iconic commands easily accessible through the clicking action. (Shlain, 1998, p. 417)

While earlier manuscripts were read even after the printing press became common, the distinguishing societal divide was that between literates vs. non-literates. Interestingly, during the present digital communication age, the acceptance of the new technology does not appear to be so much race, economic, or socially oriented as it does generational.

Today, when 20% of the world consumes 80% of its resources, when a quarter of us have an acceptable standard of living and three quarters don't, how can this divide possibly come together? While the politicians struggle with the baggage of history, a new generation is emerging from the digital landscape free of many of the old prejudices. These kids are released from the limitation of geographic proximation as the sole basis of friendship, collaboration, play and neighborhood. Digital technology can be a natural force drawing people into greater world harmony. (Negroponte, 1995, p. 230)

Tuttle's (1995) work with the children makes this readily apparent when she discusses the notion that young people have already made the transition from linear to non-linear approaches to learning even though most educators are still advocating an industrial-age model within the classroom.

I observe a group of seven year olds playing with a set of plastic transformer toys that can take the shape of armored tanks, robots, or people. The transformers can also be put into intermediate states so that a 'robot' arm can protrude from a human form or a human leg from a mechanical tank. Two of the children are playing with the toys in intermediate states (that is, in states somewhere between being people, machines, and robots). A third child insists that this is not right. The toys, he says, should not be placed in hybrid states. 'You should play them as all tank or all people.' He is getting upset because the other two children are making a point of ignoring him. An eight year old girl comforts the upset child. 'It's okay to play them when they are in-between. It's all the same stuff,' she said, 'just yucky computer cy-dough-plasm.' (online)

Digital life will promote on-demand information, often referred to as just-in-time learning. Shlain writes that "iconic information . . . allows us to disengage from the linear aspects of literacy and to look back on them. This insight will prepare us for the next great communication revolution, in which we are already deeply engaged" (p. 429). What is freeing us from the constraints of the printed word, of course, is hypertext which is resurrecting the non-linear organization of information, once so characteristic of the right-brained oriented oral cultures of history.

Papert complains that the question about technology in education should be: "How can we develop and choose visions that will use this immensely powerful technology to create and support powerful new forms of learning?" (Means, 2000, p. 20). Although new technologies such as video, computer-based learning, interactive multimedia, and videoconferencing have joined the repertoire of traditional educational tools, electronic instruction has just transferred traditional learning from one medium to another. These traditional teaching methods were based on a behaviorist view of learning and were developed for students of similar backgrounds in smaller classes with fewer societal difficulties.

Traditionally, the implementation of a technology plan concerned the most cost-effective manner of delivering a magic ratio of computers to each school. Data is still collected regarding these plans. In 1997, the number of U.S. students for every instructional multimedia computer dropped from "21 in 1997 to 13 in 1998, a dramatic improvement" (Means, 2000, p. 5). It appears that the sheer number of electronic machines would then necessarily guarantee effective learning. Various states have reported that, based on traditional assessment mechanisms, "computer education was more cost effective in improving student achievement than (1) class size reduction from 35 to 20 students; (2) increasing instructional time and (3) cross-age tutoring programs" (Schacter, 1999, p. 6). To follow along with the acquisition of more electronic units, many states are now developing standards for technology. The Milken Family Foundation (MFF) reports that "…36 states developed student standards for technology and an additional nine states now are developing such standards" (p. 31). It is arguable that considerations of cost should rank second to considerations of learning outcomes; however, until the passive learning model, which dominates today's classrooms, is radically changed to one that supports more active, engaged learning, we will still gauge the success of our technology programs on the results of the standardized tests and the numbers of machines available per student. It is interesting, of course, to note the average school spends $144.38 per student to provide technological facilities -- a mere 2.23% of their budget, according to information published by the MFF. (MFF, online).

It would seem that our teachers are themselves caught in the midst of the conundrum. Without adequate training, they cannot be expected to master the intricacies of a radical change in the traditional education model. Although several states have developed standards for ensuring new teachers are comfortable integrating technology into their environments, only 20% of new teachers feel well prepared to integrate technology into their classroom instructions (National Center for Education Statistics, January, 1999). The College Board who, in 1996, interviewed college-bound students about the level of their computer levels found traditional word processing experience to be most common followed by basic computer literacy. Problem solving experiences that might be expected to transfer easily into a curriculuar program were virtually nonexistent while an amazing 9% reported virtually no computer experience at all.

• Word Processing 72%
• Computer Literacy 51%
• Use in English Courses 44%
• Math Problems 27%
• Data Processing 26%
• Computer Programming 24%
• Natural Science Problems 12%
• None 9%
• Social Science Problems 8% (MFF, p. 30)

Negroponte is hopeful when he expresses the opinion that we are indeed moving away from the photocopier-style education of the last 30 years.

Nevertheless, we are finally moving away from a hard line mode of teaching, which has catered primarily to compulsive serialist children, toward one that is more porous and draws no clean lines between art and science or right brain and left. When a child uses a computer . . . to make a picture on his computer screen, that image is both an artistic and mathematical expression, viewable as either. Even an abstract concept like math can now use concrete components from the visual arts. Personal computers will make our future adult population simultaneously more mathematically able and more visually literate. Ten years from now, teenagers are likely to enjoy a much richer panorama of options because the pursuit of intellectual achievement will not be tilted so much in favor of the book worms but instead cater to a wider range of cognitive styles, learning patterns, and expressive behaviors. (p. 220)

Just as business and industry are establishing high performance enterprises, so must education. The goal should not be just to improve the schools through the effective use of technology but to reinvent the structure of the schools so that the structure can itself become malleable and respond quickly to changes within the society as well as future technological advances. "We must prepare our learners for their future, not for our past." (Technology in Schools, online)

As we continue our investigation of the nature of change, we strive to find explanations for the various mechanisms of change. A common investigation in these modern times is to look to technology as both the answer and antithesis to our problems. However, in developing educational theories of change, we are asking the wrong question. It is not the technological aspects that we should be exclusively concerned about but the nature of communication. The advances in technology will continue apace and we will continue to react to them using processes effective in the past but not necessarily the present. It is the communication processing changes we should be investigating in determining a new educational paradigm.

Oral societies were listeners. With the advent of literacy, the world developed two distinct styles: ideographic and alphabetic. Shlain argues that the ideographic cultures then became more holistic and right brained while the alphabetic cultures pursued logical, left-brained activities. It is his contention that the right-brain activities are more feminine in nature and the left-brained more masculine. With the advent of the printing press, the quick dissemination of the written word has been seen as partially responsible for the diminution of the Church's world influence, the advent of the Renaissance, the promotion of individualism, and the development of intellectual property rights.

If we continue to follow Shlain's train of thought, the western world continued to emphasize the written word and the more masculine tendencies down through the ages. With the advent of the computer, however, this began to change. Although the first computer users were programmers, the concept of 'digital' information was to signify a cultural change as profound as that of the printing press -- from listeners to writers to communicators of digital bits. While it took more than 100 years for the impact of the printing press to be fully realized, the sheer magnitude of the communication age is reproducing itself faster than ever imagined.

This digital communication age represents a return to the many-to-many concept found in oral cultures. As Shlain points out, our brains will, of necessity, change. Writing demanded a dominant left and/or right brained approach. Communication in the digital age involves both sides equally -- a balance. That our education system has not yet understood this profound shift in knowledge acquisition is manifested by the number of educators who still look exclusively to the standardized testing mechanism as evidence of success or failure.

However, the work done by several reformists indicates that at least some policy makers are advocating an expansion of education into the community and reassessment of technology as another medium that must be incorporated into the fabric of the education system -- not just an object placed on a desk to be occupied by individual students doing independent tasks. The transition of communication from listening to linear to non-linear is only just being exposed. It is hoped, of course, that continued research and training will allow educators to adapt our educational system into one that adequately reflects our understanding of new paradigms of learning as we continue studying the impact of digital communication on society.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

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Dewar, J. The Information Age and the Printing Press: Looking Backward to See Ahead. Retrieved September 10, 2000 from the World Wide Web: http://www.rand.org/publications/P/P8014/

Fowler, R. (n/d). How the Secondary Orality of the Electronic Age Can Awake Us to the Primary Orality of Antiquity or Why Hypertext Can Teach Us About the Bible With Reflections on the Ethical and Political Issues of the Electronic Frontier. Retrieved September 18, 2000 from the World Wide Web: http://www.bw.edu/~rfowler/pubs/secondarol/index.html

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Shlain, L.(1998). The Alphabet versus The Goddess. New York, NY: Penguin Books, Inc.

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Turkle, S. (1995). What Are We Thinking About When We Are Thinking About Computers? Retrieved October 1, 2000 from the World Wide Web site: http://web.mit.edu/sturkle/www/routledge_reader.html

Waldvogel, F.A. (1999, June). ICDE World Conference in Vienna, Austria. Retrieved September 22, 2000 from the World Wide Web: http://kurs.nks.no/eurodl/shoen/Waldvogel/index.html

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