Birkerts

I've been reading Sven Birkerts' essay, "Into the Electronic Millennium," this afternoon. I'm always amazed, when I read this essay, that it was written in 1994-- some 17 years ago. (In fact, there might even be a student or two in the class who is younger than this essay!)

While there are some awkward moments that date the essay--the limitation of the e-reader he discusses to one book, for example--his ideas remain pertinent.  It is still difficult, maybe even more difficult, to see how the web of electronic communication is surrounding us.  Certain of his predictions--banking by phone, for example--have recently come to be realities, but have we really progressed in thinking about what that means?

As a writing teacher, Birkerts' observations about language erosion and changes in education naturally interest me.  And again, I'm surprised by how current this argument sounds.  It's true that we have made some significant strides in using new technologies in education. Certainly we now know ways beyond making little videos to use the energy of networks and collaboration to foster new kinds of thinking.  But the arguments remain: should education "tailor itself to the aptitudes of its students" (125)?  Or should education--perhaps using some new technologies--continue to hold students responsible for genuinely significant ideas, ideas that require sustained attention to the written word (no matter how it might be accessed)?

That attention, of course, brings me to Birkerts' prediction that there will be ongoing language erosion. Recent studies seem to confirm his prediction--but we aren't in an entirely language-poor world yet.  Are we? Are we going there or are there trends that are stopping us from really going down that road? In any event, his framing of this question, and his careful reflections upon it, make him entirely relevant to 2011.