" A Better Pencil" Part One

 I found it interesting in “A Better Pencil” by Dennis Baron that Plato said writing would cause forgetfulness. I feel like there is some truthfulness in that statement. Back in Plato's age they didn't have books and notepads to write notes on, it was all memorization. I think that he was trying to say that because of writing people would become reliant on text and lose their ability to retain information without a physical aid. I absolutely agree with this, I think that writing has caused us to lose much of that ability. There's no reason to memorize information if you can go pick up a book and read about it. A good example of this is studying before exams most of us do not retain the information that we read once or twice. We read the book, take the test, and forget the information just as quickly as we read it. Before there was writing people would only hear things once and then it was gone. People's memories had to be quick and not need the reinforcement of repetition. I think that we as a whole have lost that ability and we now require note cards, books, and cheat sheets to remember simple information such as a name or a phone number.  

Second Half of Things Fall Apart

The second half of “ Things Fall Apart” is about how literacy and schools were brought to the tribe by European expansion. What started out to the tribes as something new and exciting quickly cascaded into something they regretted. The Europeans created schools to teach reading and writing but these schools were run by missionaries that forced their religion into the teachings and the students. The tribes had nothing to do but accept the religion and teachings or the Europeans would run right over them. I find it interesting that expansion and knowledge has always had such a deep connection with religion. In history most societies that have looked at expanding their borders have operated in this same fashion. The goal is to expand into the country and try to assimilate the population by giving them something in common with yourself. This is exactly how the Europeans acted in the story. First they offered knowledge, then pushed religion, and lastly enacted their own form of judicial system over the tribes.  

First half of Things Fall Apart

The first half of “Things Fall Apart” is about a warrior named Okonkwo. The author tells the story about how his father was a man of words and music but was unable to provide for his family and disgraced them in the process. After this Okonkwo was determined to make a life for himself and have a big family which he succeeded in but still finds himself never satisfied. Throughout the chapter he continuously finds disappointment in his family and beats his wife and children.

I found the story line interesting because it almost seems like a modern story portrayed in an earlier time and different culture. The book follows the typical broken home story where the father is a deadbeat that never made it and the child is angry and always looking for something more in life. The fact that Okonkwo is never satisfied with his children or wife really follows the story of the father that wants to live vicariously through his son and make him into the mold that the father wants.  

Second half of Ong

 The second half of Ong's book focused on the transfer from oral culture to literate culture. His analysis looks at the what was gained and lost in the process. A major concept from his writings was that the new era distanced the writer from the person receiving the information. This is both good and bad in a sense that discrimination and classicism completely disappears due to anonymous writing. There are many people who are afraid to share their thoughts and opinions for fear of discrimination and physical violence. When you read a book you don't see the color of a person's skin or hear what sex they are, you simply take the information presented and analyze it as an equal peer. I feel that writing was for the most part a positive technological advancement for society. One negative I have noticed from this is that you can take the writing and interpret it however you want instead of how the writer meant it to be. I have seen many examples of this in religion where one group of people can take a passage in the bible to mean one thing while another group take it to mean something completely different.  

Walter Ong first Half

In chapter 3 of Ong's book the author discusses the psycho-dynamics of orality and how primarily oral cultures are able to retain conversations. Ong's idea is that since oral cultures don't have text to refer to about past occurrences the conversation must have certain qualities to aid in retention. His list of qualities makes a lot of sense and if you think about it we use the same techniques to this very day. His first and fourth qualities are very similar in that they group words and ideas together. His first quality discuses how we join ideas together with “and” so that when we recall one portion of the idea the second associated portion is recalled as well. This idea is very close to the fourth quality which says there is a tendency for orality to be conservative or traditionalist. He explains this as associating an adjective with a noun to aid in memorization. I use both of this ideas when preparing for a test. You attach a memorable adjective to a noun and it seems easier to remember. Previous teachers have also used the first quality of connecting ideas to help students by making songs or rhymes about the topic. Both of these strategies have been highly effective in my experience and it is interesting that the same strategies are used today with such effectiveness.