Nicholas Carr, in The Atlantic: As the media theorist Marshall McLuhan pointed out in the 1960s, media are not just passive channels of information. They supply the stuff of thought, but they also shape the process of thought. And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation….…
Thanks for the suggestion, Matt. Similar:What My Journalism Class Looks Like on Election DayMy journos are out there, gathering news…AcademiaBenedict XVI (Pontifex) on TwitterJohn Paul II was a master of communicati…Current_EventsHow do I cite generative AI in MLA style? | MLA Style CenterWe ask students to cite encyclopedia art…Academia5 tips for choosing the right typefaceWhen…
On Language Log, Geoffrey K. Pullum invites readers to send in the earliest citation of the use of periods to indicate slow, intense speech. On page 28 of Robert Harris’s novel Archangel (Hutchinson, London, 1998, hardback edition), a character who was tortured for a long time to get information out of him says with pride,…
The family took in a matinee showing of Prince Caspian. I’d heard mediocre reviews, so I had low expectations. I knew they’d have to add some subplot because the book is pretty thin, and the long narration of Caspian’s boyhood would have been out of place in an action/adventure movie (which is how they’re billing…
Digital Scholarship in the Humanities: I’ve had a longstanding, friendly debate with a colleague about whether it is sufficient to provide page images of books, or whether text should be converted to a machine- and human-readable format such as XML. She argues that converting scanned books to text is expensive and that the primary goal…
Boston Globe: Without a robust study of literature there can be no adequate reckoning of the human condition – no full understanding of art, culture, psychology, or even of biology. As Binghamton University biologist David Sloan Wilson says, “the natural history of our species” is written in love poems, adventure stories, fables, myths, tales, and…
Our Sons their Father’s failing mainframes see, And where lies reel-to-reel goes USB. Similar:‘I saw the possibility of what could be done – so I did it’: revolutionary video game The ….. Realising that statistics wasn’t for…CybercultureI didn't ask for the AI icon on my Kindle app. I can't turn it off.I really hate that…
Tomorrow is the last day of classes, but it’s not too late to bring up a new topic. Many of my students in “Intro to Literary Study” were fascinated by Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game, so I thought they might appreciate hearing about Card’s dismissal of J.K. Rowling’s suit against a fan-created reference work devoted…
In case you didn’t know, Choose Your Own Adventure (CYOA) is back. (School Library Journal) The CYOA books allow middle graders to experiment with nonlinear storytelling, “a developmental step that some kids need.” Choice-points in the stories force youngsters to visualize and mull over plot possibilities, letting them take control of the reading experience. Individual…
AP: Nearly a third of children ages 6 to 10 are regular users of digital audio players, according to market research firm the NPD Group. And thanks to entrepreneurs like Katz, they can now use them to listen to bedtime stories. In March, the Audible.com founder launched AudibleKids.com, where children can download books directly onto…
Inside Higher Ed: 1998 was the last time that John Gallaugher, an associate professor of information systems at Boston College’s Carroll School of Management, used a traditional print textbook. He assigned it to his graduate-level introductory course in information systems. The book cost about $150. He also assigned supplemental reading — trade press articles, online…
An article about an entrepreneur who stretches the definition of “book” (International Herald Tribune): Parker has generated more than 200,000 books, as an advanced search on Amazon.com under his publishing company shows, making him, in his own words, “the most published author in the history of the planet.” And he makes money doing it. Among…
From Orwell’s 1984, which I’m teaching today in my History and Future of the Book class. This is an excerpt from the book-within-the-book, purportedly written by Emmanuel Goldstein. By comparison with an existing today, all the tyrannies of the past or halfhearted and inefficient. The ruling groups were always infected to some extent by liberal…
Similar:COVID-19 deaths vs. other common causes (in America) The number of weekly COVID-19 deaths…Current_EventsTwo stunning hugs end Amber Guyger's murder trial on a merciful note Chants of “no justice, no peace” drift…Current_EventsCollege is not a commodity. Stop treating it like one.If we are going to treat college as a co…AcademiaWhen is the phrase "when asked…
Mike Edwards describes his first time teaching Bartleby the Scrivener: I stole the idea for my lesson plan from a colleague, who’d used it to great success. Minor modifications on my part, but it went like this: for homework, I’d asked them to read the story in its entirety, and told them to be prepared to lead…
For my “History and Future of the Book” course, I’ve been using a Kindle that my university library purchased on my request. Gizmodo has a good article on the digital rights associated with Kindle e-books. In the fine print that you “agree” to, Amazon and Sony say you just get a license to the e-books–you’re…
Carolyn, my five-year-old, wept in the middle of “Owly 2: Just a Little Blue.” The Owly books use no words, just icons and facial expressions to tell some very complex stories. Carolyn likes stories about adventure and friendship, and she’s a visual learner. Once I helped her interpret the first few speech bubble icons, she…
Sky News: The science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, who wrote more than 100 books including 2001: A Space Odyssey, has died in Sri Lanka at the age of 90, according to an aide. Similar:Two Trains Running ( #AugustWilson #CenturyCycle, 7 of 10)August Wilson’s Century Cycle > Spoi…BooksThose mean fake news people at the Washington…
When I was little, I loved a book about a little red lighthouse that was dwarfed by the construction of a new bridge. I was just thinking about that book recently, and made a mental note to ask my mother what the title was so I could get a copy and read it to my…
Scotsman: “I did not see the pilot and even so, it would have been impossible for me to tell that it was Saint-Exupéry. In our youth at school we had all read him, we loved his books. I loved his personality. If I had known I wouldn’t have fired. Not at him.” — 88-year-old Luftwaffe…