contemplating digital orality

Short, J. A. Effects of Medium of Communication on Experimental Negotiation. Human Relations. 27 3 (1974): 225-34

This 1974 article details a study that John Short conducted to determine the effects of communication medium on experimental negotiation. While it was written over 35 years ago, it is foundational to social presence theory that Short later developed. The study was conducted due to what Short saw as a move to decentralize business and a greater difficulty of having face-to-face (FtF) communication, an occurrence far more relevant to the globalization of business and education in our current era. Read the rest of this entry »

The Sophistic performance of electronic rhetoric has arrived. …It is on computers. … and it is on television. (137)

Welch, Kathleen E. Electric Rhetoric: Classical Rhetoric, Oralism, and a New Literacy. The MIT Press, 1999.

In this fifth Chapter of Electric Rhetoric, Technologies of Electric Rhetoric, Welch elaborates on her idea of an electric rhetoric–stemming from an Ongian tie to secondary orality, which exists in, and due to, the electronic era. Given the ubiquity of computer use, Welch calls for a digital literacy not only for anyone wanting to enter the workplace, but also for anyone who wants to fully experience that richness that has been brought about by new media and our current state of technology. Read the rest of this entry »

[C]ultures which do not reduce words to space but know them only as oral-aural phenomena, in actuality or in the imagination, naturally regard words as more powerful than do literate cultures” (112).

Ong, Walter J. The Presence of the Word: Some Prolegomena for Cultural and Religious History. The Terry Lectures. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967.

That words are powerful is a common idea, meaning that words can hurt, words bring knowledge, words bring action, etc. However, for early man and oral cultures, words actually bring physical power.

It is a commonplace that early man, strongly if by no means exclusively oral-aural, experiences words–which for him typically are spoken words–as powerful, effective, of a piece with other actuality far more than later visualist man is likely to do. A word is a real happening, indeed a happening par excellence. (111).

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Lowerison, Gretchen, et al. Are We Using Technology for Learning? Journal of Educational Technology Systems 34 4 (2006): 401-25.

In this article, Lowerison et al. detail their study on the role that computer technology plays in transforming the learning process in higher education, specifically, the relationship between computer-technology use, active learning, and perceived course effectiveness. It is this latter point in which I am most interested, since my own study does not consider learning outcomes, but rather focuses on both students’ and instructors’’ perceptions of the effectiveness of the online video conversation (OVC) in the asynchronous online classroom (AOC). Read the rest of this entry »

Nearly a third of college students reported that their parents or guardians would be “very upset” to know how little they actually attend classes in person.

College Students on Streaming Video: Get Me Outta Class!

Here is an article posted on the campus technology site last week, which offers a great conversation starter on the use of video in the collegiate classroom. However, the initial commenter, who finds the practice “appalling,” elicited a response from me, which is worth referencing here. My comment, admittedly too verbose for this platform, is about eleven up from the bottom and includes my name.