The Downward Spiral of Literacy

The overall message one should gather from reading “The Future of reading” is that due to technological advances, people are becoming lazy and are not using their brains to their fullest potential. So why does this matter? It matters because there is nothing like opening up a book and putting the brain to work. E-texts are turning our reading literacy into mush and causing readers everywhere to become lazy.

The rhetorical situation is represented in this article through exigence, audience, and constraints. The exigence of this piece is showing the downward spiral of literacy. It brings forth the flaws and laziness of reading for digital print. The excessive increase in technology is causing this downfall. The intended audience for this article is really for anyone who reads. It relates to the tech savvy readers with their IPads and e-readers, as well as those people who enjoy sitting down to read the newspaper or cracking open a copy of their favorite book. It plays on the pros and cons of each type of reader and highlights the author’s opinion on reading in today’s technological society.  Another type of audience that can be focused on with this article is those whom are borderline with the idea of transitioning from print to digital. It’s a warning to say, “Hey your literacy level will decrease.” The constraints of this piece I feel are that it draws mainly to the print readers. E-readers are more likely to overlook this article and the message that it is giving because they are content with their style of reading. These people would rather walk around with a Nook or IPad, then a hard copy of a book. They are probably satisfied with the simplicity technology brings to the life of reading.

This text functions as an intertext by many means. If we take the piece at face value, we are getting the author’s perspective on reading in the world today. He uses real life examples to relate to the readers of the passage in order to create a sense of credibility for his statements. By mentioning the rapid decrease in print books and the increase of internet and digital sources, he plays on the emotions of the old fashioned and boosts the trends of the present.

The author mentions Stanislas Dehaene, who explains the neural anatomy of reading. The intertext of indirect quotes and the mentioning of a person with established credibility are being portrayed in this section by explaining his ideas on the differences in reading with the ventral route and the dorsal stream. With the ventral route, the reading is very familiar and routine. The reading comes across as simple and easy and it causes the readers to not have to really think. This differs from the dorsal stream because the dorsal stream causes you to use and exercise your brain to understand. By using this brain path a person is more conscious of what they are reading on the page. This would occur in printed texts rather than in digital forms. With the dorsal stream, the activity equals literacy. While reading this passage, I experienced the use of the ventral route. By looking at a screen I was subjected to larger, clearly written words. My eyes didn’t need to adjust and I didn’t have to look too in depth.

The article also references an explicit social drama. This drama is surfaced when discussing the ideas of the different types of reading. It creates a sense of drama for those hooked on digital reading, because they may rethink their methods. He mentions an example of someone reading their work on a screen where it looks polished and then once it’s printed mistakes and flaws become more visible. This shows yet another flaw in digital print. 

Overall from this article, one will recognize the changes in reading and the changes in literacy that come of the advancement of technology through the uses of rhetoric and intertext.