Janey Carey Eldred: "Technology's Strange, Familiar Voices" (21)
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"I'm
beginning to understand that in any discussion of voice, we
necessarily hear technology's inflections." (387) "Even when she's on the wrong channel of her cordless phone, I recognize my mother's voice. I'm more familiar with it in all its incarnations because we've had a long history of spoken and written correspondence." (387) |
Eldred's narrative brings the discussion back to more traditional notions of literacy (as reading and writing), but this particular exploration looks at the people behind the literacy, the specific passions behind the technology use. Literacy, as Eldred illustrates it here, is the only possible means of connecting to real people, to her mother, to her uncle. And the technologies of literacy change not only as society changes, but also as the lives of the real people connecting with these technologies change.
Eldred's story builds for us the complex and close relationship she had with her mother, a relationship that written and spoken correspondence made possible. They shared stories and memoirs. When her mother was widowed, they shared drafts of academic prose. But a few years ago, after a lifetime of connecting through traditional print (and spoken) technologies, her mother's voice began to break.
| "After the diagnosis (A.L.S.), there was one entire month of silence in which I heard about my mother only through my brother's or uncle's online postings. The phone, which feeds on true clear voices, became obsolete. Enter new technology: my mother was persuaded to go online. Through email I can now hear her written voice again." (392) |
While email allowed Eldred to hear her mother's written voice again, she was still barred from her spoken voice. And her A.L.S. threatens to take away her mother's written voice, as well. Technology was there to provide the speaker with a "spoken" voice again, but the listener was often unable to read the voice this technology produced.
| "The technological voice provided by the Crespeaker is strange and slow--she must pick out each letter one by one with a stick. I look at her thumbs, A.L.S-crooked now, and realize that typing and writing will soon end. The Crespaker will provide her future voice, however foreign." (392) |
To
communicate face-to-face, her mother uses a small notebook and a version
of sign language she and her daughters have created.
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