Part II: "Revisiting Notions of Teaching and Access in an Electronic World"
In Part Two, Hawisher and Selfe include articles that theorize gray-area subjects, subjects easily pushed aside, often uncomfortable, and frequently hard to address. No definition or practice is unshakeable--the traditional definitions of a teacher’s role as lecturer and red-pen wielding grammarian are toppled and in that place are difficult to answer questions about students’ self-perception, teacher authority, and changing discourse usage within an electronic classroom environment. Technology itself is no longer seen as a neutral third party, but is instead contextualized, forcing us to look at ourselves and the social, political and economic forces that fuel our desire for networked, hypertextual classrooms.
Lester Faigley addresses the importance of social and political context, specifically focusing on how the Internet is portrayed as indispensable to education, causing an increased need for instructors to critically examine their pedagogical uses of technology in the classroom. Charles Moran continues this emphasis on critical examination of technology when he addresses the lack of access facing many instructors, especially those who teach in underfunded schools and universities. Both Moran and Faigley urge us to continually question why we choose to incorporate technology into our pedagogical frameworks and to question the assumptions that our pedagogies are based on.
Marilyn Cooper looks at student behavior in the online classroom, seeing this electronic space as a postive venue where students can learn responsibility for their actions, even though they are not held up to the same conversational norms as in face-to-face conversations. By emphasizing the multiplicity inherent in online conversations, students can begin to understand the diverse, contextual, subjective nature of knowledge and truth.
Geoffrey Sirc and James Sosnoski both seek a definitional change, arguing that changing traditional assumptions is necessary because of technology's influence. Sirc wants a new definition of what is categorized as writing and what types of writing are taught in the classroom. Because of the availability of web-publishing, instructional writing needs to include all types/genres of writings as long as they function contextually in their electronic discourse settings. Sosnoski redefines the concept of reading by incorporating traditionally unacceptable reading practices into his definition of hyper-reading. Instead of viewing characteristics such as selective skimming as negative, he points to the necessity of such practices, especially in an online environment.
In response to articles in this section, Bertram Bruce notes that all of these articles urge us to radically change our perspectives and to seriously question our assumptions about technology and pedagogy. He calls for teachers to make sure their practices reflect what qualities are valued and desired.
The message from this section is clear: everything we do--from the hardware utilized in our classrooms to the types of writing assignments we assign to the our own uses of technology--should be infused with our knowledge of the social and political ramifications of each choice, how we can shape our students, departments, institutions, and world. To do this, praxis must be the catch phrase. Technology's use in the classroom should blend our pedagogical practice and our theoretical foundations.
- Lester Faigley, "Beyond Imagination: The Internet and Global Digital Literacy”
- Charles Moran, “Access: The A-Word in Technology Studies”
- Marilyn Cooper, “Postmodern Pedagogy in Electronic Conversations”
- Geoffrey Sirc, “‘What is Composition . . .?’ After Duchamp (Notes Toward a General Teleintertext)”
- James Sosnoski, “Hyper-readers and their Reading Engines”
- Bertram Bruce, Response: “Speaking the Unspeakable About 21st Century Technologies”
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