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Re: Diversity and reading demand
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From: Ebony Elizabeth Thomas <ebonyt_at_gse.upenn.edu>
Date: Mon, 18 Feb 2013 13:03:12 -0500 (EST)
Charles, you raise many valid points. The glib answer to your very thoughtful post is that time, as well as technological and demographic change, will sort all of these matters out. It is true that for at least 40 years, many of us have been asking for more diversity in publishing. However, over the next 15 to 20 years, our questions, our demands, even this very conversation will be altered. The ground is shifting under our feet now. The problem is that we, like all human beings, assume that the future is going to be much like the past, when there is a great deal of evidence that the opposite is true.
The more considered answer is that some of us are researching many of the issues that you raise. I'm at the very beginning of my considerations of one subset of questions, and I hope sustained inquiry over time will yield results. There are other scholars doing the same work, and many of them have been at it far longer than I have. But the world has changed. Publishing as we know it, education as we know it, reading as we know it ? We are holding our fingers in these perceived holes in the dike, but the pressure will build, and soon the dike itself will be destroyed (or changed into something else).
In my graduate seminar last week, we discussed Rosenblatt's transactional theory, and one student brought up the notion of the Gutenberg parenthesis. I'm not sure if we as book people really want to think about this, but here's a link: http://web.mit.edu/comm-forum/forums/gutenberg_parenthesis.html
Of course, there will be books in traditional formats in the future. However, they still press vinyl records, too...
Ebony
Date: Mon, 18 Feb 2013 13:03:12 -0500 (EST)
Charles, you raise many valid points. The glib answer to your very thoughtful post is that time, as well as technological and demographic change, will sort all of these matters out. It is true that for at least 40 years, many of us have been asking for more diversity in publishing. However, over the next 15 to 20 years, our questions, our demands, even this very conversation will be altered. The ground is shifting under our feet now. The problem is that we, like all human beings, assume that the future is going to be much like the past, when there is a great deal of evidence that the opposite is true.
The more considered answer is that some of us are researching many of the issues that you raise. I'm at the very beginning of my considerations of one subset of questions, and I hope sustained inquiry over time will yield results. There are other scholars doing the same work, and many of them have been at it far longer than I have. But the world has changed. Publishing as we know it, education as we know it, reading as we know it ? We are holding our fingers in these perceived holes in the dike, but the pressure will build, and soon the dike itself will be destroyed (or changed into something else).
In my graduate seminar last week, we discussed Rosenblatt's transactional theory, and one student brought up the notion of the Gutenberg parenthesis. I'm not sure if we as book people really want to think about this, but here's a link: http://web.mit.edu/comm-forum/forums/gutenberg_parenthesis.html
Of course, there will be books in traditional formats in the future. However, they still press vinyl records, too...
Ebony
-- Ebony Elizabeth Thomas, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Reading/Writing/Literacy Division Graduate School of Education University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, PA 19104-6216 Office: (215) 898-9309 Email: ebonyt_at_gse.upenn.eduReceived on Mon 18 Feb 2013 01:03:12 PM CST
