read the whole thing? That was just you...
I learned to skim technical documents centuries ago so I could skip the details until i got to the section I could tell was about my topic of concern.
Changes in the Nature of Reading?
- Thread starter Jack7
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read the whole thing? That was just you...
I learned to skim technical documents centuries ago so I could skip the details until i got to the section I could tell was about my topic of concern.
read the whole thing? That was just you...
I learned to skim technical documents centuries ago so I could skip the details until i got to the section I could tell was about my topic of concern.
Yup. Skimming is an incredibly useful skill when reading any sort of reference/technical material.
jmucchiello
Hero
The change has little to do with reading habits and a lot to do with general education. ENWorld might not be the right place to debate this but "long ago" education involved learning the classics. And everyone who was considered "educated" had read these same books. So making reference to Greek mythology or Virgil or Shakespear was going to get your point across. Today, kids don't read more than a handful of those classics and have no encouragement to seek them out on their own.
OTOH, the same problem could be caused by modern "culture". I prefer to blame education but admit that the lure of TV/Xbox/Internet is a large part of kids not reading.
As someone else pointed out, space/weight is key factor here. If you want to read a "current" novel, it is hardcover and weighs over a pound. Carry more than one and you need to lug around a large bag. A kindle or nook weighs less than 1/2 a pound and fits in a medium purse or a large coat pocket.
I'd like to know why you thought the fact that it was technological mattered. Whether they know it or not, form is as important as function. People like iPhones because Apple spent a lot of time choosing its form.
Technology is not the cause of fragmented society. Information is. Technology is merely the transport layer for that information. I was commenting on this recently. The world was small for a while and then exploded in size. (This takes a bit to setup.)
Long, long ago, the world was tiny. It was the small valley your village sat in. Sure there were "far away" places. But for 99.99% of the population, they were born and died with a couple square miles of land and lived among a group of people who lived and died in that same area. The world was small.
The world grew as the Industrial revolution came along and people became more mobile and as far back as the start of the 20th century, going to the far reaches of the world was feasible for a determined person. You could cross 2-3 continents by railroad with ease. The world was big.
Then TV came along and the world shrank again. Yes, you could still travel far and wide but the common culture of the day had shrunk. Everyone watched Clark Gable movies and the number of well-known people were well-known to all far and wide. Everyone watch the Ed Sullivan show. Everyone knew where they were when Kennedy died or when Armstrong and Alden landed on the moon.
And now in the Information Age, there is no commonality of popularity. There are thousands of different entertainment options vying for your eyeballs and no two people watch even 1% of the same TV programming/surf the same websites week to week. There is a huge fracture in what "everyone" knows. The shared experience is unusual. The world is huge and everyone is an island within it.
Or perhaps, the world is very small again. Maybe island is the wrong metaphor. Should I say valley as I did at the start of this and call the world, my world, your world, small?
Krug
Newshound
Well to the original poster, it's more convenient for me to read certain things now. I use Instapaper to save articles I want to read on my iPad, and I'm at the age where I pass on books with too-small fonts. But no problem with an e-reader where I use big fonts.
In terms of the social networking aspects, I grab interesting articles that I find on my FB feed.
In terms of the social networking aspects, I grab interesting articles that I find on my FB feed.
IMHO, in the long run, variable font size is THE major advantage of electronic literature. My Mom ha been buying hard overs for some time- even for books she doesn't intend to keep- and that costs money. That was the impetus for me to start exploring the world of eReaders & tablets.
I'm still miffed, though, that the costs of some of these books is still quite high, so I haven't committed to which one I'm getting for her.
Stormonu
NeoGrognard
Before the internet boom (we're talking like '95), I used to read quite a lot of books. Of course, I used to have a lot of extra time on my hands as well.
In grade school, I spend a good chunk of my recess and lunch in the library. At first, it was reading books (I remember Encylopedia Brown mysteries, the CS Lewis books, 3-2-1 magazine and some book about fossil-hunting I read at least 3 times over the years). When I moved to Mississippi in my teens, it was too hot to be outside, I remember spending my summers locked in an AC'ed room with the latest book I'd checked out listening to a Blondie cassette as I read (couldn't get a Rock'n'Roll radio station and the tape was the only one I had). I remember devouring the likes of the entire Dragonlance series, The Book of Swords series and rereading Beowulf several times. All in-between playing D&D, that is.
As I reached college, my recreational reading dropped off dramatically. The last book I remember reading before college was a novelization of the movie Aliens. I did quite a bit of story-writing during college, but I don't remember reading any books for recreation during that time at all - besides D&D rulebooks and adventures.
I used to have a 1 1/2 hour commute to work for two years while I was working in Atlanta (my wife was in Gainsville, getting her college degree). It was then I started to listen to audio books to and from work. At the time, they were mostly Star Wars books. I also picked up the likes of Redwall on audio.
When I got back to a job with a short commute, I also stopped reading (or I should say "listening") to books, until after "discovering" Harry Potter following the first movie. For the first time in years, I sat down and read the Chamber of Secrets. The rest of the books I listened to on audio - I could do other things while I was listening to the audio. Did the same for the Lord of the Rings series and the Eragon books. Obviously, listening to the book on audio has become my preferred method of interacting with literature. Oddly enough, I still find myself buying a physical copy of the book. I really don't understand why I do, though.
Although, recently, I did take the time to sit down and read H.P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness and Dracula on my iPad. I kinda surprised myself at that; I had more or less really impressed upon my self I didn't have the time to sit down and read it. Dracula I read while away for a week at training. At the Mountains of Madness was me trying to put a stressful situation out of my mind.
Overall, I really think reading has changed because there are so many choices these days - and so many offerings for entertainment. Books are generally slow, attention-consuming slogs; they are the worst way to gain information. An audio books frees you up to do other things while you listen. A movie version takes considerably less time, and you are somewhat free to undertake other activities while watching it. People still want entertainment, but, like me, I think most people don't think they have the time to sit down and read a book for that entertainment.
Likewise, I personally despise the stance on "the classics" as "must" reading. There's way too many varied books and information out there these days that the so-called classics can be held up as "must" reading. The few classics I've read are pretty boring (even poor Odyssey and Dracula - don't get me started on Shakespeare's stuff), and there are handfuls of other books I'd rather have on my reading list than have some "classic" shoved down my throat because someone else thought it was the bee's knees.
...And this is coming from a 41-year-old, no less.
In grade school, I spend a good chunk of my recess and lunch in the library. At first, it was reading books (I remember Encylopedia Brown mysteries, the CS Lewis books, 3-2-1 magazine and some book about fossil-hunting I read at least 3 times over the years). When I moved to Mississippi in my teens, it was too hot to be outside, I remember spending my summers locked in an AC'ed room with the latest book I'd checked out listening to a Blondie cassette as I read (couldn't get a Rock'n'Roll radio station and the tape was the only one I had). I remember devouring the likes of the entire Dragonlance series, The Book of Swords series and rereading Beowulf several times. All in-between playing D&D, that is.
As I reached college, my recreational reading dropped off dramatically. The last book I remember reading before college was a novelization of the movie Aliens. I did quite a bit of story-writing during college, but I don't remember reading any books for recreation during that time at all - besides D&D rulebooks and adventures.
I used to have a 1 1/2 hour commute to work for two years while I was working in Atlanta (my wife was in Gainsville, getting her college degree). It was then I started to listen to audio books to and from work. At the time, they were mostly Star Wars books. I also picked up the likes of Redwall on audio.
When I got back to a job with a short commute, I also stopped reading (or I should say "listening") to books, until after "discovering" Harry Potter following the first movie. For the first time in years, I sat down and read the Chamber of Secrets. The rest of the books I listened to on audio - I could do other things while I was listening to the audio. Did the same for the Lord of the Rings series and the Eragon books. Obviously, listening to the book on audio has become my preferred method of interacting with literature. Oddly enough, I still find myself buying a physical copy of the book. I really don't understand why I do, though.
Although, recently, I did take the time to sit down and read H.P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness and Dracula on my iPad. I kinda surprised myself at that; I had more or less really impressed upon my self I didn't have the time to sit down and read it. Dracula I read while away for a week at training. At the Mountains of Madness was me trying to put a stressful situation out of my mind.
Overall, I really think reading has changed because there are so many choices these days - and so many offerings for entertainment. Books are generally slow, attention-consuming slogs; they are the worst way to gain information. An audio books frees you up to do other things while you listen. A movie version takes considerably less time, and you are somewhat free to undertake other activities while watching it. People still want entertainment, but, like me, I think most people don't think they have the time to sit down and read a book for that entertainment.
Likewise, I personally despise the stance on "the classics" as "must" reading. There's way too many varied books and information out there these days that the so-called classics can be held up as "must" reading. The few classics I've read are pretty boring (even poor Odyssey and Dracula - don't get me started on Shakespeare's stuff), and there are handfuls of other books I'd rather have on my reading list than have some "classic" shoved down my throat because someone else thought it was the bee's knees.
...And this is coming from a 41-year-old, no less.
Well, Shakespeare's plays were not written to be read, but to be performed and viewed. Of course they read like crap.
The poetry's another matter, but poetry reading and appreciation is a bit of a learned skill, and I don't think it gets taught properly.
Indeed.
Similarly, as Peter Greenaway artfully demonstrated in Rembrandt's J'Accuse, appreciating and interpreting paintings is almost a lost skill.
Maybe I should open a second thread titled 'Changes in the Nature of Watching?'
I think we'd note a lot of parallels.
Constant exposure to 'modern' media certainly has its disadvantages. Wrecking our attention span is only the beginning.
You may be right about poetry. It's not high up on my preferred reading list.
Stormonu
NeoGrognard
Sorry, the (movie) performances of the plays I've been forced to watch do not appeal either.
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