[new media and not so intelligent reporting]

The Independent on Sunday did a piece which included "quotes" from Professor Sue Thomas on reading and writing in digital climates. Besides misquoting Thomas (and OMG he says she's a lecturer!! Hello...I think he'll find it's Professor) and making fundamental generalisations the reporter (or observer as this write-up is imbued with numerous personal surmising) the article sees digital literacy as a highly straight-forward, black and white issue. Print books are good and "e-books" are bad. I'm slightly simplifying the argument, well nah, that's pretty much the gist of it. For the article writer, e-books and seemingly anything available online is there for entertainment and readers become "power browsers." While print fiction is "intelligent" and a collection of "classics" including "Don Quixote, Bleak House, Moby Dick, In Search of Lost Time." Umm... Most perplexing to me, is the comment that gone are the years when teenagers (yes! teenagers) "confidently approached" these books (specifically Quixote et al.). Speaking from a small and necessarily parametered experience, I've never know a teenager to approach these books with confidence...in fact, I wonder whether anyone does. These are books that instill questions rather than answers so I'm not sure really whether confidence is synonomous with the kind of literacy this reporter is striving for. In fact, why is it not "A la recherche du temps perdu" because serious readers would surely only read the book or, erm, text in its original language (the same for Don Quixote de la Mancha and my, isn't this a good example of self-conscious/self-reflexive language-play?).

Digital literacy and programmes devoted to instilling and encouraging this (still) nascent skill emerge alongside other forms (and teaching) of literacy, including print, visual and sonic. Thomas's course, just one example, focuses on narratives crafted in an online or digital environment. It's not about replacing Moby Dick or handing someone an e-reader and replacing the whole publishing business, but it is about learning more and reading more and, as Thomas says, connecting more.