Forms of Mediation

Ø Oral: “Orality”

s Based on the ear (listening)

s Communal experience

s Time-oriented

Ø Written/print: Literacy

s Based on the eye (reading)

s Individual, privatized experience (according to many accounts)

s Space-oriented

Ø Electronic: “Secondary orality” (Ong)

Ø Plato’s The Phaedrus

s Writing is inhuman

s Writing destroys memory

s A written text is passive, unresponsive

Ø Technological determinism

s Social relations

s Consequences of technological determinism?

- Technological change (of a particular kind) is inevitable: Ride the wave

- Moral obligation becomes irrelevant

Ø What is technology? Common definitions:

s John Law

“…a family of methods for associating and channeling other entities and forces, both human and nonhuman.”

s Ron Westrum

- Technology is things.

“Devices,” ranging anywhere from a pencil to an ocean liner.

- Technology is techniques.

Based on practical skills (e.g., recipes, instructions, formulas, rules).

- Technology is abstract knowledge.

Based on complex systems of scientific and technical concepts (e.g., the design of a space shuttle or a nuclear power plant).