MaNgUeL and BaRrOn

These two essays have a lot in common. Barron mainly discusses the pencil as a technology, and how it is a paradigm of the development of literacy, as Manguel discusses the book, and how it developed in different ways over time. In both essays the new literacies allowed more and more room for fraud. The pencil used to be a tool for bean counters, now it seen as an old technology merely invisible, and every year it seems we have to catch up and embrace whatever is new at the time. With computers, as Barron points out, it is less authentic and there is ample room for fraud. Similar with Manguel, when Gutenberg bible was cheapened to quick production, it led to a larger market, yet there was that much more of the book out there that was less authentic. People were skeptical of which sources were reliable.

The writing technology I came up with would be seen as an early example like the pencil or clay palates, and would be modified just as these were. Manguel stated that books were made to be read more comfortably, and inventions were made to utilize this like the rotary reading desks. Nowadays things are created to fit into the fast lifestyle. I am proud of the writing style I created, but it wouldn't fit in today.

Writing technologies have to develop with the times, this is the common thread between Ong, Plato, Barron and Manguel. Not only without he times, but at the convenience of people. Like the computer, it may seem complex, but it's convenient. With the pencil, it may not seem complex, but as Barron stated, they needed knowledge of ink, cotton, waxes furnaces,dyes amongst other things to create was seems like a simple technology. With Plato, spoken word was more noble than written, but then truth was based on who the speaker was and where they came from. There's always that something as time goes on. With Ong and Manguels essay, they both touch on new technologies being artificial. How calculators are even allowed to be used, and how spell check was not even implemented when word was first introduced in classrooms. As time goes on, we become more and more outside ourselves, and create objects to do the thinking for us.