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ISSUES WHICH AFFECT AND THREATEN OUR ELECTRONIC PARADIGM
The fact that we wish to create and practice a pedagogy in the digital arena brings about many concerns of which we are often not even aware. The bottom line is that the net is an insecure place, at best. Corporate finances and concerns have moved what began as a reliable file transfer system for researcers and scholars (not considering the original military model, the ARPANET), to a capital-driven marketing pipeline. This section is not intended to fulminate against capitalism, but we cannot all bury our heads in the sand and refuse to consider the implications of capital concerns and motives, not to mention political ones, on this digital venue.
The original Internet was text-centered, consisting of newsgroups, bulletin boards, the original MUD, etc.. However, recent innovations have shifted the content focus of the Internet to a graphical medium, supplanting text and pushing it to a secondary, or often tertiary (as in the case of VR worlds) position. We, English educators, scholars, and students, are in the business of text. That is our medium. Granted, much research has been done on the learning benefits of graphical mnemonic devices, but this research never suggests the replacement of text with graphics or other visual cues. Yet, we find our medium becoming increasingly archaic. Additionally, the squeeze of capital concerns is beginning to be felt in our abilities to access what originally promised to be a totally free forum for the entire populus. As well, the absurd Telecommunications Omnibus Bill of 1996 has severely restricted what all people in our field should fervently support--free speech and expression. This bill threatens to eventually represent a modern, digital book burning.
The Internet represents to us a Janus faced spectre: It can be one of the most useful, imaginative, and successful methods by which we teach and learn. It can also be one of the most threatening exposures we as citizens can make. We should not fear the Internet, though. We should, and indeed must, embrace it as our tool and resource. However, we must always be midful of the potential threats that this medium represents. Much like educators in openly opressive countries, who take a firm commitment to teach a free paradigm regardless of the consequences, we must approch the Internet as a potentially hostile teaching environment, but commit ourselves to a firm stance on the rights of its users over the rights of its manipulators.
This section is dedicated to exploring and exposing the issues which limit us in our abilities to educate and to learn in what should be the most free and expansive environment known to us. Admittedly, these are not pleasant topics, but we must set aside fear and expand our knowledge. As well, the dangers associated with electronic pedagogies are but one in a list of threatening issues facing educators and students in our society. Please read what others have contributed to this section, and please contribute yourself. We must maintain awareness of such issues, and we must uniformly declare our stance on them if we ever are to achieve success.
"Contesting Digital Darwinism"--excerpt (Author: Dan Goodman)
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