As the world evolves new things emerge and older ones begin to fade. This is true for cell phones (touch screen in, flip phones out), computers (fewer desktops, more laptops), and this is not solely isolated to technology. As we have been realizing and seeing first hand, writing as well is going through a similar transition. It seems to me that writing is becoming less beautiful. Now just wait before you bite my head off and read my reason why. I don’t mean beautiful as in people nowadays don’t know how to write and every piece of writing is so poorly written that its atrocious, but in high school and even my freshman year Eng 299 class some of the readings were simply captivating. I would read sentences and become awestruck that such a beautiful sentence could be constructed from such simple words. On the other hand, (what people consider)“big” words would be used but only a few, but they would produce such a pithy sentence full of so much meaning in such a terse manner. So I ask you, how do you feel about writing compared to the past? And I guess I should define the past as 19th century and years past. I understand that encompasses a larger time frame compared to now but just go with it.
First, I understand in centuries past and even years past there were not computers, video games, social networking sites, or even the internet to consume people’s time. Everything was old fashioned. Social networking required going to a party, or a luncheon, any place where you had to have face-to-face interactions with others. Times were much simpler and so people had more time to devote to other things and they weren’t preoccupied with knowing everything that happened every second of every minute of every hour.
Second, let’s go back to time like the 1700’s or even the 1800’s, 1900’s or early 20th century. Most people probably spent more time reading and writing as leisure (I wasn’t there but I will assume). The more time they spent engaging in these activities the more they learned and better they got at reading and writing. Now don’t get me wrong I know different societies praised different things (Greeks and Romans praised rhetoric and frequently engaged in it), but it was commendable to be a master of words and such.
I am beginning to lose my train of thought and I hope I have not contradicted myself but I was just wondering if this thought ever crossed the minds of others.
This is a really interesting post. I think I know what you mean. I feel as if people now are writing more colloquially. It is more laid back and less "beautiful". I'm not sure why this is. Maybe it has to do with technology. People are used to writing quick messages to people rather than taking time to handwrite notes or letters to each. It must just be our developing society. It is becoming more fast passed. It is more about getting the message across and less about how the message comes across.
ReplyDeleteI actually feel that this sort of captivating writing still exists, except now most students are swamped with writing papers and assignments for class that it gets to the point where they are simply going through the motions of writing. Nowadays, people don't even seem to have the time to "beautify" their writings.
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