Derick Le
Rob R. d'Annibale
English 4
23 October 2014
The Slow Death of Reading In Dwight Macdonald’s article, “Reading and Thought”, he believes that in today's generation, people do not value the importance of printed materials because of a lack of time. Comparing the previous old generation to today's generation, the old generation had more time to imagine and go in depth in what they were reading. The way our society reads printed material like novels, articles, news, etc. is what Macdonald calls, “functional curiosity.” Stated in his article, Macdonald quotes a publisher from the Time, trivial rather than functional, who says that, “functional curiosity grows as the number of educated people grow” and explains that functional curiosity
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With numerous amounts of information being loaded into my head, I still really enjoyed that class because I was reading the textbook, involving myself. For example, I pretend that I was a psychologist, taking on many researches about the mind and body. Involving myself in a text, helped me practice reflection, thought, and creativity. Macdonald stated that we only practice reading and interpret it when it is well-informed and is relevant to us, then we would read it. Engaging myself in something I really enjoyed was what made me strive to follow through in the AP Psychology course but if it was for something that did not interest me. I personally skim through boring literature without fully grasping the concept. Macdonald believes that we read as only practice and that every time we read something not important, we just glance at and read with ease, not understanding the concept and not reading in depth. We just read it for the heck of the assignment then it goes out of our memory, unless it is something that is attention-grabbing or is well informative. He believes that when reading, everyone should exercise and practice reflection, thought, and …show more content…
Reading without thinking was expressed in my AP US History Class. The work load was overwhelming and boring! I hastily read each chapters being tested the night before the test, just to process all the information, then I would forgot about it. I repeated this whole process for the whole entire course not understanding any of the material. At this point, I barely remembered what I learned because I did not find the text I read interesting. I did not grasp the real meaning and only read for the sake of passing the class. Today people read to only “inquire information.” I didn't inquire information because I didn't care to involve myself. Reading the history text was basically a waste of time and just practice because I did not process any information. I did not challenge myself to reflect or think about the concept. Even though reading a lot is fantastic, not be able to comprehend and give reading its meaning is a waste because when reading, it helps us evolve our creativity by thinking about the topic and reflecting with
When Baca said “I always had though reading a waste of time” I flashed back to silent reading time in grade school when I would pretend to be asleep. I was energetic and got along well with others, so I didn’t see a reason to focus on schoolwork, honestly I hated it. Not until my mentors entered my life did I begin to see any reason to care about my academic ability. They were a young couple, both well educated and fun and looked a bit like me. They read a lot and would ask what I was reading or how my grades were. I was humiliated by the answers, how could I tell them the highlight of my report card was a
While I student taught the classroom teachers were informed to take the reading block, which provided students to read a book for pure enjoyment and replace it to test prep. I believe that if the school system does not take action and get rid of these standardized test society is going to be composed of hollow minds. Yes, it is easy to memorize terms but to completely understand them and apply them to the real world takes skills. Reading is everything in the outside world and is a form of communication. As I read the book the author reencounters reading a book titled Come Back and how his perspective suddenly made him realized that feeling anger towards someone in his family for his sisters death was wrong and destructive. Perhaps, can someone who is not a reader realize what the author
Reading is on the decline and our reading skills are declining right along with the amount of reading we do. This is happening right across the board through both genders, all age groups and education levels, people are busy and they just do not have time to read books that they are not required to read for school or work. There are serious consequences to this neglect of reading that will continue to worsen if ignored. We need to take notice of what is happening to our culture and stop this situation from continuing, we must act to correct these issues that we are faced with. These things are discussed in the essay “Staying Awake’’ by Ursula K. Le Guin who uses the NEA essays “To Read or Not to Read’’ and “Reading at Risk’’ to support her argument that there is a decline in the amount of time that we are spending on reading and our ability to understand what it is that we are reading.
In the novel, technology, especially the enormous TV screens, are responsible for replacing literature, intellectualism, and curiosity. People spend so much time watching programming that is considered unproductive. People in the novel became less likely to search for knowledge and discover new abilities. This happens frequently today. Many people are engrossed in their technology and mass media. They have become less likely to...
In the beginning of the article, Nicholas Carr talks about how his mind started to alter due to technology. Carr feels that these changes are possible, making him go instane. Some of these changes are not being able to read a full article to skimming. According to Carr, “now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle” (Carr 314). Ever since Carr has started using technology his mind seems to work in a different way than it used to be. Before, Carr would spend long period of time reading books and articles, now he searches everything on Google and finds the information he needs. Carr wants others to feel sympathy for him because he feels that technology is controlling his way of thinking and to get others to agree with
You read books—to learn facts—to get grades—to pass the course—to get a degree. That's all—it has nothing to do with thoughts." George Murchison
In the article “Reading and Thought” the author Dwight MacDonald provides criticism and disagreement with Henry Luce’s idea of “functional curiosity”. Luce developed the term “functional curiosity” defining it as an eagerness of people to know the latest news happening around the world. On the other hand, MacDonald concludes that functional curiosity only strengthens reader’s practice in reading rather than in providing invaluable information. He underlines that literature nowadays is deficient and insubstantial since there is no deep meaning in the texts. Modern printed literature is simply being skimmed through by the reader as the reader nowadays tends to avoid too much information resisting thinking in such a way. Because of the new nature of the printed materials, MacDonald considers today’s reading behavior and the way people think as flimsy and indifferent. I agree that our thought has definitively changed since we are paying less time to serious critical thinking losing connections with society and awareness of it.
While critical thinking can still be achieved without reading; it cannot reach its full potential on thought alone, and it certainly relies on literacy to stand. Literacy provides sources, language provides words to back up thought, and reading opens a person’s mind to new words and ideas. If someone is unable to read or chooses not to read, many facts and ideas are lost to him. Reading also helps a person organize their thoughts. Without organization a person can articulate their thoughts just not as orderly. To better illustrate this point think of this metaphor: Picture a mother and her child. The mother represents the people and language is represented by the child. The mother loves her child so much and wants to do everything she can to help her child along in life. The child grows up and, because his mother did everything in her power to better him and give him a bright future, he flourished and went on to change the world. If a society desires to erect something that can change the world, they need to do everything in their power to better their language. They need to delve deeper into books, yearn for knowledge, listen to others opinions, grow their vocabulary, and know how to establish truth. When a nation strives to better their language and give it all their love and time, that language will continually grow until it changes the
First, he provides an overview of the history and development of the book as well as the development of reading. Carr analyzes and explains the effects of these developments on the individuals. Furthermore, he notes that the Internet recreates and alters a medium’s content by the use of hyperlinks, which ultimately distracts readers, and by separating the content into organized chunks. These characteristics make the content “searchable” which stimulates skimming behavior or superficial reading. As a result, readers retain less information due to the lack of deep, analytical reading. In addition, online texts often incorporate opinions, beliefs, or skewed viewpoints of certain topics, which can have negative effects on readers. Carr also addresses that some opponents believe that hardcopy reading was a result of “impoverished access” (111) and that the desire to use the fast paced web is a result of a quickening pace of life and work over the past few
Donald M. Murray, in this article entitled “Reading as a Reader” is talking about how reading is an unique, an essential, and a necessary aptitude for human beings in their society. While illustrating his point of view, the author stresses on the idea that our attitudes towards reading is directly linked to the systematic approaches we have while facing a article or a book. In this article, he said that: “If we approach a text believing that we are not readers, or that we can’t read, that attitude may make it more difficult for us to understand the challenging text.”(Murray, 2). Throughout those words, Murray emphasizes that we should consider the process of reading as a learning process, and as a way of deepening the capacity we have as readers. We should have an open-mind while engaging with a reading, and understand that it may always not be our fault if it comes that the text we are reading is difficult. In clear, it is all part of the process of improving ourselves. Then, Murray, in his well structured writing, portrays differents types of reading and also gives us some tips on how to approach them.
Andrew Solomon has some valid arguments in his article, and he tries to persuade the readers through logos, pathos, and ethos. Solomon wants the readers to understand the importance of reading, and how its decline can be harmful to the nation. To reinforce his arguments, Solomon shares a variety of examples, for instance, he mentions that reading helps improve memory and concentration, and the decline of reading is causing mental “atrophy.” He also calls upon the readers to take some sort of action to raise reading rates and help the society. This can grant the readers a form of power and control over the crisis that will lead to an em...
Heather McHugh was born in San Diego, California on August 20, 1948. McHugh was raised in Gloucester Point, Virginia, by her two Canadian parents, Eileen Francesca and John Laurence, a marine biologist, he worked on the York River directing the laboratory. Heather McHugh had an early teaching on the emphasis on grammar at a young age by nuns at parochial school. At the age of five, Heather was writing poetry and at age twelve was an excellent eavesdropper. Heather McHugh attended Yorktown High School in Virginia before moving on to Harvard at the age of 17, where she attended a seminar with Robert Lowell and had her first poem published in The New Yorker. In 1970, after receiving her Bachelor's Degree from Harvard, Heather McHugh moved onto
When I was younger, I didn’t like reading much at all. I always questioned my teachers what was the purpose of reading; I never got an answer from either teacher until I was in the seventh grade. Starting junior high school was different from elementary. In seventh grade, we were in our reading class for two hours a day. I asked the teachers why didn’t we have the privilege to stay in our other classes for two hours; I never received an answer from my teachers.
“While it is true that more books are sold today than ever, recent statistics show that only about 15% of books bought today are read. Evidently, they are of more use as furniture—coffee-table books—than as a source of information or aesthetic buzz. The statistics continue; of those that are read, less than 20% are read all the way through. The unfinished book symbolizes the state of attention spans today”. Eric McLuhan opens up his 2010 argument against technology with this quote. He seems to believe that literacy is only fully achieved through limited technology and hard copies of books. He fails to realize there is more to literacy that picking up a book defined as a ‘classic’ and reading it cover to cover. Literacy covers all spans of artistic
...wan believes, one of the best things about our digital lives is the ease with which we can share ideas with others. It is now possible for readers to connect with each other worldwide, as well as recommend and share their opinions about a particular piece of literature. Our need to engage in “deep reading” will not go away, as Rosen believes. The act of how we read may evolve as it has been evolving since beginning of mankind. How we read and write has evolved from cave walls to stone tablets to paper to keyboards. The digital world will not change what we read, but how we read. Because the experience of reading, the love of narrative, and cravings for story-telling is instilled into our DNA. Reading is a basic human need, it is evolutionary. Even though our means of attaining information or story telling may change, the act of reading is literally forever-lasting.