When the semester began, I came to class with many of my own assumptions and feelings about our modern day use of the internet. In all honestly, I’ve always been a bit hesitant when it comes to the internet and the consequences that may come with living and existing in a sort of virtual reality, and I still find myself questioning the intentions behind something that takes up such a large part of our daily lives, for some of us anyway. The idea of replacing face-to-face interaction with online connections makes me nervous, I have to say, and I’m not sure what to expect from that.
But isn’t that always the way? A fear of the unknown can often make us reluctant to give something a go, resulting in us missing out on opportunities or worse, relationships. And of course, I spend a good amount of time on the internet myself when it comes to school, work, life... we all have to now, right? I mean, I don’t think you can get a library card anymore without an email address on file.
I think, though, for me, it’s this timidness that I feel at the growing insistence of society to connect more personally online and an anxiety about where that will lead the nature of relationships in the future.
Anyway, I decided in that first week of class to let go of my assumptions and really hear what McCulloch was trying to tell me in her book, and I’m glad I did. And as I mentioned in many of our forums, her generous and gracious nature allowed me to feel as though I could sit at that table and openly engage in conversation about the internet, without judgment. As did all of you.
So, I would say that through this class I have a better understanding of the internet and how it relates to the past, which influences our future. And how that influences our relationships with one another, and I’m thankful for that.
And while I’m not totally convinced that we all won’t end up cyborgs someday, living our own versions of Vanilla Sky, I’m much more aware of the benefits that the internet has brought to different communities, and I honor that and see it as a good thing, in its own way.
I totally know what you mean about being able to really open up about the internet and the ways I use it without judgment in this class. I have never quite felt so comfortable talking about my internet usage with other people, so it was really cool to see how relevant it is in writing.
ReplyDeleteHa! Vanilla Sky reference!
ReplyDeleteI am glad you enjoyed McCulloch as much as you did. :)
I completely relate to the assumptions before this class started. I feel as though after reading McCullochs book I have a new respect for the Internet that I didn’t have before. I remember thinking spending a lot of time on the Internet it was a waste of your life, which maybe I still agree to to a point, however, I now understand the importance of the Internet.
ReplyDeleteGosh, I know what you mean, in an attempt to relate different sides of the internet and its linguistics to the class, I wound up sharing a LOT MORE than I thought I would in this class! (This is true to an extent for a lot of classes I'm in. Sometimes this stuff just comes up and you have to make a call on whether or not to forward the conversation by sharing, right there in the moment! Talk about fear sweating...) I feel like we had a very interesting range of people who related to the internet in different ways that really made the class go in interesting directions.
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