The Irrevocable Alteration of Communication

Abstract

In our digital society, the ability to communicate has irrevocably changed. The purpose of this chapter is to provide a glimpse into the impact of digital media on society, specifically digital communication. This glimpse is framed in terms of four characteristics of digital communication: product/ion, semiotic, public, and transitory. Issues are examined that relate to the democratization and monopolization of communication, who has access, the persistent Spiral of Silence, privacy, cyber bullying, identity theft, the ethereal being captured, as well as education and new literacies. Methodological gaps are noted in the research corpus and suggestions are proposed regarding the need for timeliness, support for a comprehensive span of research paradigms, and representation of a full range of populations. Finally, implications and recommendations are explored for civic engagement, commerce, education, and policy.

Wag the Dog: A Digital Literacies Narrative

“…Fast forward 20 years: Working with a team of researchers, we parsed the literature to consider whether the public nature of literacy in our digital culture remained a viable construct (see Baker et al, 2015 ). To pull this thread through time, let me first consider where we were as a digital culture in the 1990s (see Roser et al, 2015 ).…”

“…In 2015, my research team wrote, While collective intelligence is as old as society and exhibited by most forms of life ( Malone & Bernstein, 2015 ), due to the public nature of digital communication, we are on the precipice of something previously unattainable. ( Baker et al, 2015 , p. 99) …”

“…During the years of Web 2.0, readers and authors collaborated. More recently, in the era of Web 3.0, given browser cookies and such, the internet reads the readers ( Baker et al, 2015 ; Markoff, 2006 ). All iterations require proficiencies with the publicness of digital literacies and have implications for literacy researchers and schools.…”

“…Twenty years later, my research team examined whether this construct persisted ( Baker et al, 2015 ). We considered Wikipedia.…”