I’ve been pretty dang sick this week. When I’ve been pushing my body at Mach 10 for too long, it just shuts down as a way to slow me down. This week it did that…and then the doctor prescribed something that I had an allergic reaction to…so needless to say I’ve been a little out of commission. However as I’ve slowly started to resurface, I’ve been catching up on emails and such. One email asked me to read the following “position statement” and comment (http://zircon.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/archives/2006/04/12/ocotillo_0607.php).
Background info to skim as you digest the above statement: I set up this blog site last January. I’ve been wanting to blog professionally for a while now. And one of my former colleagues, and I like to think friend, has kept suggesting that I do so. He has a wonderful blog that anyone and everyone interested in education technology should read religiously (http://cogdogblog.com/). However, you all know how life is…we’ve all got too much on our plate (Mach 10, remember!) and it is always difficult to start something new (and really commit to it). However, I think the above position statement, and my desire to react to it, has given me the motivation to start. I also think that my reaction will encapsulate the key points that I want to keep this blog primarily focused on…not that I don’t reserve the right to wander as I see fit, and desire!
So…why is it that so many people see technophiles as “elitist”? As I was getting frustrated at that claim and figuring out how to respond, I realized that the claim so clearly resonates with people who complain about how certain theorists, with Judith Butler (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Butler) being a favorite target, are elitist in their use of confusing language.
But I’ll shift to an example first…I have a good friend that likes to tease apart my various theoretical, political, philosophical, and ethical stances. When we “get into it” I’ll get rattling and sometimes he’ll look at me weird; I’ll translate and then he’ll say “so why didn’t you say it that way the first time?” When I try to defend my own use of “big words” I talk about how the word I choose is usually more precise. It means more closely what I want it to mean. Yes, I could use other words, but they are not as “clear” as I want.
Back to Butler…now someone like Judith Butler is both selecting more precise words and having her writing demonstrate the theory she is espousing. However, like Butler (or at least I’m going to assume so…hopefully she’d agree with me), I am also playing with language. Words are fun! This is one of the reasons I’m getting a PhD in English, specifically rhetoric and composition. Words weave together and make meaning, and if you pull one string, the weave shifts and the meaning shifts; if you replace string the overall design shifts and the meaning shifts. However this is serious fun; play that is also hard work.
So…what does this have to do with “techno-elitism” you ask? Maybe nothing; however, I think the elitist labeling comes from the same type of feeling, or disconnect, that people have with theorists like Butler. Maybe people don’t like playing that is also work? Or maybe they are jealous that their work isn’t also fun? Maybe people who have embraced technology, in this case those that have embraced teaching and learning with technology, have identified the need to have more precise words, more precise tools, with which to do their work and those who do not identify and/or are disconnected can negatively “banish” these folks with the label “elitist.”
Now the Marxist-Socialist in me cringes at the term “Elitist” because of the introduction of money and class. But yeah…technology is expensive! I don’t even want to know how much money my department spent on me this year since I got both a new computer and some software. And my “spending” doesn’t stop at the hardware and software…I need support too! So all those IT guys and gals get paychecks for keeping the servers I use running and answering my questions when I have them. But honestly, I think this “elitist” labeling by my education colleagues is not primarily an economic labeling, but a social one. As mentioned in the “position statement” technophiles, specifically this group, are viewed as a “closed club.”
I don’t think closed, but definitely close knitted (wow…back to the weaving metaphor…my mind is clicking this morning!). As with any other social group, or discourse community, education technophiles share a lot of similarities that bond them. They firmly believe that technology positively supports teaching and learning. They invest a lot of resources into their hardware, software, and support. They sometimes speak “Greek.” They like to play with emerging technologies…a lot of times this playing happening on their own time, energy, and resources.
As a self-proclaimed technophile I confess to sometimes being frustrated with either my colleagues or students who want to “get it” or “just be shown it” as a way to instantly learn technology. “Play Damn It! If you just take some time to fiddle around with the technology, you’ll learn a lot about it and how to use it.” Maybe this is why some of us are labeled as elitist. (And now that I think about it…that is the same suggest I give to students when they are first reading theory…“just wallow in it, make meaning where you can, but don’t necessarily plan on ‘getting it’ all the first couple reads through.”)
Since I tend to rely on the same set of resources for my techno-help and support (ie, those who know more than I do); I feel it is important to consciously and graciously provide the same support to those who know less than I do. In other words, I believe in Kosmic Kharma. And the longer I’ve played being a technophile, the more technophiles I have found that believe the same thing. So honestly, I don’t feel like they are trying to close any “club” doors. But maybe we need to do a better job of announcing our doors are open?
Coming up next…a brief discussion of why the (mis)spelling of “technofile”
