Electracy and the new paradigm

[ReverendAJS]

Okay here goes. There is a social theorist by the name of Gregory Ulmer. I've mentioned him a few times. He talks about a new change in human evolution that is taking place right now. Since humans evolved into the current physical form that we have now, the total of human evolution has been taking place in our brains through the evolution of memes. this is called Memetic Evolution. Just in case you don't know, memes are social habbits that we pick up as a culture. Things such as clothing styles, languages and dialects are good examples. My favorite example is slang. Anyway, Greg Ulmer calls the latest huge shift in our Memetic Evolution Electracy. It's been called a lot of things up until now, Post-Literacy, the digital age, the electronic age. Let me put it into perspective for you.
Thousands of years ago, humans lived in an oral society. They communicated using the technology of language. Then the first big human paradigm shift occured: Literacy. Literacy began when Mesopotamians and Phonecians decided they needed a way to keep track of their grain. The Alphabetic writing system followed. The alphabet is the technology of Literacy, Which lead to the printing press and so on. The most important thing that happened durring that shift was the change in the way humans learned. In Orality learning took place using spoken word technology. In Literacy learning took (and takes) place using written word technology.
Which brings us to Electracy. The technology of electracy is the Image. Think of Icons, images that represent abstract concepts. This relates to Carl Jung's archetypes. We see the changes already in learning. Attention spans are shorter because of the barrage of media that we are exposed to everyday. We can take in multiple sources of information at the same time. This is out of neccessity. Like in any evolutionary proccess, the environment changes and the organism changes at the same time. A tandem proccess, and those who don't have the skills to survive in the new environment will be lost. I have more to say about this but I will wait and see if this generates any discussion first.

[ReverendAJS]

okay. I realize that this is a dry subject, but I'm going to go on anyway. There are two reasons why I'm writing about this. The first reason is I thought some of you might be interested. The second reason is more personal. There was a thread going on here recently about Pagan school, the theory of a pagan school anyway. I am trying to come up with a new educational model based on the paradigm of electracy. Using the language of images as a new way of learning. (Keep in mind I am not proposing that we all stop talking and reading and writing in our learning) How would this model apply to the teaching of Pagan practices and theology? I'd especially like to hear from some of you teenagers on the board, since this applies to the young people more than anything. I hope you all can see the implications of this new world.
Still waiting
Reverend aJS

[Radocs]

Since nobody else replied I'll chip in here.

I think to a degree some learning is already done by pictures. However it seems to me that teaching primarily by pictures would be pretty bloody hard. Where do you get the pictures or icons from? Do you make them up or.. what?

Concerning Pagan education I question the value of learning by pictures. When I was first looking into Paganism I did an immense amount of reading. There were images and symbols but it's not always easy to tell exactly what an image is getting at.

Maybe I'm missing the whole point here but I think this is interesting and I'd hate to see this topic just fade away.

[Drisel]

I'm goning to start out by agreeing with Radocs that some learning is already done by pictures. When my daughter was learning to read she depended on the pictures in her books and how they related to what she was reading when she got stuck on a word. Also keep in mind when there is a language barrier people will often resort to drawing a picture of what they are trying to say.

Another point towards the fact that people have already tried to use pictures as a way of comunicating might be to look at egyption pictograms. Are they really so different than the smilies that we use in our posts?

I can also see the point of a persons lack of attention due to media overload. It is often much quicker to look at a picture of an event than to take the time to read about it.

That said I would be interested in reading your educational model once it is complete. :)

[ReverendAJS]

I think you missed a sentance in there.

I am trying to come up with a new educational model based on the paradigm of electracy. Using the language of images as a new way of learning. (Keep in mind I am not proposing that we all stop talking and reading and writing in our learning)
An example:
When humanity changed from an oral culture to a literate culture people didn't stop talking. Electracy BUILDS on what already exists. So we will read, write and talk just like we always did. But Iconography will become essential to our communication.
The model I have sofar has lots more than what I have already described. In my model classes will not be taught, there will be a focus on individual or group research. A "teacher" will be an expert on the subject of the class, I call it a guide. The guide will evaluate the quality of the research and suggest changes, help the student find resources, and gather research materials for a library on the subject. My belief is that students will learn more and have more personal interest in the subject if they dictate the course of the class. I don't know if I'm explaining this very well. Oh well, if you have questions I'll answer them

[Radocs]

It is often much quicker to look at a picture of an event than to take the time to read about it.

Quicker but in many cases not as informative which was kind of the point I was trying to make above. The paper could print a picture of a burning house but without an article or at least a caption to go with it all you know is that someone's house caught fire.

[Drisel]

I might be missing the point but what I'm getting is that students will be encouraged to come up with their own icons and the like to represent the research they have done on a topic or are you saying that with a guide's help they will use an already existing set of icons to further their learning development of a subject?

[Radocs]

Well I had that sentence in mind but I was thinking in terms of a shift from a focus on reading and writing to primarly icons rather than combining them.


My belief is that students will learn more and have more personal interest in the subject if they dictate the course of the class. I don't know if I'm explaining this very well. Oh well, if you have questions I'll answer them

I agree.

[ReverendAJS]

Some of the icons exist. But these icons and their associations will come from the same evolutionary process. They aren't all in place yet, and probably won't be for years, and even then they will continue to evolve, like our language is still evolving. So that isn't a big part of my focus. And these icons arent pictures. Pictographs are a pretty good description. I want to focus on the new method of learning. I can't think of anything else to say right now

[Radocs]

Fair enough.

Let us know what you come up with. :)

[MistOfTheSea86]

Actually, I think learning from pictures and discussing would be very insightful. I find many times that when I can't understand the text and there is a picture description I slap my forehead and laugh at my stupidity lol

[Drisel]

You might want to consider that you may have a mild learning disability. I do and after a little hard work I was able to overcome it. Keep in mind of course that there are many different learning disabilities. Many make it dufficult to understand simple or complex word problems. Pictures are a very useful aid in overcoming difficulty with various forms of reading comprehension problems. Just a thought.

[MistOfTheSea86]

Originally posted by Drisel
You might want to consider that you may have a mild learning disability. I do and after a little hard work I was able to overcome it. Keep in mind of course that there are many different learning disabilities. Many make it dufficult to understand simple or complex word problems. Pictures are a very useful aid in overcoming difficulty with various forms of reading comprehension problems. Just a thought.


Good point, that or i am just lazy lol

[Drisel]

*bump*

[story]

I hafta admit, i'm not really all that up on the meme thing. Is that kinda like the Burroughs language virus trip, with out the nova ovens and mugwumps?
let me bounce a few, most likely totally irrelevant, ideas around and see if any of them fit.
I look at an object, say a coffee mug. My eyes capture the image, translate it into electro-chemical stimuli, whereupon my brain isolates all the various objects in my view, fixes names to them, and I come up with the proper identification for each. Already, I am several steps removed from the concrete reality of the object. I type into my computer the word 'mug'. The person on the other end reads it, attaches a mental image to the word, and we are now totally separated from the object that started the chain of events.
The picture gets even hazier if we're taking about sensory or emotional experience
for example, lets take this onion article:
http://www.theonion.com/onion3420/so_starving.html
one word can mean a lot of different things.
Along with the evolution of language came a ever increasing division of labor. This ultimatly led to the construction of a society where diversity of ethnicity, occupation, world views, and language became the rule. This can have an isolating affect on individuals, becuase it menas that the common ground shared between you and your neighbor is shrinking.

I've always kind of thought that the next phase in linguistic evolution would be the ability to grasp multiple levels of meaning at once. Maybe the written language would change as this happens. Who knows? 200 years from now Finnegans wake could be a fast read.
But this has nothing to do with pagan colleges and stuff. right. back to that.
Perhaps intensive interviewing before classes begin.
like:
when you say the word x, what do you mean? What picture or image does it bring to mind?
the teacher could collect the data and direct the course of the lesson by choosing the language carefully, in order to make the information as accsesable as possible to the students.
Of course this could only really be done after a certain amount of previous education. Otherwise, you'd just be dumbing down the course.
damn thats longwinded. sorry bout that.

[crusader_daisyy]

hey this may not be that relevant here but juz a personal thought. when it comes to teaching using pictures, sometimes, there're goods and drawbacks. the good part is, a picture can help understand a concept better, as the visual appeals much more to the learning most of the time. however one drawback's that, as helpful as pictures are, they are subjective to interpretation, that is to say, what one is exactly trying to teach, may not be 100% interpretated by the student that same way you want through the picture. Whether the message that the student learns through the picture is good or bad, is again of subjective nature, depending on how he/she perceive the picture. Alot of stuff here concerns method of perception and good teaching techniques. okkayy hope i'm gettin' somewhere here..


!~cheerZ~!
daisyy