(Crabby) Thoughts While Reading

A few evenings ago, I read the introduction and studied the index of a book published late last summer – Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives, yet another exploration into generational issues. This time the focus is on anyone born after 1980, when social digital technologies, such as Usenet and bulletin board systems, came online.

In other words, the authors cast a very wide net, one going beyond a single generation, in fact. And it does appear their intent is to discuss an entire generation, not just those members having easy and regular access to the requisite technologies.

From the first page, I developed a sense of déjà vu.

Haven’t I seen some of this material before? I asked myself

Here’s the best example, a fill-in-the-blank observation found on page 7.

Digital Natives will move markets and transform industries, education, and global politics.

Wasn’t there a magazine article I read in the mid-60s that posited baby boomers will move markets and transform industries, education, and global politics?

Or what about that book published in the early 80s declaring that Gen-Xers will move markets and transform industries, education, and global politics?

Or some similar sentiments.

These types of books tend to annoy me for a couple of reason. (And, to be fair, the jury is still out on whether or not Born Digital unequivocally fits this category.)

First of all, there’s the one-size-fits-all trap that bedevils many generational observers. They observe the behavior of the white, privileged, and, as time goes on, college-educated minority and then make sweeping generalizations, treating their subjects like the cast of a lushly choreographed Busby Berkeley musical.

The Gang’s All Here – and they’re all reading from the same script.

Secondly, they play down or ignore everything that doesn’t fit into their research parameters. In the case of Born Digital, the authors appear to have reworked the Genesis creation story.

Then God, in 1980, said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness;…… And God blessed them, and God said to them, Be technologically savvy.

Getting back to my sense of déjà vu, I googled the term, “first TV generation”, but didn’t find the perfect analogy. The best I could manage was a link to a transcript of a 1977 address given by the apparently insufferable Harvey Beutner, an English professor at Illinois Wesleyan University.

In my own classes during the last ten years, I have noted the effects of cradle-to-college television. Often I write comments similar to this in the margins of student papers: “Your essay reminds me of a neon sign flashing in the night. The images, pictures, and ideas are often fresh and graphic and even beautiful, but there are no connecting links.” The point is that the student educated on TV expects me – the reader – to make the connections, to make the transitions, and to fill in the meaning.

And then there’s this comment from Born Digital.

They [Digital Natives] probably don’t even know what a library card looks like, much less have one; and if they do, they’ve probably never used it.

Sez who?

I suspect Palfrey and Gasser aren’t familiar with the work of the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Here’s a quote from a 12/20/2007 report, “Information Searches That Solve Problems”.

The survey results challenge the assumption that libraries are losing relevance in the internet age. Libraries drew visits by more than half of Americans (53%) in the past year for all kinds of purposes, not just the problems mentioned in this survey. And it was the young adults in tech-loving Generation Y (age 18-30) who led the pack. Compared to their elders, Gen Y members were the most likely to use libraries for problem-solving information and in general patronage for any purpose. (My emphasis.)

Furthermore, it is young adults who are the most likely to say they will use libraries in the future when they encounter problems: 40% of Gen Y said they would do that, compared with 20% of those above age 30 who say they would go to a library.

Generation Y is generally defined as the cohort born in the years 1978-2000. In other words, the great majority of them are Digital Natives, according to Palfrey and Gasser’s definition.

Oh well. The authors did say their book would become quickly dated.