Blogging Off

Faithful Followers,

Thank you for such a great class! By far one of most interesting classes I have taken at BYU. We were given the chance to direct our own learning, and I think we did a great job. We produced an entire eBook in just a few short weeks, and I must say, it is legit. I'm glad I failed last semester, because if I hadn't I would never have taken a spring class that's for sure, but more importantly, I would have missed out on so much learning!

I haven't decided if I will continue blogging or not, but if I do continue, you can be sure "Sh*t Carlie Says" will make its reappearance!

Blogging off for now,
Carlie :P

Consume, Create and Connect

Consume

The first learning outcome of this course was to "demonstrate the ability to analyze literary texts, and to gather, search, filter, sample, bookmark and research within academic and general sources" (Burton 2). My favorite part of this outcome is the general sources! I took this exact course winter semester, and for several reasons I did not get the grade that makes me, my GPA or my mother proud, so I did some ratemyprofessor.com searching and signed up for Dr Burton's class. I cannot say that either course was better than the other, because both winter and spring Engl 295 taught me a lot. I learned how to be an educated writer (I'm not saying I am perfect, but my writing did improve). However, this class took the traditional research and writing style of the winter class and revamped it to match the modern world today. Not every single source I used had to have a .gov or .org domain! This opened up a whole new world of the internet. Of course, I had to have a mix of scholarly sources, but this class allowed me to go outside of the BYU library database and search Twitter, blogs, facebook and Goodreads. Instead of using BYU Refworks to collect my sources I was able to learn and use Diigo, a great bookmarking site that I will continue to use past this class.
The best part of this class has been the opportunity to choose my own topics. My winter class had three assigned texts that had a detailed reading schedule (John Steinbeck will forever bring bitter feelings). This was not so in Dr Burton's class. I learned how to schedule my own learning. I was able to pick my own books and sources to consume. This made me realize how important it is to think with your own brain! A syllabus is good, but having the responsibility of your own learning is incredible. I wasn't held accountable by quiz or honor to report whether I read the material or not, but by understanding that what I learn is dependant on how much I want to learn is not noly scary but motivating.

Create

Holy cow! Have you ever Googled your own name? Well, I just did and I am shocked! I've googled it in the past and about all that comes up is my Facebook profile, but since the goal of creating a professional online profile so much more has been added to my google results! Check me out! This is part of the creating process of the class. We took what we were consuming and we created something out of it. We started producing academic blog posts on our topics. We created an entire eBook from our consuming process. Instead of consuming an assigned book and writing an assigned, formal paper to be read by one person, graded on his/her opinion and then filed away in my shoebox of papers that date back to sophomore year of high school, I now have a usable piece of work that I can show potential employers. Also, now that I know how to create eBooks, blogs, Diigo, Goodreads, Twitter and Google accounts, I can put these into practice in my future classroom. This class wasn't just a 2 month course, but it has created life-long learning.

Connect

For me, connecting was hard. I was so scared to post publicly for people to read. I love to write, but I am also very self conscience of my writing and do not like to share it. I would hear about Amy writing artists, and Derrick's podcast interviews, and I would shudder! They are so brave! This class forced me to connect with people. I was required to start posting daily and connecting with people in class and outside of class. I posted questions on Goodreads, and reached out to English teachers, especially Tammy Stephens. Instead of writing for just me and the teacher, I had to expand my writing to reach a public audience, formal online discussions and professionals in the English field. I not only learned how to be brave publishing my writing, but also I learned to adapt my writing to fit the audience.
We as a class were tasked with creating an eBook that connected each of our individual chapters, and then connected with the world! We took what we consumed, created something worthwhile and then connected it with ourselves, each other and everyone else. This class didn't give us another 10 pages of paper to file, but instead we learned sites, sources, people, technology and life-long learning.

My Biased Review of Our eBook

Writing About Literature in the Digital Age

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


5 stars! An amazing collection of essays! I might also be partial since I am a contributing author as well. :)



View all my reviews

We're Published!!!

It is done! We're officially online and published!

Writing About Literature in the Digital Age is completely finished, online and ready to read! This has been by far one of the best assignments I have done at BYU. In fact, it didn't really feel like just an assignment. All semester long it has been our creation-not just another paper to write. We have worked hard and long to ensure that every chapter is relevent and useful to readers. Each of us put in hours of research and writing in order to produce a chapter that would enhance the book. The editing team scrutinized every word of our work, and the design and publishing teams seemed frazzeled as they worked so hard to put everything together, but in the end we pulled off an amazing eBook.

You can download and read the eBook here! Exciting, huh?!
You can also read the book on your Kindle using these directions as to how to download it using your Kindle.
Also, you can read the eBook on Goodreads here!

Happy Reading : )

A Bookmark From Our Dear Friend Weiye Loh

Back in May an email came to me from our class Diigo site. I opened it, and read that it was bookmarked by Weiye Loh....what? Who is this? I felt like a social hermit for a minute! I have been in the class for a month, and this is the first time I have heard this name! I tried to think of who this could be. I ran through the class layout of how we all usually sit, and for the life of me could not think who this was. I was relieved to hear Dr Burton ask the class if we had noticed this person bookmarking, and that he was not even in the class! Phew, that cleared up my curiosity of who Mr Loh was! The other day another bookmark came in from this mystery man, and I actually enjoyed his mark. It was an article reporting how there will be one paper format of every online book created, saved and stored for physical records. There are some obvious flaws to this system as Bri points out in her comment, but if this article is true, we will be published online as well as in paper and stored in the archives of online literature.

Thanks, Mr Weiye Loh-whoever you are....

Goodreads Is Proving To Be Good!

Today I got an email from Goodreads saying I had another comment on my thread about Charlotte's Web. I know that the time for research is past, but I felt that her comment was good, and she had spent time in replying to me, so I want to post it.

I asked the Children's Literature group what they thought about Charlotte's Web's themes, relationships, plot and characters. If the book was still useful for students, and how they taught it. Jenny replied:

I read this to my second grade class the last month of school. I think it is a great story...and has many ways that it is valuable. I was planning to copy some of the writing my students did about the characters' and their relationships...but I ran out of time... so I'll just have to paraphrase what I remember them writing... and share a few of my thoughts.

Of course, the most obvious relationship si that between Charlotte and Wilbur. Wilbur starts out as not very confident, but because of Charlotte's belief in him, the praise of others, and his newfound safety, he becomes quite confident by the end of the story...helping to care for Charlotte's eggs and really growing into his own skin. I think that the 3 things I mentioned are all so important in gaining confidence and self-esteem... you must feel safe (physically and emotionally), you need to hear praise and ou need to know that someone believes in you and thinks you can do whatever it is you want to do. Charlotte believes that Wilbur is "some pig" and "radiant" and "humble" and in turn, Wilbur becomes a radiant, humble, confident pig.

A perhaps less obvious relationship is that of Templeton and Wilbur. Many of my students said Templeton was their favorite character. They liked him because he was funny and kind of grumpy. But also, I think, because even though he acts selfish and doesn't want anyone to know that there's goodness in him, there obviously is good in him. He generally only helps Charlotte and Wilbur when there's something in it for him... but when it comes down to it, he does help ...and sometimes without really getting much in return. Charlotte has him pegged.

And there is the relationship between Fern and Wilbur. She is pretty devoted to him, feeding and caring for him and then coming to visit him each day.
She is the only human that can understand the animals as they talk.

This class has been so helpful with its focus on social outreach. I wouldn't ever think to research sites like Goodreads or Twitter to find sources, but if among the many other things learned in such a few short weeks, I've learned that people do care about the topic, and they are out there-it's just a matter of finding them wherever they may be.

Beginning, Middle and End

The Beginning: Creating an eBook

First, what the heck is an eBook?

When this idea first started floating around in class I was slightly confused as to what exactly an "eBook" was! I could assume from the preceeding 'e' that it was in technology family of iPod and iPad. So...it was an online book? Well, that is actually pretty accurate. An eBook is an organized piece that can be published online and ready for download through several venues such as Kindles, iPads, iPhones, computers and Nooks. Ew. If you've been reading my blog from the beginning then you know that I am not the biggest fan of online literature or technology ruling the world. However, as the class brainstormed topics, formats, covers, designs and a many other aspects of an eBook I became increasingly excited to be apart of an eBook.

The Middle: Writing, Editing and Design

This was by far my favorite part of the the process. I enjoy writing, so producing a first draft that wasn't hastily self-edited and turned into the professor the next morning was a refreshing change. I had direct feedback from Dr Burton, two class members on two separate occasions and from a complete editing team. This was the fun part. I felt that my chapter made it through editing in pretty good shape. I discovered the program of Track Changes in Microsoft Word, which thrilled me (that might be a sign of a nerd if an editing program "thills" you). I've used the comments tool to edit before, but through the editing process I learned how you can accept and decline the changes, which makes applying editing changes so much easier!

Design took over from there, and I know they worked hard to get the eBook together. I feel empathy for them. I've had to use Indesign a couple times at work, and I know that I threw a couple good temper tantrums, swore a bit and even just cancelled out of the project and started over. So a big thanks goes out to the editing and design team for pulling this eBook through!

The End: Marketing

This is where the whole class really had to pitch in. What use is an online eBook if nobody knows about it? I was on the educational team with Amy and Ashley. Throughout the semester our research seemed to shift towards an educational aspect of writing in the digital era. We are all teaching majors, so everything we would learn and research had a "Where would I use this in a classroom" question attached to it. Now that we are at the marketing point in our eBook, the education part has time to shine. We have been asked to personally contact 20 people about the eBook, and as I was seeking out my 20 people I really wanted to make sure most of them had some sort of connection to teaching, whether they be a teacher or heavily involved in the education process. I sent out emails to many current teachers and school board members tonight, and I know that my fellow team members also focused on teaching in the marketing process. Hopefully, between the three of us specifically focusing on education, our eBook will find its way into a classroom or two and make itself useful to students all over.

Webinar Invitation: Writing About Literature in the Digital Age

Please join us for the launch of Writing About Literature in the Digital Age at a free webinar taking place Wednesday, June 15th, 2011 from 5:30-6:30pm MDT (you can sign in using LearnCentral's site, or simply click here at that time).

Writing about Literature in the Digital Age is a free eBook by students at Brigham Young University who are pushing boundaries of traditional literary study to explore the benefits of digital tools in academic writing. This collaborative effort is a case study of how electronic text formats and blogging can be effectively used to explore literary works, develop one’s thinking publicly, and research socially. Students used literary works to read the emerging digital environment while simultaneously using new media to connect them with authentic issues and audiences beyond the classroom. As literacy and literature continue their rapid evolution, accounts like these from early explorers give teachers and students of literature fresh reference points for the literary-digital future.

The table of contents for Writing About Literature in the Digital Age can be browsed here.

During the webinar, we invite you to hear the authors discuss their work and the making of their eBook. You will be able to download your free copy of Writing About Literature in the Digital Age during or following the webinar launch on June 15th, 2011.

Contributors: Alymarie Rutter, Amy Whitaker, Annie Ostler, Ariel Letts, Ashley Lewis, Ashley Nelson, Ben Wagner, Bri Zabriskie, Carlie Wallentine, Derrick Clements, James Matthews, Matt Harrison, Nyssa Silvester, Rachael Schiel, Sam McGrath, Taylor Gilbert, and Gideon Burton

In Defense of the Comic Book

The other day I needed to run into Macey's really fast a grab just a few things, and 45 minutes later, I walked out of the store with my two items. No, the lines were not excruciatingly long, nor was I looking for some obscure object. I got distracted--shocker, right? I was taking a shortcut thought the normally empty magazine aisle when I something caught my eye. I'll be honest, it was the amount of magazines with Justin Beiber's face on them! The kid has a magazine showing his face for every year he has been alive! As I was counting how many Beiber Fever articles I could see, two magazines caught my eye. One was a comic book on Thor and the other was Marvel and the top comics turned movie in 2011. I thought of how Matt has been blogging about comics all semester long, and I realized that I don't think I have ever actually read a comic book. I picked up the one about Thor and skimmed it, but soon flipped to the first page and started reading. I moved onto the Marvel comic/movie magazine. This one kinda shocked me. I guess I had never fully realized that movies like Batman, Green Lantern and Spiderman all came from a comic book! I am a staunch believer that the books are always better than the movies, and I always try to read the book before seeing the movie, yet I never extend this rule to the superheros! Matt's topic is way bigger than I thought, and I now realize that comic book are being overlooked! So, thanks Matt for making a bold move and arguing on behalf of comic books.

20/20 on Consumers

Today in class Dr Burton asked each of us to list 20 people we could contact about reading our eBook. Wow! 20? Sometimes I feel that I know a lot of people, but yet I don't. I have friends on Facebook, but are all of them really friends? Most of these people I cannot contact as potential consumers, so I had to think a bit harder. So far my list of consumers include:

• Heather Wing (BYU professor)
• Tammy Stephens (English teacher)
• Toni Birch (English teacher)
• Julia Rowland (English teacher)
• Lorraine Kimball (Librarian)
• Holly Peralta (English teacher)
• Natalie Thomas (Kindle User)

These are the first few names I've collected. I emailed Tammy Stephens about getting in touch with the other English teachers in my hometown school district. She replied saying:

I never give other people someone's private email without asking them first. When you email me, I will be happy to forward it to the other high school English teachers. Also, would you like me to ask Mrs. Wells, the computer teacher, if a link can go on the school web site? I'll ask Brian, our district tech man, if the link can go on the district site, too. Finally, if you want, let's put an article in the News Examiner. I think it would be neat to highlight you and what you're doing and what this ebook is all about. What do you think?

I love this idea! I come from a small farming community in Idaho, but everybody reads the valley's daily newspaper. In fact, I know that many people outside of my small town subscribes to this paper (to keep in touch with their old hometown, family or friends). This might not be a huge contact like Dr Burton is looking for, but I feel that this would be awesome. Are we planning on doing a short write-up of the gist of the eBook? If so, this would be a great summary for the paper. And I think Mrs Stephens is being so helpful with asking about posting a link on the district website for our eBook. It may be just small town publicity, but I like it!

Consumer: Heather Wing

Duh! I posted about how I learned about the UCET/LA conference in my English teaching class, but I didn't think of promoting there?! Heather Wing is a professor at BYU who heads the 276R course. This course is the introduction class to the English Teaching Major. It is a beastly class. I loved it, but hated it. It is a block class (7 weeks long), only 3 credits and is held Monday through Friday from 7am to 12pm. This doesn't leave a lot of room for other classes or for a job. These are some major negative aspects of this class, but it makes up for it in content. Potential English teachers spend this crash course of 7 weeks learning how to teach, what to teach and where to teach. Professor Wing focuses on a modern movement. She taught us places to look for better ways to teach, but if I had taken this Digital Writing class before my 276R class I would've had a greater knowledge of how to use the internet and digital age to teach. I think we should contact Professor Wing, and see if she is interested in our eBook, because it really would help future students of 276R.

Hmm...Shoulda Searched Harder

Bam! I happened to hit the back button and found a big section on submitting conference propsals. Guess I'll look harder next time! : )

This is how we submit a propsal to present at the UCET/LA!

Submit a Conference Proposal

Who's Gonna Read This?

Now that our final chapters are in editing we are starting to look for audiences who would want to consume our eBook. Here are the "Seminary Answers": educators, technology learners and our moms. Dr Burton is not impressed with these answers; he wants specific name and places of where we could market our eBook. I had no idea who we could market to, until I remembered a class period in my English 276R class. We had a guest speaker, Jaime Leite, who is an English teacher at one of the Provo alternative schools and is the chairman for this years Utah Counicl of Teachers of English and Language Arts. This years conference is taking place on October 7th in Salt Lake City. I went to their website to see if there was anywhere we could promote our book. I found a section on submitting your own work, and I expect there was meant to be a link in it, but there wasn't. Dang it! I did, however, find Roseanne Markham's name and contact information. She heads all the registration for the conference. And if that fails, then I personally have Jaime's contact info, so we can just shoot her an email asking if there is anywhere that our eBook could get some publicity at well-known, established conference.

What do ya'll think?

"Some Texts": E. B. White's Web of Primary Texts

Some people you meet, artists, intellectuals, business people, technological innovators are having a great time because we are inventing so many new things, we are in a whirl, or an extraordinary whirlwind, in which there are all kinds of stimulation. The people who are excluded from this system are not simply poor, exploited or even irrelevant, they’re those who don’t understand this enjoyment of creativity and innovation. That’s why we’re living in two different cultures: a culture of bewilderment about the world we live in and a culture of innovation, creativity and the opening of new frontiers (4).

To everyone who did not have the privilege of being raised on a farm, I am sorry. Your childhood was severely robbed! I was raised on a farm located in the south east corner of Idaho, and it was there that I learned every life lesson needed to survive. I worked hard all year round, I learned how to improvise, sacrifice, gain, lose and love. I learned about death and, more importantly, I learned about life. One night in particular taught me what it means to live, and gave me a connection with Charlotte’s Web, which is why I chose to spend an intense seven weeks studying E.B. Whites story of Wilbur and his quest to live a long life.

For weeks now our family had been awaiting the arrival of the piglet litter. One night I happened to glance out the window and see the pig’s light was on, and I instinctively knew why. My dad had gone over earlier to check on the pig, so I grabbed my coat and slipped my rubber boots over the tops of my pajamas and ran across the road. I took the shortcut through the hole in the wall that dumped me right into the pig’s pen, and saw my dad sitting to the side watching a handful of baby piglets squeak and runt around for their first meal. My dad pointed to a small little porker and said, “There’s Wilbur.” As I look back on this memory after examining Charlotte's Web I recognize the compliment that little piggy was unknowingly given. Wilbur's story is a classic about love, life and friendship, and of course a little gluttony brought to us by Templeton, the gluttonous rat.

The Primary Text

The entirety of this English 295 course has been devoted to exploring, creating, consuming and evaluating literature in ways that are not traditional. This course of action brought into question what is considered to be the primary text of a piece of literature. With new technology being developed on a daily basis, it is understandable that the arts should not go unaffected. The traditional primary text is the physical book that is published and sold in bookstores; however, using non-traditional adaptations of a novel such as film, audio or other versions will create a new experience and understanding of the text that is unique to each form and beneficial to consumers.

The Traditional Book

I started my research project with Charlotte's Web by reading the original text E.B. White written back in 1952. I love this book; it brings back fond and not so fond memories of my childhood. I literally laughed out loud when I read the some of the beginning lines about Fern being "up at daylight, trying to rid the world of injustice" (5). I've heard this line quoted to me countless times from my own father. There is something special about reading a book. Ironically, Wilbur D. Nesbit authored a poem about books which begins "Who hath a book/ Has friends at hand,/ And gold and gear/ at his command" (Felleman, 629). Mr Nesbit was very wise; the printed text is like a friend. There is a unknown relationship that the reader forms with the pages, cover and feel of the printed book. Tammy Stephens, an English teacher who has taught almost every grade, incorporates other mediums of the text in her lessons, but emailed me her feelings on reading the printed text. She said, "I truly believe one cannot fully experience an author's words without reading those words. Probably, the book on an electronic device is very good, but I do love turning pages!"(Stephens). This connection with the book is in the entire reading process from seeing the words spelled out, to turning the pages, to fanning the pages to see how many are left, all the way down to falling asleep while reading the book before bed.

The Film as Primary

Unfortunately, there is no record of the first book turned big screen, but whatever that text might have been, it paved a road lined with Grammys and academy awards. In Christine Geraghty’s book, Now a Major Motion Picture: Film Adaptations of Literature and Drama, she poses the argument that adaptations make explicit what seems to be implicit in a book. She defines explicit as “a recognition of ghostly presences and a shadowing or doubling of what is on the surface by what is glimpsed behind” (195). To all who crow that film makers twist the plot line, create or kill characters or morph the original out of shape, this is why. The medium of visual literature has been sculpted out of the implicit words behind, between and below the original text. That being understood, this new vehicle of literature is now a new experience of the text. As I read Charlotte’s Web, I came across a passage that was so beautifully written I read it twice. Chapter 19 of the story begins with a scenic description, “Next morning when the first light came into the sky and the sparrows stirred in the trees, when the cows rattled their chains and the rooster crowed and the early automobiles went whispering along the road…” (144). As each description is read, it is added to the imaginary scene; however, I could pinpoint this exact scene in the movie when the screen faded into the beautiful morning complete. The visual was a new experience as it was given in its entirety rather than pieced together word by word. As soon as a I saw this picture my mind immediately jumped to morning on the farm when I would pause in moving my irrigation pipe and look at the sun shining in the morning sky, and think to myself what a beautiful world I live in. Experiencing a text through a visual medium is not a lazy way to consume; in fact, it can enhance an already beautiful passage into a powerful scene of the film.

The Audiobook as Primary

One of my earliest memories is of hearing the words of an author read aloud to me instead of myself reading the text. I remember laying on my parents’ bed with my sister on one side and my dad on the other. I listened to his soothing voice as he read the story of Big Dan and Little Anne and their coon hunting adventures in Where the Red Fern Grows. My father would change his voice with each character, and his tone would reflect the mood of the scenes. Through audio I could devote my entire focus on envisioning the story of the two dogs, and my experience with Charlotte's Web in audio format was equally memorable.

Audio books were first produced in 1935 for war veterans returning home from World War I suffering blindness, Agatha Christie and Joseph Conrad were the first authors to be transformed into spoken word (Philips, 294-295). With this knowledge, it is now discrimination to say that listening to a primary text is not really reading the book. That may be extreme, but that does not make it any less true. Over time, however, what was once produced as a resource for the blind is now marketed as new medium of literature. I purchased the audio book version of Charlotte’s Web after I had read the original text, and even though the words did not change, the experience of listening to the author read his own words enhanced the story. The parting lines are normally piercing, but in audio format it was an entirely different piercing. Instead of snapping the cover of the book shut in triumph over finishing the text, I sat in thunderous silence as E.B. White read his parting lines about Charlotte. “She was in a class by herself. It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both” (184). In audio format I was forced to give these lines and the story as a whole a moment of silent reflection before the end credits began. This is not guaranteed when reading the text in its primary form. The reader sets the pace and gives as little or as much reflection as he sees fit, but in audio, the consumer is required to wait, to listen to anticipate the next words, which turns a typical reading into an active participation of the text.

Video Game as Primary

The list of non-traditional texts is not limited to film and audio. There are countless ways to experience traditional writing via art, music, comics, plays and even video games. Each one of these unique vehicles of experiencing has their own set of pros and cons. I chose to go outside of my box (way outside), and experience Charlotte’s Web in video game format. I’ve played video games before; one I once spent an evening playing Halo, and I will not lie, I was terrible. However, for one evening I became a character in White’s classic tale by spinning my own web of words to save the life of a piglet. I left the realm of merely reading about Charlotte’s creations, or even listening or watching her spin a web, and I became Charlotte. I chose the words to weave and where to weave them. I left the bystander position of consumer and became a creator along with the author and characters. Experiencing the text through this medium develops an appreciation for modern technology. A video game was no longer a way to waste time, but it became a medium of teaching a reader exactly how difficult it is to spin words in a web. In a digital literature study, Anna Gunder claims that “the digitisation of the media scape has affected the nature of . . . media migration by giving birth to new artistic forms such as computer games and digital hyperfiction. But it has also provided new means for storage and presentation of texts and works (Gunder, 31). This movement enhances the original; it creates new means for literature to be consumed, and each one gives the reader a new experience with any particular passage of text.

Conclusion

There is no longer a solid definition of the primary text because in the modern technological world, a piece of literature can be consumed in multiple ways, and depending on the medium in which it was experienced, that can become the primary text for readers. Each format connects to the reader in different ways, which means the purpose of reading a text is fulfilled differently to each reader. The themes and overall moral of the story are best processed by whichever format creates the most personal connection with the reader. Next time you pick up a book, experiment a little and pop in a CD of it instead.

Castells, Manuel. The Internet Galaxy: Reflections on Internet Business and Society. Oxford: Oxford University, 2001. Print.

Charlotte’s Web. Dir. Gary Winick. Paramount Pictures, 2006. Film.

Geraghty, Christine. Now a Major Motion Picture: Film Adaptations of Literature and Drama. Mary Land: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Print.

Gunder, Anna. Hyperworks: On Digital Literature and Computer Games. Uppsala: Uppsala University, 2004. Print.

Philips, Deborah. “Talking Books: The Encounter of Literature and Technology in the Audio Book.” Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 13.293 (2007):293-306. Print.

Stephens, Tammy. Personal interview. 1 July 2011.

Nesbit, Wilbur D. "Who Hath a Book." The Best Loved Poems of the American People. Ed. Edward Frank Allen. NY: Doubleday, 1936. 629-630. Print.

White, Elwyn Brooks. Charlotte’s Web. New York: Harper Collins, 1952. Print.

White, Elwyn Brooks. Charlotte’s Web. Unabridged Audiobook, 2002. CD.

Carlie Wallentine
Five Things She loves:
1) Flowers
2) Stars
3) Cowboy Boots
4) Snow Storms
5) Cooking

Tweethis

In Monday's class, Dr Burton asked us all to take our thesis for our chapters, and work it down into a 'tweetable' sentence. I don't know much about Twitter, but I do know a thing or two about texting. One of the most irritating aspects of a text message is the character count. When I write a text I can only have 160 characters, which means it counts each individual letter, space and punctuation, and when it reaches 160 the text breaks into two messages. I hate this! I want to be able to put in apostrophes, commas, periods, spaces and smiley face emoticons without being counted and limited! As soon as my text goes into two messages I go back to the start and begin deleting the commas. If that doesn't bring it down to one messages then I go back and take out all apostrophes, then end punctuation, then I start putting random words into contractions (minus the apostrophe, of course!), and finally I will start deleting spaces between words. It doesn't bother me at all to receive a text that is in two pages, but for some odd reason another weird quirk about me is proper grammar in text messages and two page text messages. So, when asked to make my thesis 'textable' I scowled at Dr Burton. Here are a few of my attempts at texting my thesis:

The Original

The traditional primary text is the physical book that is published and sold in bookstores; however, using non-traditional adaptations of a novel such as film, audio or other versions will create a new experience and understanding of the text that is unique to each form and beneficial to consumers.

Character count: 299 :(

First Attempt

The traditional primary text is the print book thats sold in bookstores however using nontraditional adaptations of a novel such as film audio or other versionsll create an experience and understanding of it thats unique to each form and beneficial to readers.

Character count: 261

Second Attempt

Nontraditional adaptations like film, audio or other versions will create a new experience and understanding of the text that is unique to each form and beneficial to consumers.

Character count: 176

Third Attempt

Film, audio or other versions will create a new experience and understanding of the text that is unique to each form and beneficial to consumers.

Character count: 144!

Whew, third time is the charm, right? I thought about texting my 'twethis' to Dr Burton to make sure that it was textable, but since it is 10:30pm I decided not to test my grade against that! : )

Good, Better, Best: Which Text is the Primary Text? (Second Draft)

Some people you meet, artists, intellectuals, business people, technological innovators are having a great time because we are inventing so many new things, we are in a whirl, or an extraordinary whirlwind, in which there are all kinds of stimulation. The people who are excluded from this system are not simply poor, exploited or even irrelevant, they’re those who don’t understand this enjoyment of creativity and innovation. That’s why we’re living in two different cultures: a culture of bewilderment about the world we live in and a culture of innovation, creativity and the opening of new frontiers (4).

To everyone who did not have the privilege of being raised on a farm, I am sorry. Your childhood was severely robbed! I was raised on a farm located in the south east corner of Idaho, and it was there that I learned every life lesson needed to survive. I worked hard all year round, I learned how to improvise, sacrifice, gain, lose and love. I learned about death and, more importantly, I learned about life. One night in particular taught me what it means to live, and gave me a connection with Charlotte’s Web that is deeper than just reading the text.

For weeks now our family had been awaiting the arrival of the piglet litter. One night I happened to glance out the window and see the pig’s light was on, and I instinctively knew why. My dad had gone over earlier to check on the pig, so I grabbed my coat and slipped my rubber boots over the tops of my pajamas and ran across the road. I took the shortcut through the hole in the wall that dumped me right into the pig’s pen, and saw my dad sitting to the side watching a handful of baby piglets squeak and runt around for their first meal. My dad pointed to a small little porker and said, “There’s Wilbur.”

The Primary Text

The entirety of this English 295 course has been devoted to exploring, creating, consuming and evaluating literature in ways that are not traditional. This course of action brought into question what is considered to be the primary text of a piece of literature. With new technology being developed on a daily basis, it is understandable that the arts should not go unaffected. The traditional primary text is the physical book that is published and sold in bookstores; however, using non-traditional adaptations of a novel such as film, audio or other versions will create a new experience and understanding of the text that is unique to each form and beneficial to consumers.

The Film as Primary

Unfortunately, there is no record of the first book turned big screen, but whatever that text might have been, it paved a road lined with Grammys and academy awards. In Christine Geraghty’s book, Now a Major Motion Picture: Film Adaptations of Literature and Drama, she poses the argument that adaptations make explicit what seems to be implicit in a book. She defines explicit as “a recognition of ghostly presences and a shadowing or doubling of what is on the surface by what is glimpsed behind” (195). To all who crow that film makers twist the plot line, create or kill characters or morph the original out of shape, this is why. The medium of visual literature has been sculpted out of the implicit words behind, between and below the original text. That being understood, this new vehicle of literature is now a new experience of the text. As I read Charlotte’s Web, I came across a passage that was so beautifully written I read it twice. Chapter 19 of the story begins with a scenic description, “Next morning when the first light came into the sky and the sparrows stirred in the trees, when the cows rattled their chains and the rooster crowed and the early automobiles went whispering along the road…” (144). As each description is read, it is added to the imaginary scene; however, I could pinpoint this exact scene in the movie when the screen faded into the beautiful morning complete. The visual was a new experience as it was given in its entirety rather than pieced together word by word. As soon as a I saw this picture my mind immediately jumped to morning on the farm when I would pause in moving my irrigation pipe and look at the sun shining in the morning sky, and think to myself what a beautiful world I live in. Experiencing a text through a visual medium is not a lazy way to consume; in fact, it can enhance an already beautiful passage into a powerful scene of the film.

The Audiobook as Primary

One of my earliest memories is of an audiobook. I was laying down on my parents’ bed with my sister on one side and my dad on the other. I listened to his soothing voice as he read the story of Big Dan and Little Anne and their coon hunting adventures in Where the Red Fern Grows. I have never read the story myself, but I consider my experience with the story complete via audio. First produced in 1935 for war veterans returning home from World War I suffering blindness, Agatha Christie and Joseph Conrad were the first authors to be transformed into spoken word (Philips, 294-295). With this knowledge, it is now discrimination to say that listening to a primary text is not really reading the book. That may be extreme, but that does not make it any less true. Over time, however, what was once produced as a resource for the blind is now marketed as new medium of literature. I purchased the audio book version of Charlotte’s Web after I had read the original text, and even though the words did not change, the experience of listening to the author read his own words enhanced the story. The parting lines are normally piercing, but in audio format it was an entirely different piercing. Instead of snapping the cover of the book shut in triumph over finishing the text, I sat in thunderous silence as E.B. White read his parting lines about Charlotte. “She was in a class by herself. It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both” (184). In audio format I was forced to give these lines and the story as a whole a moment of silent reflection before the end credits began. This is not guaranteed when reading the text in its primary form. The reader sets the pace and gives as little or as much reflection as he sees fit, but in audio, the consumer is required to wait, to listen to anticipate the next words, which turns a typical reading into an active participation of the text.

Video Game as Primary

The list of non-traditional texts is not limited to film and audio. There are countless ways to experience traditional writing via art, music, comics, plays and even video games. Each one of these unique vehicles of experiencing has their own set of pros and cons. I chose to go outside of my box (way outside), and experience Charlotte’s Web in video game format. I’ve played video games before; one I once spent an evening playing Halo, and I will not lie, I was terrible. However, for one evening I became a character in White’s classic tale by spinning my own web of words to save the life of a piglet. I left the realm of merely reading about Charlotte’s creations, or even listening or watching her spin a web, and I became Charlotte. I chose the words to weave and where to weave them. I left the bystander position of consumer and became a creator along with the author and characters. Experiencing the text through this medium develops an appreciation for modern technology. A video game was no longer a way to waste time, but it became a medium of teaching a reader exactly how difficult it is to spin words in a web. In a digital literature study, Anna Gunder claims that “the digitisation of the media scape has affected the nature of . . . media migration by giving birth to new artistic forms such as computer games and digital hyperfiction. But it has also provided new means for storage and presentation of texts and works (Gunder, 31). This movement enhances the original; it creates new means for literature to be consumed, and each one gives the reader a new experience with any particular passage of text.

Conclusion

There is no longer a solid definition of the primary text because in the modern technological world, a piece of literature can be consumed in multiple ways, and depending on the medium in which it was experienced, that can become the primary text for readers. Each format connects to the reader in different ways, which means the purpose of reading a text is fulfilled differently to each reader. The themes and overall moral of the story are best processed by whichever format creates the most personal connection with the reader. Next time you pick up a book, experiment a little and pop in a CD of it instead.

Correspondence With English Teachers

After Wednesday's class period I sent an email to a couple of my old high school English teachers asking them how they incorporate different formats of a text into their teaching. I was surprised by the detailed message I received in return from Ms Tammy Stephens. Below is my email I sent to her, and her response she sent back to me:

Hi Mrs Stephens!

I hope this email finds you well--especially since school just got out! I have a huge favor to ask you!

I am currently in a class that is publishing its own eBook, and my contributing chapter is about the nature of primary text. So, for this semester I have been consuming Charlotte's Web in every way possible. I watched movies, listened to the audio book, read the picture book and played the Charlotte's Web video game. Now that I am done, I am researching about what the primary text is. For example, if a person has only ever consumed Charlotte's Web in movie format, have they really experienced the book? My class focuses on technology and modern era, so the point is that not everybody sits down and reads a book today, but they can listen, watch or play books now.

So, my question for you is basically how do you, as a teacher, feel about this? Would you ever teach Shakespeare in film adaptations? Listen to poetry instead of read it? Basically, would you consider a student's experience with a certain text complete if they consumed it in a different format?

Thank you so much for taking time to help me on this. Hope your summer has been great so far!

Her response:

Carlie,

It is wonderful to hear from you!! What an interesting class. I graduated from college in 1983 (Apple IIE was the up-and-coming computer!), so this is absolutely foreign to me, as far as an undergraduate college course is concerned.

You are asking a dinosaur about modern technology (though I did finally purchase a laptop, which I am using, via our wireless modem-- whoohoo!!). So, here goes.

I walk my dog twice (or more) times a day and consume books via my MP3 player. I like that, but when I find one I truly enjoy, I often read the print version (i.e., paper version not Kindle). I discover very quickly that I did not get even a small portion of the beauty of the language, the poetry of the imagery, nor an iota of the emotions when I listened as I walked. There is something so sensual (yes, I chose that word on purpose) in curling up with a printed book, turning pages, rereading interesting passages, that is lost in any other medium. Ok, I have not tried the electronic book form, partly because my eyes focus better on printed pages than electronic ones.

I use electronic mediums more often than ever before-- videos, YouTube, movie clips, and more-- but it is to enhance learning. When I teach Shakespeare, I begin with the taped versions, with the BBC Shakespeare Company (complete with British accents) reading it with us-- the printed text is there and I pause often to discuss. Soon, however, students are reading it alone.

IMHO-- a movie is someone else's vision of what the printed page holds. I truly believe one cannot truly experience what the author meant w/o experiencing the author's true words. Far too often, the director's version and the version in my mind are so totally different that I hate the movie!! Sometimes, however, a truly well-made movie enhances my experience of the novel. The Mel Gibson version of Hamlet is one example, as are the Lord of the Rings trilogy movies. But those seem to be exceptions.

RE: listening to poetry-- I do that more often than I ever thought I would, but I am very picky! I have several dialect poems that the regular seniors study that I let them listen to as they read-- it's so much better to listen to someone reading in that dialect. If I find a truly great reader, I will let students listen, but with the text in front of them. Again, if we're studying poetry, we need to go back to the words to find the imagery, figurative language, poetic devices such as rhyme scheme and alliteration, and so forth.

This year, I got a great copy of Ipsen's "The Doll House" and we basically watched it instead of reading it; however, I did assign the reading and then quizzed them over differences (I'm so mean!). They all agreed it was wonderful to watch it, but the director left out a few small parts they thought were vital, and one scene was quite different in action from the stage directions in the play. But it was successful and I will do it again.

In a nutshell, I truly believe one cannot fully experience an author's words without reading those words. Probably, the book on an electronic device is very good, but I do love the feel of turning pages!

I hope this helps. Let me know if you need anything else. I'd love a copy of your finished project!

Tammy

Not only is her response interesting to see how modern mediums are taking part of a classroom, but also she is a potential consumer of our eBook!

What Qualifies as Primary Text? (First Draft)

“Because literacy itself is undergoing rapid and radical changes, the conventional interpretive essay and its convention may no longer be adequate either for academic or broader purposes. Therefore, a part of this course will be devoted to critiquing the traditional writing about literature, exploring the new modes of communication now emerging, and critically evaluating them. . .” (Burton 2). A part of this course? I will boldly say that is an understatement; the entirety of this course has been devoted to exploring, creating, consuming and evaluating literature in ways that are not traditional. This course of action brought into question what is considered to be the primary text of a piece of literature. With new technology being developed on a daily basis, it is understandable that the arts should not go unaffected. The traditional primary text is the physical book that is published and sold in bookstores; however, using non-traditional adaptations of a novel such as film, audio or other versions will create a new experience and understanding of the text that is unique to each form and beneficial to consumers.

Unfortunately, there is no record of the first book turned big screen, but whatever that text might have been, it paved a road lined with Grammys and academy awards. In Linda Hutcheon’s book, Now a Major Motion Picture: Film Adaptations of Literature and Drama, she poses the argument that adaptations make explicit what seems to be implicit in a book. She defines explicit as “a recognition of ghostly presences and a shadowing or doubling of what is on the surface by what is glimpsed behind” (195). To all who crow that film makers twist the plot line, create or kill characters or morph the original out of shape, this is why. The medium of visual literature has been sculpted out of the implicit words behind, between and below the original text. That being understood, this new vehicle of literature is now a new experience of the text. As I read Charlotte’s Web, I came across a passage that was so beautifully written I read it twice. Chapter 19 of the story begins with a scenic description, “Next morning when the first light came into the sky and the sparrows stirred in the trees, when the cows rattled their chains and the rooster crowed and the early automobiles went whispering along the road…” (144). As each description is read, it is added to the imaginary scene; however, I could pinpoint this exact scene in the movie when the screen faded into the beautiful morning complete. The visual was a new experience as it was given in its entirety rather than pieced together word by word. Experiencing a text through a visual medium is not a lazy way to consume; in fact, it can enhance an already beautiful passage into a powerful scene of film.

Another hybrid of primary text is the audio book. First produced in 1935 for war veterans returning home from World War I suffering blindness, Agatha Christie and Joseph Conrad were the first authors to be transformed into spoken word (Philips, 294-295). With this knowledge, it is now discrimination to say that listening to a primary text is not really reading the book. That may be extreme, but that does not make it any less true. Over time, however, what was once produced as a resource for the blind is now marketed as new medium of literature. I purchased the audio book version of Charlotte’s Web after I had read the original text, and even though the words did not change, the experience of listening to the author read his own words enhanced the story. The parting lines are normally piercing, but in audio format it was an entirely different piercing. Instead of snapping the cover of the book shut in triumph over finishing the text, I sat in thunderous silence as E.B. White read his parting lines about Charlotte. “She was in a class by herself. It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both” (184). In audio format I was forced to give these lines and the story as a whole a moment of silent reflection before the end credits began. This is not guaranteed when reading the text in its primary form. The reader sets the pace and gives as little or as much reflection as he sees fit, but in audio, the consumer is required to wait, to listen to anticipate the next words, which turns a typical reading into an active participation of the text.

The list of non-traditional texts is not limited to film and audio. There are countless ways to experience traditional writing via art, music, comics, plays and even video games. Each one of these unique vehicles of experiencing has their own set of pros and cons. I chose to go outside of my box (way outside), and experience Charlotte’s Web in video game format. For one evening I became a character in White’s classic tale by spinning my own web of words to save the life of a piglet. I left the realm of merely reading about Charlotte’s creations, or even listening or watching her spin a web, and I became Charlotte. I chose the words to weave and where to weave them. I left the bystander position of consumer and became a creator along with the author and characters. Experiencing the text through this medium develops an appreciation for modern technology. A video game was no longer a way to waste time, but it became a medium of teaching a reader exactly how difficult it is to spin words in a web. In a digital literature study, Anna Gunder claims that “the digitisation of the media scape has affected the nature of . . . media migration by giving birth to new artistic forms such as computer games and digital hyperfiction. But it has also provided new means for storage and presentation of texts and works (Gunder, 31). This movement enhances the original; it creates new means for literature to be consumed, and each one gives the reader a new experience with any particular passage of text.

There is no longer a solid definition of the primary text because in the modern technological world, a piece of literature can be consumed in multiple ways, and depending on the medium in which it was experienced, that can become the primary text for readers. You may disagree, and to that I have only Manuel Castells’ response to give:

Some people you meet, artists, intellectuals, business people, technological innovators are having a great time because we are inventing so many new things, we are in a whirl, or an extraordinary whirlwind, in which there are all kinds of stimulation. The people who are excluded from this system are not simply poor, exploited or even irrelevant, they’re those who don’t understand this enjoyment of creativity and innovation. That’s why we’re living in two different cultures: a culture of bewilderment about the world we live in and a culture of innovation, creativity and the opening of new frontiers (4).

Burton, Gideon. “Writing about Literature in the Digital Age.” 2011. Print.

Castells, Manuel. The Internet Galaxy: Reflections on Internet Business and Society. Oxford: Oxford University, 2001. Print.

Charlotte’s Web. Dir. Gary Winick. Paramount Pictures, 2006. Film.

Geraghty, Christine. Now a Major Motion Picture: Film Adaptations of Literature and Drama. Mary Land: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Print.

Gunder, Anna. Hyperworks: On Digital Literature and Computer Games. Uppsala: Uppsala University, 2004. Print.

Philips, Deborah. “Talking Books: The Encounter of Literature and Technology in the Audio Book.” Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 13.293 (2007):293-306. Print.

White, Elwyn Brooks. Charlotte’s Web. New York: Harper Collins, 1952. Print.

White, Elwyn Brooks. Charlotte’s Web. Unabridged Audiobook, 2002. CD.