Week 11 Reading Response
The article by Kathleen Blake Yancey, “Made Not Only in Words: Composition in a New Key”, is a very interesting piece to analyze how writing has evolved over time in good ways. Writing used to be more limited than it is today. It was more exclusive to “writers” writing on paper by hand and the writing machine later on. There is a significant difference when it comes to writing in the 19th century to today. In the past, writing was also thought more of a “classroom” activity were people would only write for academic purposes. Now, with all the new technologies and methods, writing has taken a whole new level. There are now visual methods such as blogs, websites, social media and people today now write about anything for their own fun or satisfaction. (Tumblr). A comparison can be portrayed of the printing press giving greater access to reading for people in the 19th century, and new technologies such as social media, giving access for more writing to the public mass.
(This GIF portrays a pen drawing out the steps and pieces of evolution to complete the final product: the pen. Just as writing has changed and evolved)
Traditional methods of teaching English and writing are not effective in the world we live today. As most things evolve, writing has changed too, and the need to adapt to the modern ways is imperative for students and teachers. Yancey focuses a lot on the importance for students to be literate to be successful in life. The techniques of using videos, audio, words, and pictures in different and efficient ways to speak and transmit a message effectively.
(Literacy is a key factor no matter the field of study)
From a business standpoint, being literate is very important especially in modern methods. To be able to communicate with potential clients or partners, the use different communication methods is very important. Also literacy helps us understand the message that other are trying to give us. In a marketing perspective, the use of social media and visual rhetoric is very important to be able to sell or transmit your product to different markets. I completely agree with Yancey’s article and find it very important to be a literate individual too.