The Unlimited Frontiers
4.10.07 | A few words about the American context are appropriate here. The new digital media bring to mind two longtime considerations. As formulated by the historian Frederick Jackson Turner, America has been a country of frontiers. At first the Eastern shore itself represented a frontier for Europeans on the run or on the make. Thereafter, the middle West, the far West, and the entertainment worlds of Hollywood represented frontiers of various sorts. With the NDM, we have a new and essentially unlimited set of frontiers—those embodied in virtual realities.
The second feature, pointed out almost 200 years ago by the French visitor Alexis de Tocqueville, is that America is a country of voluntary organizations. The NDM have spawned innumerable networks and associations, dedicated to every cause and pursuit that one can think of, and, no doubt, many that are inconceivable. Whether, in the long run, these voluntary sprouts will add up positively, negatively, or as an entirely mixed bag cannot be anticipated.
Reflecting these two features, Americans dislike to be regulated, and we push against strong government, particularly when it appears to be intrusive. Yet, it cannot be denied that the NDM are rife with opportunities for abuse, unethical behavior, or worse. We all witnessed the reaction of the government to corporate abuses in the rapid enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley bill. Should the inhabitants of the media be unable to provide internal or self-regulation, we can be certain that other forces—religious, corporate, governmental—will intervene.
The changes in each of the Kantian spheres will occur gradually, and at first they will appear to be quantitative, rather than qualitative, clearly in the realm of human culture rather than human nature. But at least in some of the spheres, a tipping point will be reached. At that time, the human senses of time, space, objects, identity, relations, and even ethics will no longer resemble those that obtained in earlier epochs. At that point, we may well declare “The new digital media have changed everything.”
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Sam Abramovich (Center for Technology in Education at Johns Hopkin)
5/15/07
2:23pm
First, I’d like to thank Dr. Gardner for his postings for what has to be one the most important topics facing the world in the 21st century.
I was curious what Dr. Gardner and others thought could be the international effects of the way American culture has and will influence the NDM. Jared Diamond stated in “Guns, Germs, and Steel” that geography caused societies to develop differently. The many examples in the book show how those differences have had monumental (and sometimes traumatic) changes on the world as a whole.
I would argue that America is in a similar scenario in respect to our culture and the NDM. Americans, as the creators for a lot of the NDM, have had an enormous cultural influence on its development. Consequently, there are many examples with the NDM of how American culture has spread to others.
As Dr. Gardner mentions however, the NDM is creating a reality where “space has only a metaphoric meaning”. Does this mean that the eventual result will be a singular homogenized world culture with equal contributions from worldwide participants? Or will America’s dominance in the NDM create similar scenarios to the past where one culture will become a dominating force?
Mechelle De Craene (James Buchanan Middle School)
5/19/07
12:43pm
Sam,
You make some interesting points. However…
Re: “Or will America’s dominance in the NDM create similar scenarios to the past where one culture will become a dominating force?”
Who says that the US is dominant in NDM? I have studied abroad and am not so sure this is true…especially with regard to K-12 tech and education. Do you have any scholarly research papers that back up this statement? If so, can you please post the reference?
Thank you kindly.
Mechelle
abramovs
6/5/07
4:36pm
Hi Mechelle,
Thanks for your comments.
You wrote, “Who says that the US is dominant in NDM?”
I was mostly attributing this to the prominence of Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and U.S. advertisers.
I look at an example of NDM like YouTube and see a large amount of American (or at least Western) content. The reason for my original post was to ask if, for example, the fact that since YouTube is first (and foremost) and American phenomenon then will that affect how it (and other NDM) develops across the world? Or will the pattern be more similar to Orkut (a Google product designed for the U.S. but now largely used my Brazilians)?