Course:Recurring Questions of Technology/Keywords/U V W
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
U
Ubiquitous
Derived from Latin (ubīque: present or appearing everywhere), this adjective was first cited in 1837 by American novelist C. M. Sedgewick's in her novel Live and Let Live. More recently this term has become popular with researchers describing technology in the 21st century. In 1988 Mark Weisner" coined the term ubiquitous technology" which referred to the profound ways technologies have woven themselves into the daily fabric of everyday life, until they become indistinguishable. Without being consciously aware, people are interacting with technology daily (i.e. smartphones, mobile devices, Internet, gaming devices, TV, etc.) Furthermore, in The Wealth of Networks Yochai Benkler (2006) states "Personal computers and networked connections are ubiquitous". Unlike decades past, he argues the physical materials needed to communicate and produce in our "networked information economy" are now either owned or accessible by the commons. The result, Benkler believes "is a flourishing non market sector of information, knowledge, and cultural production, based in networked environment, and applied to anything that the many individuals connected to it can imagine". In the realm of education, van 't Hooft and Swan (2007) authors of Ubiquitous Computing in Education: Invisible Technology, Visible Impact, suggest a transformation is also occurring in education, as growing numbers of teachers and their students have access to technology. Similar to Benkler, they argue the result is active participation of all in the learning process; both creating and producing. In fact, if the current growth rate of people accessing the Internet continues as it has in the past, Coiro, Knoble, Lankshear, and Leu (2008) suggest "almost half of the world's population will be online by 2012 and Internet access will be nearly ubiquitous [everywhere] sometime thereafter". (Jennifer Barker)
Universalization
Derived from the Anglo-Norman universell and Middle French universal. First used in English in this form in 1798 in reference to the process of making something work for the whole world. In his examination of George Grant’s work, William Pinar (2012) cites Grant when he suggests that “Canada’s capitulation was another ‘realization of the technological dream,’ e.g. ‘universalization and homogenization’” (The First Task of Thought In Our Time, p. 3). Pinar further states that because of technology, this universalization is “not just one optional mode d'être, but the only way of life on earth” (p. 3). In this sense, Grant (by way of Pinar) is pointing out that the potential impact of the pervasive democratizing effect of technology is that it will spread itself to all corners of the earth in such a way that it begins to eliminate difference between peoples. In a different context, universalization is used to discuss the notion of principles that apply to all. Egonsson (1997) asks the question of “what it means to say that the universalization of an action under a certain description is acceptable” (“Kant’s vegetarianism”, p. 474). In this context, Egonsson explains that use of universalization is “that we should act only in accordance with that maxim which we can at the same time will that it should become a universal law” (p. 474). Following this same line of thinking, Buckle (2005) says simply that “universalizing is necessary for ethics” (“Peter Singer’s Argument For Utilitarianism”). (Ian Felgar)
User-Driven
According to Benlker, in his article The Wealth of Networks(2006), user-driven is a term coined to describe communities of developers supporting open-source software. User-driven was first cited in 1969 during the AFIPS Spring Computer Conference during which William M. Zani discussed On-Line Business Applications, “The act of mimicking dynamics is a (user-driven) dynamic picture.” In Cho and Olson’s article, in the Journal of Operational Research Society, when discussing The Evolution of Management Science and the Birth of Self-Starters, they use the term ‘user-driven’ to describe the work that the user does, differentiating this from the act of a user simply participating. "These users are working out problems without external direction," (1989). By the nineties, the term user-driven, was being used to describe the work being done by an expert user (as opposed to using an algorithim) for image enhancement related to genetic programming. By 2003 we can observe a shift in the use of the word. Where originally the focus has been computer software and applications now we see it used in the context of branding" "a clean, user-driven U.S. brand that understands the needs of the modern mountain activist" (Mountain, Trek & Travel Catalogue, Ellis Brigham). The concept user-driven has been expanded by Eric von Hippel to not only include the developers in the open-source community but also to include the individual user who is intrinsically motivated to express her creativity and who fulfills an individual’s need to be participatory, The Wealth of Networks(2006). (Adrienne Longworth)
V
Values
Value is defined as worth or quality as measured by a standard of equivalence. In use in English since the 13th century with regards to the monetary worth of objects. However, it was also used to mean the worth of objects based on esteem and the quality of importance. Values, the collective form of the word, are measured not by money but by esteem, desirability or usefulness. The word came to be used in philosophy and the social sciences in the 19th century to discuss the principles or moral standards held in relation to an individual or group. In 1844 Emerson discussed the effect of consumerism or 'trade' on our moral values and draws attention to the impact of government and trade on our moral values. “Trade..tends to convert Government into a bureau of intelligence, an Intelligence-Office, where every man may find what he wishes to buy, and expose what he has to sell, not only produce and manufactures, but art, skill, and intellectual and moral values”(OED). The subjectivity of our values is drawn to attention in the modern information age. George Grant in Time as History explains: “Till recently it was assumed that our mastery of the earth would be used to promote the values of freedom, rationality and equality- that is the values of social democracy.” Unfortunately what is increasingly evident is that there are no moral guidelines. The values that indivduals have are being dominated by the corporate values. Grant discusses this subjectivity and reminds us that “all values are relative and man made: the highest values of the past have devaluated themselves.” William Pinar helps us to understand Grants concern. Whatever their function, “values” were to be confined to the private sphere where one was, presumably, free to do what one wanted. The public sphere was no longer the civic square but, rather, the marketplace, the site where one purchased whatever one valued.” (Pinar, morning lecture, June 13th 2012) Although Grant and Pinar call on us to question the use of technology in stripping away the role of moral values in society and they remind us of the concerns against the increasing commodification of our modern environment and the loss of core values that support the common good. Benkler in Wealth of Networks (2006), offers a different view and calls on us to consider that the modern drive of technology and information production actually breaks down the barriers and “opens a range of possibilities for pursuing the core political values of liberal societies— individual freedom, a more genuinely participatory political system, a critical culture, and social justice.” (Holly)
Visibility
Visibility from late Latin vīsibilitāt or French visibilité. The condition, state, or fact of being visible; visible character or quality; capacity of being seen or perceptible to vision. In English the word was used as early as 1581 in reference to the importance of the visibility of the church “What visibilitie could there be in those daies.., when there was no face at all of an outward Church?” (OED). In the context of modern technology it is used in regards to surveillance. Technologies are being created to increase the visibility of people as citizens to control, and consumers to be led to market. William Staples looks at this in his book Everyday Surveillance, Vigilance and Visibility “We seem to be entering a permanent state of visibility that attempts to control and shape our behaviour, in essence our bodies, are accomplished not so much by the threat of punishment and phyiscal force but by the act of being watched” (Staples, 2000). “New conditions of visibility which alter the ratios shaping the connections between public life and private life. The spaces of anonymity are disappearing as our online and offline lives merge” (Poyntz, 2012 in lecture) Crang and Graham discuss the politics of visibility in Sentinent Cities where they look at how “ technologies make our habits and practices visible.” They discuss how technologies make us knowable to each other , traceable by the military and marketable as a consumer. (Crang & Graham, 2007) De Certeau questions our need for visibility in regards to consumer society as being ‘characterized by a cancerous growth of vision, measuring everything by its ability to show or be shown (Quoted in Crang, 2007). The challenge is that in accepting these technologies into our lives that allow for the visibility of our every experience, we are giving up our privacy as well as our agency to the public technological realm. (Holly Paris)
Virtual Education
Virtual education refers to teaching and learning happened at different times or places supported by modern technologies. Instructions can happen at different times but same place (i.e. classroom capture system); different places but same time (i.e. web conferencing and videoconferencing); different times and different places (i.e. internet archiving). In Wikipedia, the definition for Virtual education is: “Virtual education is a term describing online education using the Internet. This term is used in K-12 schooling, often to refer to cyber schools, and in higher education, where so-called Virtual Universities have been established. A virtual program (or a virtual course of studies) is a study program in which all courses, or at least a significant portion of the courses, are virtual courses, whether in synchronous (i.e. real time) or asynchronous (i.e. self-paced) formats.” Centuries ago, teachers and students are connected together through books. They used writing and reading to record and playback, which enable instructions happened at different times or places. With the employment of current technologies, virtual education can be positioned with more innovative learning environment design and wider spectrum of instruction modes, instead of just “using new tools for old things” (Chris Kennedy, 2012). (Jennifer Jing Zhao)
Visuality
Derived from Latin (vīsus: sight) and late Latin (vīsuālis, vīsuālitas: attained by or belonging to sight) meaning the state or quality of being visual or visible to the mind - mental visibility - and can more specifically refer to mental picture or vision, even a visual aspect or representation. It was first used in this context in the mid-nineteenth century ("every compartment of it is worked out, with intense earnestness, into truth, into clear visuality," Thomas Carlyle, 1841). In literary analysis regarding narratology, Dobson, Michura, Ruecker, Brown, & Rodriguez in "Interactive visualizations of plot in fiction" (2011) contend that using emerging digital media to further study narrative structure will produce new forms of interactive visualization which address twenty-first century competences and technological literacies in the analysis of the concept of plot in fiction. New analyses considering structural and organizational techniques incorporating visuality not only generate diverse readings of the same story but point to varied complex considerations - manifold stories- within one narrative structure. Traditional analyses such as diagrams can be unsuccessful in examining certain essential aspects which embody and project a narrative's visual sphere, such as time, space, settings, constructs and characters. Through visuality the traditional "reading path" becomes multi-perspective and an interactive space is created in which the reader can actively participate. Franco Moretti in "Conjectures on World Literature" (2000) discusses the notion of 'distant reading' which can be seen as a loose visual narratology through which the development of visual models can but used to recognize and correlate different elements of the narrative. Visuality allows for different connections and perceptions to be made through associative interactive discovered and is a symbiotic relationship between digital media creators, readers and the text. Not only, as Mieke Bal states in Narratology: Introduction to the theory of narrative (1997), is attention to visuality "tremendously enriching for the analysis of literary narratives", but it is an essential consideration for literary educators in the twenty-first century. (Jim Shaw)
W
Web 2.0
The term web 2.0 was coined by Tim O'Reilly and refers to the social networking and social media functionality of the internet over the last decade. As the internet left the realm of exclusivity and became commonplace in regular life sites such as MySpace, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn gained popularity. The 2.0 in the term refers to the version names of traditional software since this cyberspace is seen as a new version of the internet. Ross Mayfield explained the term by saying, "Web 1.0 was commerce. Web 2.0 is people." Due to the ever changing nature of the web, there are questions about whether or not we may now be using Web 3.0, although this term has not entered common dialogue at as quick a rate. The claim is that Web 3.0 would be a Semantic Web and based on your past history it would be able to act as your personal assistant; recommending books, restaurants, music, etc. based on your previous choices. Web 2.0 is a participatory internet; it gains value and meaning the more its users contribute to it. Benkler explains web 2.0 in Wealth of Social Networks and "show[s] how a wide range of mechanisms — starting from the simple mailing list, through static Web pages, the emergence of writable Web capabilities, and mobility—are being embedded in a social system for the collection of politically salient information, observations, and comments, and provide a platform for discourse." Web 2.0 is based on a model of social capital and immaterial labor; it is an important step towards the cyborg life Haraway envisioned. (Ashley Bayles)
Willing
Derived from Old English (willung), willing traditionally refers to a wishing or desire (Oxford English Dictionary). Conversely, in his book/lectures "Time as History", George Grant defines willing as the determination to do; a taking of decisive action that impacts the world. According to Grant, the human race is determined, or willing, to create the future. In fact, what differentiates humans and animal is our ability to create novel experiences. The more new experiences we create the more we can be referred to as historical beings, with these events labeled as “progress” (p. 14). Technology can be leveraged to encourage willing and progress. However, danger lies in the consuming nature of technology. When progress becomes the primary focus, or a replacement for knowledge and morality, the willing to improve the world becomes an action against it (Pinar, W.F., The first task of thought in our time, 2012, p. 7). William Pinar (Modernity, Technology, Nationality, 2012) summarizes this idea nicely when he states “We live in the ideology of technology, a promised land where distraction renders forgiveness forgettable, replacing moral or material striving with momentary and virtual satiation” (p.1). The reason for living and willing becomes framed in consumerism rather than “spiritual discover or social understanding” (p.2). This is not to say technology should be ignored or resisted in order to improve willing because we can’t escape it. Grant, in referencing Nietzsche, states the danger is inherent in purporting our values onto nature in order to master it (p.35), not technology itself. As well, Nietzsche claims fate is tied to dynamic willing, but in his lectures Grant points out modern people are inclined to passivity, such as belief in destiny (45). This creates difficulty in defining willing as decisive action instead of a desire. A question that remains is how will technology continue to impact our willing? It is already an integral, if not essential, part of our lives. Will it, as Grant suggests, undermine our morals or, as Nietzsche asserts be the 'height of modern truthfulness and the centre of our destiny" (Grant). (Christie Robertson)
Weltliteratur
Weltliteratur is derived from German and translates directly to world literature. It was used by Goethe in 1827 to describe the circulation of literary works from around the world to Europe (Oxford English Dictionary; World Literature). Franco Moretti has brought this term to the forefront in his essay “Conjectures on World Literature.” In it he questions how the study of world literature should be implemented and he suggests distant reading as an option. He states, “world literature is not an object, it’s a problem, and a problem that asks for a new critical method; and no one has ever found a method by reading more texts” (p.55). Instead he postulates more can be learned from literature if it’s viewed through a lens that is much larger than the text, such as genre or theme. He steps away from Goethe's original projection of world literature as a singular object to suggest it is a “a world literary system (of inter-related literatures)” (p.56) that is unequal due to the impact of periphery culture(s) intersecting the core literature. In such, it is necessary to view them with a wider scope. This is contested by some scholars who maintain close reading of individual works is the best option for understanding the contexts, such as politics and economy, of the text. (World Literature, Contemporary understandings) Teresa Dobson (Interactive visualizations of plot in fiction) supports distant reading of world literature with her theories of visualization. Technology is making it easier for “readers and instructors to explore different structural features of the same story” (p.175) by using XML to construct diagrams of the visuality and relationships in a text. Incorporating visuality, a form of distant reading, enriches the study of narratology and world literature. The question that naturally arises is which is more appropriate in today's global society, close or distant reading? Or, would a blend of both, if possible, enrich learning? (Christie Robertson)