Poster

For Thursday’s class we had to read Mark Poster’s essay titled “Postmodern Virtualities.” In this essay Poster talks about the different ways in which new forms of communication is now shaping our identity and the person we become. A passage on page 534 explains this best when he writes, “In the 20^th century, electronic media are supporting an equally profound transformation of cultural identity. Telephone, radio, film, television, the computer and now their integration as ‘multimedia’ reconfigure words, sounds, and images so as to cultivate new configurations of individuality” (Poster, 534). As radio, TV, and film progress, our social cultural identity changes equally. I think the way we are able to communicate on computers and cell phones have been the most rapid change in the last few years. The advancements in laptop computers and Internet have made avenues of communication available. For the Internet there are networks such as AIM and Facebook that allows you to have a conversation through instant messaging. Now for the MacBooks they have iChat, which allows you to use the personal camera installed in the MacBook and have a face to face conversation with another person who also has a Mac. In today’s world, most of the American population uses one of these ways to communicate on the Internet.

Cell phones are another means of communication in today’s world. When I think of cell phones, the first thing that comes to my mind is the Rollins College community. This year especially, I have noticed that the majority of the kids that go to this school have either an iPhone or a Blackberry (myself included). To be honest I do not really know why I got a Blackberry. I have to pay 30 dollars a month extra for the plan for unlimited Internet and unlimited messages on the bbm (Blackberry Messenger). I just like how fast it is with the messaging and the keyboard is a lot easier too but it just goes to show that people in this world are obsessed with new technology and for the need of communication.

On my honor, I have not given nor received nor witnessed any unauthorized assistance on this blog.