Here’s a depressing and blunt comment from Larry McMurtry, speaking not only as a novelist but as a bookstore owner (it’s an interview):
The end of the culture of the book. I’m pessimistic. Mainly it’s the flow of people into my bookshop in Archer City. They’re almost always people over 40.
I don’t see kids, and I don’t see kids reading. I think little kids love to have stories read to them, but when they get to 10 or 11 or 12, they run into this tsunami of technology: iPod, iPhone, Blackberries.
They don’t resist it, and it’s normal that they wouldn’t; it’s their culture. I’m not so sure they ever come back to reading. Some will, but most won’t.
The tsunami metaphor is apt, and it points out the relationship between books and other media in kids’ lives. The list of options has grown, with books now joined by games, Web surfing, music downloading, Photoshop, YouTube, social networking, blogs, texting, IM, and the rest. Lots of folks think that the environment has grown more challenging and rewarding and enlightening, the addition of digital diversions fostering a rich plurality of texts and images and stories and sounds in which books maintain a central place.
Here is former Deputy Secretary of Education Eugene Hickok cited in a report on video games and learning by the American Federation of Scientists:
“The MTV generation is a different generation . . . they are not inclined to sit down and spend hours quietly reading a book. They’re more inclined to be reading three or four books at one time while they multi-task on their Palm Pilots.”
This is a rosy picture of leisure habits that misconstrues the relative demands of digital and book materials. In truth, it’s no contest. Digital tools exist in a hyper-competitive market, and they are accompanied by huge ad campaigns, media blasts, and (among young consumers) peer pressure. Web sites make money by attracting eyes and holding them there. They don’t want to share time with books. They want every waking moment.
Think of the window displays in Apple Stores a couple of years ago (see here). It presented a shelf of glistening laptops with the caption “The only books you’ll need.” Virginia Postrel called it “The Apple Store’s Campaign Against Books,” and it indicates the rivalry relationship between books and digital diversions.
So, when professors and intellectuals and futurists tweak and tease and resent the bookish types for being snooty about digital culture, for decrying games and Facebook, it’s a false frame. They aren’t brave souls standing up against an elitist culture Establishment. They are conformists going with the flow, and it’s a tidal wave.
Educators should heed McMurtry’s prediction and fight back, and we need more figures such as Oprah and Michael Bugeja (see one of his Chronicle pieces here), more reports such as the MLA/Teagle study of English curricula that defends literary understanding, blogs such as www.literarygulag.com, consumers heading to new and used bookstores for gifts and storytime for kids, organizations such as www.boysread.org . . .
(Brainstorm illustration incorporating photos by Flickr users abdelwahab alhajji and nyki m)
