This article seems to be the "genesis" of the Transliteracy movement. The main point of the article is that both print, digital, and all other modes of communication should not be seen as in competition with one another but as complementary to one another and simply different means to the same end. I found this article to be a bit too high-flung for my personal tastes--they've developed a team devoted to studying this concept over years, and the article is quite long (they even reference Socrates). I found myself rolling my eyes a bit as I read it, since after the first few paragraphs it seems like academia run haywire. But anyway, I like to connect this reading with the very popular, very divisive current debate over "print vs. e-book." There are some people who staunchly oppose e-readers, claiming that they will never use an e-reader, or read e-books, and that they love the smell of the paper and the feel of a book in hand. I get that, that's cool. I like print books, too. I grew up with them, they look good on my shelf, I get to use fun bookmarks, and that crinkle noise of a page turning is irreplaceable. And then you have other people who exclusively read e-books, claiming the convenience factor, and that the book is "dead" (much like libraries, right?). E-books are cheaper, you can carry a million books with you anywhere you go. That's great, too. When I'm reading A Song of Ice and Fire books, I don't really like carrying them with me on the bus. Or when I go on vacation, and I know I'll finish my one book on the trip there, so I need to pack an extra one, or two even, for the duration of my stay. That gets heavy, it takes up space in my bag, I could lose or damage them. So I dig e-readers, too. I think many people, myself among them, have discovered a healthy balance between the two forms. It's just two sides of the same coin. The print book isn't going away. The robots aren't taking over (yet). I think that's what these authors are trying to say in their article; that in the "modern age" we all need to become literate across a wide spectrum of media.
"Not Just Literate, but Transliterate: Encouraging Transliteracy Adoption in Library Services." Trimm, Nancy. Colorado Libraries. 36, 1. 2011. 1-3. (Sorry, no link. MLibraries doesn't want other people to see this.)
I found this article much easier to swallow. Anyway, here is a quote I liked about what it means to be transliterate in a library setting: "We help our users access and move between and across various media whether it is an encyclopedia, a research database, or a blog. As a result of the wide variety of our users' information needs and the wide variety of avenues by which those needs can be fulfilled, the information professional must be able to achieve competence in any number of social and technological communication platforms." Somewhat tellingly, I have a note next to this in my PDF file that says "Ugh, I guess I need to be more proactive about learning new technologies," and I think that sums up my position. I'm a lazy technology learner. I still don't have a Twitter account. This is my first attempt at a blog. I just got a smartphone less than a year ago, and I am not ashamed to admit that I don't know what the heck I am doing with it. In fact, I kind of hate it. In my past three months at UMSI I have learned more about current technology than I have in my life, probably (see the Alt+Tab trick on Windows. Wow.). So I guess that is what I am doing here at SI. This article points out technology as a natural extension of library services, which I think makes sense in terms of literacy skill.
"Transliteracy--New Library; What it Means for Instruction." Jaeger, Paige. Library Media Connection. Oct. 2011. 44-47.
This article was more focused on school library media than what I was expecting, apparently, which is not necessarily my focus area but I have thoughts on it, anyway. This article points to the Common Core Standards as a means to foster more transliterate instruction in schools. However, I felt that the actual message of the article missed the mark. I agree with the idea that librarians should be teaching students to evaluate the information they find online, but I really felt like this article was still struggling with the way things used to be done and simply trying to apply the same model to a new technique. The author says that the students of the "millennial" generation don't take the time to read for understanding, or that they speed over articles briefly before clicking onto a new page. This may come as shocking, but I am not a middle schooler. However, I am still young enough to be basically the "first generation" to be raised with the internet, and I firmly disagreed with the author. I think (sorry, I don't have research here to back me up) that students who were raised with these kinds of technology simply access and process information differently than those who weren't. Of course students will need to be taught what is credible on the internet and what is not. Of course when they are doing class projects they should be reading to understand the information. But I felt like this author really discounted the instructional power of multi-media tools which can enhance learning. It's simply the reality of the world we live in now.
Edit: I got to make a meme in class! :D
Love the meme! I admit, I am one of the ones that has been slow to adopt e-readers. My mom has one. So does my dad. Even my grandparents have I-Pads. In the case of Dad and grandparents, they're generally used for games, not reading, but still. I don't have one, and frankly I don't want one. I am too attached to the nostalgia of print books, I guess. There was one book in my undergrad that I had to purchase and read on my mom's Nook, and I hated the experience. Part of that may have been the book itself-- fiction wherein people were cloned, then the clones were used to "harvest" organs for the hosts-- but I didn't like any part of the experience, from holding the reader to "turning" pages to reading the text on the screen. I also know that e-readers are incredibly valuable for the reasons that you mentioned and more. They offer people access to things that they may not otherwise have gained, and they are here to stay because they are small, light, and easy-- and have built-in features like dictionaries to help readers understand the texts that they possess. They are equally valid-- we should just each have a choice about the format that we prefer.
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