Our society has evolved greatly over the years and has allowed for major leaps forward in communication ability. Back before newspapers and telephones people would travel to get news, and hear gossip from traveling merchants, and now we are able to instantly access information from all over the world on our personal computer and phones. Our society continues to change and new social structures such as Facebook and MySpace, MSN and Skype, and forums and blogs have given us new ways to communicate and have created for us entirely new cultures.
In the past, culture has always been indicative of ethnicity, birth place, or how someone was raised. Traditional cultures, though they will always be apparent, are no longer the only cultures that people can identify with.
Online communities created through social networking websites, video games, and other online profiles are becoming places where people can interact with other people who have similar interests. One very simple example of this is by joining “groups” on Facebook. People who are on Facebook often join groups pertaining to their ethnicity, favorite music, television, and virtually any other aspect of themselves that they have in common with other users. There’s even a group for people who turn their pillow over in the middle of the night to get to the cold side!
These mini-cultures help to validate people’s personal identities as well as their online identities and promote conversation with people of similar interests. Never before have we as a society been able to have this communication ability in not only such a massive way, but such a specific way as well.
The same idea exists in video games. Users can create avatars that represent themselves in teams, guilds, and other miniature societies that the games allow for. This example is often a cause for debate because the dialogue in these environments is often hostile, but usually meant to be entertaining or social rather than malicious.
Almost every medium we manipulate has some form of communication ability. The cell phones we use to call and text with, the instant messaging clients we have conversations on, the video games we play, and almost all other technological devices we use on a day to day basis. We’re encouraged to communicate almost every moment of every day. Though there are negative associations present with some of these different media, the fact that we are instantly able to contact anyone we associate with anywhere in the world at essentially any moment in time is the greatest advancement in our society’s evolution.
- David Wytenburg
In the past, culture has always been indicative of ethnicity, birth place, or how someone was raised. Traditional cultures, though they will always be apparent, are no longer the only cultures that people can identify with.
Online communities created through social networking websites, video games, and other online profiles are becoming places where people can interact with other people who have similar interests. One very simple example of this is by joining “groups” on Facebook. People who are on Facebook often join groups pertaining to their ethnicity, favorite music, television, and virtually any other aspect of themselves that they have in common with other users. There’s even a group for people who turn their pillow over in the middle of the night to get to the cold side!
These mini-cultures help to validate people’s personal identities as well as their online identities and promote conversation with people of similar interests. Never before have we as a society been able to have this communication ability in not only such a massive way, but such a specific way as well.
The same idea exists in video games. Users can create avatars that represent themselves in teams, guilds, and other miniature societies that the games allow for. This example is often a cause for debate because the dialogue in these environments is often hostile, but usually meant to be entertaining or social rather than malicious.
Almost every medium we manipulate has some form of communication ability. The cell phones we use to call and text with, the instant messaging clients we have conversations on, the video games we play, and almost all other technological devices we use on a day to day basis. We’re encouraged to communicate almost every moment of every day. Though there are negative associations present with some of these different media, the fact that we are instantly able to contact anyone we associate with anywhere in the world at essentially any moment in time is the greatest advancement in our society’s evolution.
- David Wytenburg
No comments:
Post a Comment