Electronically Based Thought

In chapter 3 of Ong, he introduces nine characteristics or oral based thought. He mentions that more thought must be devoted in able to gain a deeper understanding of the primary oral thought processes. In doing this, a perspective will also be gained for chirographically, typographically, and electronically based thought. (Ong page 36)

Upon reading "electronically based" my ears perked. They perked in the same way on Monday night when I watched the documentary I am trying to Break Your Heart by Sam Jones. The film is about the painfully awesome band Wilco and the troubles they encountered with the recording and release of their album Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.

There is a great interview in the film with David Fricke, who is a senior editor of Rolling Stone Magazine. In the interview he talks about the electronic culture in which we live.

“We're now in a culture, not just a business, but a culture which we expect everything to happen (snaps) – like that. You know, you have people outside, standing around talking on cell phones – you know – the gist of the conversation is: I'll be there in five minutes. Who gives a fuck, just be there in five minutes – don't talk about it.”

He goes on to explain that our electronically based thought culture expects music, art, literature, and poetry to all be done quickly and be constrained by a time schedule. As mentioned in class today, TIME is against us just as libraries and universities. At least it is against the oral tradition of thought. Here is the obvious problem with due dates on creative assignments. One thing I like about creative things, or Muse secretions (that sounds awful), is that they are organic. I mean that creative things are living, breathing and malleable. It seems that when I intervene and try to make it into something it isn't - the result is forced crap. Deadlines often do this.

The Arts as an organism makes me think of an interview of David Bazan in the short film Alone At The Microphone. He talks about song writing and the best approaches to it. Sitting down without any preconceived notions and just writing allows for the output of the muses to grow into its own product.

Going back to David Fricke's words, electronic thought waters down meaning more so than even literate thought. In the situation he describes, literate thought would dwell on these words because they are not memorable, and they are trivial. The electronic (cellphone, email, instant access) culture has instilled a hyper-heightened sense of time, which means that the triviality of literate thought is also heightened. The muses don't function well in the construct of time, and what is produced in electronically based thought cannot be a valuable creation of the truly organic muses. Electronic thought only adds triviality. The added constraint of time only fuels the flames of the ephemeral.