Reply to comment

The Portlandia sketch emphasizes the degree to which people's access to the internet and the millions of resources it houses gives a sense of there being a body of knowledge that exists outside of people but is ready to be tapped into (and the more one taps into it, the more in tune one will be with a certain culture.) Transmitting data through SMS, however, feels different because all information is sent from one body to another, whether those bodies be organizations or individual people. Knowledge is gained through being “communicated to and from” instead of “seeking out information.” I hope I am not falling into any sort of simplistic trap of stating that people in developing countries are more connected and communicative with one another than people in the U.S., for instance, or that they do not actively seek out information from print or internet sources created by third parties. I simply wish to explore further how the differences in what kind of information and communication technology people use may affect how they view literacy as something that must be attained in relation to some external body of knowledge or in relation to other people and the institutions they create.