Communitas v. 2009.0

The current graduating class earned its diplomas during the very early stages of an information revolution. As we prepare to leave Cambridge it is worth thinking about whether the tidal changes in how we read, write, and speak to each other might distinguish our experiences from those of our predecessors.

The proliferation of communication-gadgets-cum-appendages has profoundly increased the speed at which we all operate. With the aid of our ubiquitous laptops and cell phones, the viral circulation rate of cultural memes never ceases to amaze (within four days, no less than 21 million viewers had paid witness to Susan Boyle’s on-stage coup d’état). The more fundamental change, however, has come in the content, volume, and sources from which we glean our information. The scope and depth of answerable academic questions has broadened dramatically with the advent of digitized databases. Indeed, it is inside the classroom that the Harvard student has most directly experienced the much-celebrated “democratization of knowledge.” Wikipedia and other free information databases that are created and accessed anonymously pose a serious problem for the priests of high culture, raising questions about how anyone’s words can become christened as everyone’s knowledge.

Amidst these changes, we have grown up as a generation of instant gratification. The simultaneous rise of video technology and online news sources has engendered a profound sense of nostalgia—not entirely unjustified—lamenting the disintegration of our national discourse into one of soundbytes and an American youth plagued by generational ADD. After observing a teenager’s impatience with the sloth of text messaging, comedian Louis CK commented wryly, “Your message is going to space. Give it a second.” Moreover, our vocabulary has come to reflect the speed at which our words are spoken and sent: Since we “obvi” don’t have time for those extra two syllables, our new bevy of “abbrevs” can sometimes be pretty “egreg” (egregious for those over 22). But our impatience with technology is not entirely without productive potential. A number of recent studies, for example, have confirmed that we are better multi-taskers than our parents, a fact poignantly illuminated when Firefox asks, “There are 40 tabs open. Do you want to quit anyway?”

More worrisome than our shorter attention spans, however, is the alienation that accompanies the new ways in which we inform and communicate with each other. In the academic realm, we can now search for terms in Google books without reading the book itself. This may work wonders for a short response paper, but it also comes with an irrevocable loss of context and depth. For the handful of classic works that deserve to be read in their entirety, isolating key passages can collapse the dimensionality of argument that make them worth reading in the first place. Similarly (and duly noted) the arrival of the personal computer in the lecture hall has challenged the college classroom’s traditional role as a special type of community. It is exceedingly difficult to simultaneously transcribe with precision while fully engaging with a complex and discursive argument. While boredom and distraction are certainly not unique to the 21st century, the laptop has no historical rival in its capacity as a portal to infinite distraction. Nothing quite interrupts a lecture on 18th century Romanticism like the fateful “ding” of a G-Chat. The simultaneity of our physical presence and virtual absence in the lecture hall suggests that, for all its wonders, ultra-connectivity can come at the cost of sharp and atomistic disconnects.

On the other hand, the information revolution has provided concrete (if controversial) benefits outside the classroom. With the recent burst of social networking sites comes the criticism that we have sacrificed depth for breadth in our relationships. A fellow senior reflected on the discrepancy between Facebook and his real social life: “There is no way that I have 900 actual friends.” But this provides an overly restrictive framework in which to consider the new ways in which we interact online. We can distinguish between the “core” elements of friendship—connection, laughter, and empathy—that remain independent of the medium through which they are forged. There are many friendships that would thrive even if Pony Express were the only method of communication after Harvard. An online social network’s real impact is not strengthening the core relationships around you, but bolstering connections within your network of peripheral acquaintances.

To get updates about someone’s life through pictures, posts, and video does not require physical proximity. Perhaps even more important than boosting our ability to multitask, the information revolution has bred a generation of remarkably good stalkers. In the extreme, this can become voyeuristic. An unrelenting barrage of Twitter updates threatens excessive intrusion for both readers and writers, challenging our most basic understanding of the concept of “privacy.” But for the most part, our online interactions are a natural response to a new and generational exhibitionism; after all, Facebook albums and Tweets are posted precisely because others will see them. In this sense, coming of age in the early bouts of an information revolution has laid the foundations for a radically different conception of community, one enriched by public identities that are created expressly to be shared with those outside our circles of closest confidence. Long after leaving the hallowed halls of veritas, the class of 2009 can continue to build a historically unique communitas—a globally accessible forum in which to articulate shared ideas, issue spirited dissents, and strengthen peripheral relationships—140 characters at a time.


Audrey J. Kim ’09, a Crimson photography editor, is a history concentrator in Adams House.