Once More, Into the Breach!

I've aptly titled this blog entry after a line from Henry V, by William Shakespeare, because I'm once more grappling with (or rather, I'm once more instructing students to grapple with) concepts revolving around the rhetoric of technology... Okay, so Henry V has nothing whatsoever to do with the rhetoric of technology, but I am, once more, leaping into the "breach" of arguments revolving around this incredibly salient and prescient topic. I've approached this topic with classes before, but in keeping with the responsibility to the kairotic moment - that is, in keeping with the times - I'm incredibly anxious to see what new layers of meaning and different levels of argument and various viewpoints this new batch of blog-writers uncovers.

What will they find important? What new vocabularies, new technologies, and new ways of seeing our interaction with technology will they uncover?

I've already started noting the depressing fact that, while I age every year, the students I teach always remain about the same age. There was a time when I could ask a classroom if anyone was born in the 80's, and a few hands would have gone up. Those days are, regrettably, past. But with new, fresh minds, comes fresh perspective. I hope that taking a step back and, once again, taking a long, hard look at the technology and power we hold in our hands on a day-to-day basis will help each writer learn, and thus, teach others, about the rhetorical meanings behind all the things and objects and ways of communicating we take for granted.

See for yourself! This semester's list of writers is below the cut!