Literacy as One of the Most Significant Aspects - Research Paper Example

Development of Sophisticated Technology and the Aliens’ Language Literacy is one of the most significant aspects in our societies today. It is only through literacy that people have been able to lead successful lives. With the invention of and development of technology, the need of literacy rose immensely since illiterates cannot operate these technological devices. Language has been of great significance in this field since it has facilitated the rate at which literacy is attained and technology is developed. This has therefore led to the question that: if language structures thought, would the language of the aliens allow for the development of sophisticated technology? In his work, “Writing is a Technology that Restructures Thought,” Walter Ong says that literacy is not an innate human understanding; but a learned process which has developed along with technology as humanity progressed. He argues that many people do not make the distinction between having an idea, and putting it down on paper; a thought is only legitimate if it is written down. In this this essay I relate his argument on language to “Darmok”, an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and argue whether or not the alien species as depicted would have been able to achieve advanced technological capabilities. It is quite evident in the episode that the factor that act as an obstacle between the two parties is the language barrier In the Star Trek: The Next Generation, the Federation meetings with the Tamarians have all the time been challenging because the universal translator could not translate the languages. The Tamarian captain and Picard, Dathon, try to converse from their corresponding ships, but the translator can only give ambiguous expressions like "Darmok and Jalad at Tenagra," which does not make sense to the crew. As Picard attempts to clarify that Starfleet wishes peaceful relations, Dathon lifts his hands clutching two daggers, then he and Picard are beamed from their ships to the surface of the planet below. Meanwhile Riker and the crew realize that the Tamarians have put up a field in the planets ionosphere to avert a beam out, Dathon offers Picard a dagger, of which Picard declines because he thinks the Tamarian, wants to fight him. At night, Dathon lites a fire, and then flings Picard a flaming log so that he cannot sleep cold. Dathon keeps repeating the phrase, “Shaka, when the walls fell " and Darmok and “Jalad at Tenagra," which does not make sense to Picard. In the morning, Picard and Dathon are pursued by a large alien while the Enterprise sends a shuttlecraft on a saving mission that is thwarted by the Tamarians (Mazama 6). They combat it together and Picard comprehends that the bizarre utterances by the Tamarian are events and names (examples of how they might bridge the divide between their cultures). LaForge attempts to beam Picard back to the Enterprise at the worst possible instant, just as the alien on the planet has Dathon in its grasps. Back on the planet after the failed attempt, Picard realizes that Darmok and Jalad are part of Tamarian lore: two leaders who also battled a common threat. He tells the dying Dathon the human myth of Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Weve seen that Picard outshines as a speechmaker and negotiator, yet here he appears like the mute Riva deprived of interpreters, as if he cant visualize any way to link the cultural gap without common words. The Enterprise seems not to have a linguist on staff, considering that Troi and Data are directed to find clues in the mysterious Tamarian expressions uttered on the view screen. They manage to link up Tenagra and Darmok through computer records, and Troi then speculates that theyre being offered a pointer into Tamarian mythology, yet she seems puzzled how they might use that information to give a new approach to the Tamarians. The Enterprise is able to save Picard by incapacitating the Tamarian vessel, yet Picard stops an armed battle by talking to the Tamarians using metaphors about the conflict. "Picard and Dathon at El-Adrel" results in the communication development that the Tamarians wanted gravely enough for Dathon to sacrifice his life (Mazama 7). Its uncertain whether the Tamarians have only a restricted vocabulary of myths or whether Dathon tenaciously sticks to the same few in the assumption that Picard will catch on, rather than trying to overpower him with a variety of scenarios. Picard is visibly starting to pick up on the meaning before the beast attacks, and his hindrance at not being able to make the leap to full communication is profound. Terrific acting on the part of both Paul Winfield and Patrick Stewart make the scenes on the planet memorable; despite an energy monster whos not one of the effects departments best. Winfields recital is a big reason some of the apparently absurd phrases are so compelling: while it seems at first that "Shaka, when the walls fell" might be a reference to the elimination of a psychological or communications blockade like the one Dathon and Picard are trying to undo between their cultures, Dathons evident sorrow when he says the phrase suggests instead that it refers to a literal collapse, a disaster. In Star Treks unfailingly positive view, the density of metaphor and dialogue is never an impossible barrier; this particular breakdown gets set in about a day in series-time. Whats more amazing is that the audience learns to appreciate Tamarian right along with Picard, and its authentic as a language. It could sound ridiculous in the hands of smaller actors; maybe it would sound ridiculous - rather than charming. Starfleet may not be aware of these strangers, and may find "Mirab, his sails unfolded" to be a stroppy phrase for "Prepare to depart, warp factor yet "Darmok" makes clear that this is a complicated culture whose mystery will take many years to unwrap, with much learning along the way not just the technology that Federation planets commonly share, but a wealth of history and literature The is no clear criticism of Star Trek it that doesnt have to do with the changes of the Universal Translator, a device whose workings have never been explained in a lucid manner; how come it has no problem distinguishing the metaphoric nature of Klingon oaths and insults, but not the Tamarian means of communication? Anyway, it doesnt matter much, as the Universal Translator erases what should be an enormous barrier to establishing peaceful relations with apprehensive alien cultures, namely a means of communication. In a way, we see in "Darmok" how absolutely dependent Starfleet officers have become upon their magical technobabble machine. Picard seems at first to assume that speaking his usual message loudly and clearly will be adequate to open a dialogue; no wonder the Tamarians then say, "the river Temarc in winter," which would appear either to refer to someone babbling or to tell that person to freeze so someone else can speak. Troi sees no hostility from the Tamarians, yet she has no useful propositions for dealing with their bewilderment, like providing an illustration that might insinuate peaceful intent. Prieswerk & perrot (73) think that a culture of bipeds that use knives as weapons would recognize photos of people laying down arms together, or people harvesting and swapping crops together. Picard doesnt even attempt to use sign language. We can clearly see that lack of proper understanding between the Aliens and the human in regard to any development. I seem to agree that the language of the aliens could have allow for the development of sophisticated technology Ong relates Plato’s theory of writing as a subjective human discovery to modern day criticisms of technology, notably the computer. He suggests that writing is a technology, much as typing on the computer. To write one needs training and tools. Ong (34) states that once reduced to space, words are frozen, and in a sense dead and detached from the living human life world, its inflexible fixity, assures its fortitude and its potential for being revived into limitless living circumstances by a limitless number of existing readers. The dead, thing like text has capabilities far outdistancing those of the simply spoken word”. It is not certain that writing a thought down extracts it from the human “life world” and transfers it to a different world, the enduring world that lives on paper; I never considered an audible versus visual world in this context either. In making this contrast Ong (37) is not essentially insulting the technology of writing he states, “To say writing is synthetic is not to doom it but to praise it”. He goes on to discuss the priceless contributions it has made to humankind. Ong claims that, “writing has the ability to free us more and more from the bias and confusion it creates,” thus writing can actually save us from the irrationalities it creates. It does so by separating “the known” from “the knower”. The known is whatever fact or thought is being adorned, and the knower is whoever is writing or reading it. This dissimilarity is quite important as it makes knowledge available to some but not others. However, it “also ties the knower and the known more consciously and more eloquently” that’s than the oral world. In his article Ong discusses the very fascinating idea of multiple realities existing among the human involvement. He makes a discrepancy between the life that lives in the oral tradition, and the form of death that takes place once thoughts are inscribed down. Reading and writing is always considered as something that is characteristically good; but Ong possess just the contradictory. It is also interesting that he argues that writing is just like any other technology that humans have established. It is easily defendable as it began moderately late in the human existence. It can’t even be reasoned as intrinsic as it was invented much after tools such as the wheel and hunting gear! Ong (41) denotes an agreement with the general idea that humanity is continuing along a “civilizing” track, stirring from oral cultures to written cultures. I think he’s also suggesting that the next liberal step for humanity is complete assimilation with the machine. In a true post-human fashion our minds will be hard-wired to a circuit board in a similarly as they are currently to writing and it’s a good thing! Popper (10) thinks this theory is creative but faulty. He makes the linking between speech and writing: technologies which work recursively to inform each other. However, he does not show how “technology,” commonly, essentially changes the role of speech and/or writing as totally as the leap from oral to written cultures? His argument is more in line with a general theory of cultural dissemination via “mediums” such as a cultures access to books and discourse in common. Well, he could make an ontological connection, which he does, pointing out that our brains will be re-wired literally on account of our incorporation with machinery, but that’s a lot to think about at the moment. Anyway, Ong only asserts the position theoretically. It doesn’t make us less literate or functional automatically, but it does definitely change the role of memory and our ability to access “things” as a result of technology and tools. Ong argues that literacy makes it probable to “study,” (Popper 14). After all, if we didn’t possess literacy, we wouldn’t be able to do any of this stuff. And access to tools does touch the level of literacy we have because if those gadgets and systems of spell-check are not there, then where does that leave a person? They may be able to read/write well with tools, but if this ability drops off theatrically when the tools are not available, how literate are they in those practices? I have to ask “How would it be possible to read and write if there were no tools available? “That’s part of the point of the little “invent your own technology” project, by the way. The interesting part is when Ong is outlining the objections Plato raises to written text. It is striking how Plato’s “complaints” can be likened with our use of technology today. For instance: (1) “A written text is fundamentally unresponsive” not really true since conversation happens with technology (i.e. email) it just happens at a slower pace; and, more people are able to partake in responding to a text (i.e. comments on a blog), (2) “Writing destroys memory”– this is particularly true because we can be dependent on devices to store information for us (i.e. phone numbers); but, it does leave us open, to discovering more and more material, (3) “Writing is passive, out of it, in an unreal, unusual world”– people do think this way when involved with the internet; they are braver in emails than they would be in person or they adopt an online identity unlike theirs in real life (Prieswerk & Perrot 56). This is a surface look at Plato’s objections to writing, but it does reflect the paths my mind takes when reading this article. Ong says a couple times that people elevated objections with writing just like they object with aspects of technology today. This is seen all-over society, though a fear of the unknown and a fear of change. People want things to remain the same and this can’t be. The written text is purposes with a built-in, given, overt and absolute meaning whereas oral cultures tend to merge clarification and data (Ong 38). Street (14) ascertains that “a clear writing system definitely represents meanings; the meaning is in the texts. In fact whereas written language’s main function is the communication of information, oral language basically has a strong intended purpose. In other words, through orality people do not say anything expressive; they simple found contact with one another. What this shows is the clear summary between the much indicated benefit of learning to read and write, and the cautious use of literacy as a means of brainwashing into modernity. The outcome of the process of training into the European worldview has been an augmented westernization of the world (Street 19), whereby standards were superfluous, and at times lost, to be replaced by Europeans ones. In summary thought without symbols life without language it’s a mental reality that is virtually impossible for most modern humans to measure. For the vast majority of us, our thought processes have been intensely been shaped by the introjections of language into our reasoning worlds, the taking on board of an enormous intellectual prosthesis, and the collective product of countless generations. Human thought, for the most, is not simply the individual outcome of our evolved neural architecture, but also the result of our borrowing of the vast symbolic and academic resources available in language. What would human thought be like without language? Conclusion In general, watching “Darmok,” an episode of Star Trekthat illustrates the difficulties of communicating with an alien species that has a language structured completely differently from human languages. This has left not only me but many people wondering about the meaning of communication. Even the Starfleet universal translator failed to interpret the Darmok language because it used references to Darmok legends in order to communicate abstractions or emotions. As a consequence, the only way to understand the Darmok would be to spend time learning their myths and stories, as well as the syntactical methods of interpreting their meanings. This lesson of understanding might be useful in many other encounters. In order to make Picard understand, the Darmok force him to engage in a Darmok bonding ritual. Many of our novels involve attempts at understanding species whose languages are known. As Mazama (232) says in Self Glorification, “The ability to speak a language perfectly does not necessarily convey any understanding of it”. Even after interacting with the Alien, the humans don’t know anything of alien’s relations, and they attempt to involve themselves in them before having a complete understanding. This strikes me as a failure to communicate. Though if humans are able to learn the language of the aliens then it would for certain allow for the development of sophisticated technology. It is therefore apparent that if language structures thought, the language of the aliens would not have allowed for the development of sophisticated technology due to its controversial and reverse use and idea that are unique and completely different from all languages on earth. Works Cited Mazama Ama. The Eurocentric discourse on writing an exercise in self-glorification. New York: Sage Publications, Inc., 1998, 3-16. Ong Walter. “The written word: Literacy in transition, Ed. Gerd Baumann.” Writing is a technology that restructures thought. New York: Oxford University Press, 1986, 23- 50. Parsons, Thompson. Societies: Evolution and comparative perspective. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1966, 12-43. Popper, K. Objective Knowledge: An evolutionary approach. Oxford, UK: Clarendon, 1972, 8-31. Prieswerk, R., and Perrot, D. Ethnocentrism in history: Africa, Asia and Indian America in Western textbooks. New York: NOK Publishers, 1978, 33-98. Street, B. Literacy in theory and practice. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1984, 3-22. Stubbs, M. Language and literacy: The sociolinguistics of reading and writing. London: Routledge kegan Paul, 1980, 4-12. Read More