Bailey Moorhead
ENGCMP 0200
Adam Johns
March 17, 2009
For my final project, I would like to study how the prevalence of technology in everyday life has lead to an ADD culture, both figuratively and literally, and how this has lead to a perpetual dissatisfaction with our lives. I will begin to argue this by showing how there has been an increase in ADD diagnoses recently and although not all of us are clinically diagnosed, most people show many of the symptoms and this translates to the way we live our lives. I would like to focus on an increase in materialism that has arisen because of our constant exposure to advertisements. We are constantly trying to obtain more possessions to fill the void that technology has left us. I will argue that technology, such as TV, the internet, and our cell phones, encourages us to focus on breadth rather than depth; that is, we focus on forming as many relationships as possible and getting as much work as possible done, but our relationships and work lack depth and quality. I would also like to discuss how we have become obsessed with acquisition of wealth. A counterargument to my thesis could either be that technology has increased our prosperity, which has allowed us to obtain more possessions and that technology itself hasn’t changed our mindset or that technology is actually filling a void that we have been missing: we are now able to communicate with people around the world and the fact that we are constantly on Facebook or our cell phones only says that we are able to maintain friendships with those who are geographically distant.
To begin research, I plan to look at studies that track ADD diagnoses over the past few decades. Also, I plan to study how our materialism and consumption has changed. I will also study the increase of the presence of technology in our lives and how this affects our materialism (the amount of commercials we see, the accessibility of online shopping, etc.).
Initial Sources:
Dimitri A. Christakis, Frederick J. Zimmerman, David L. DiGiuseppe, and Carolyn A. McCarty. Early Television Exposure and Subsequent Attentional Problems in Children. Pediatrics 2004; 113: 708-713. (http://www.aap.org/advocacy/releases/tvapril.pdf)
http://media.www.thelantern.com/media/storage/paper333/news/1999/11/10/Column/Consumerist.Culture.Hurts.Poorer.Nations-48706.shtml
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/393599/social_networking_sites_effect_on_relationships.html?cat=15
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2 comments:
I like the topic, and you've already done a lot of thinking about it. The danger here is breadth; it is, in fact, almost as broad as the student paper we read in class, and is setting you up for something long and complicated. Trying to discuss ADD literally and metaphorically, while connecting it to advertising and materialism, is very ambitious. Maybe you want to start just like this, but look for ways to focus as you proceed (maybe there's a good way of making advertising itself into the metaphoric ADD you want to work with, for instance).
Short version: Good topic, but you will *need* to focus it further to stay sane.
Hi Bailey,
You have a really interesting topic and I’m excited to read it. I recently read an article in the Economist (the best journalism in the world, in my opinion) that is relevant to your argument. It’s about Facebook and our Primate past – and the article goes on to say something along the lines of, ‘albeit we have lots of friends and broadcast our lives… studies have shown that still have the same small circles of intimacy as ever.” Which I think can really help with your counterargument. I’ll bring the article into class for you tomorrow.
However, for my real critique: In conjunction with what Dr. Johns said, your proposal is really broad. By focusing on how we are the products of mass marketing by itself, OR focusing on our ADD culture through the increase in ADD diagnosis, you can really focus your paper. If you choose to focus on how technology has led to our perpetual dissatisfaction, I think you could take the next logical step in your argument and argue that technology has led to our perpetual dissatisfaction because technology HAS changed our mindset. The rapid development of technology has contributed to our greed and want for more material possessions, exacerbating our dissatisfaction. For example: several years ago I bought an IPod… I felt so cool sitting on the back of the school bus with my earbuds in jamming out to Chumbawumba and Tenacious D… I felt prosperous… then the 16 gigabyte IPod touch came out… I was not pleased. I needed it, I got it… then a few months later low and behold… the 32 gigabyte Touch… damn it… I need it. It was a snowball of emerging technology that didn’t lead to my happiness, rather it drove me into an inescapable cycle of self hate and destruction haha.
Not relevant to this riposte, but I dropped my 32 gig IPod touch the day AFTER my warranty expired… now I’m back to my old IPod listening, again, to music that was only popular in early 2000 haha. Karma is a butt.
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