Attending to Surroundings and Thoughts on Walks

I came across a long-form essay in Aeon by Carlo Iacono, a university librarian, titled Books and screens. Mr. Iacono argued against the idea that phones and other modern technological innovations are driving us toward a post-literate society. I would broadly break his argument into two parts while otherwise encouraging you to read it and reach your own conclusions. Firstly, he compared the fear that technology is leading to a post-literate society to critiques of other “changes in how knowledge moves through society,” covering everything from 19th century periodicals to 20th century comic books. Secondly, he argued against the belief that “literacy [is] primarily about decoding text,” and favoring instead looking at literacy as a multi-domain phenomenon encompassing books and long-form texts, podcasts, videos, and more. The issue, he suggests, is not different ways of absorbing knowledge, but choosing “[b]etween habits that cultivate human potential and platforms that extract human…