Are today's youth digital natives?
In the debate of digital nativism between boyd and Prensky, I wholeheartedly agree with boyd's perspective. Digital nativism is the idea some generations are digital natives, meaning they naturally adept at navigating and understanding digital technologies and systems. On the other hand, the existence of a digital native implies the idea of digital immigrants, or those who are foreign to the digital familiarity experienced by natives.
In chapter 7 of danah boyd's It's Complicated, she discusses the idea of digital nativism and how it is actually dangerous mindset to have. To start, boyd discusses that the idea of nativism vs immigrant truthfully stems from the fear created by generational gaps which are increasingly illustrated through technology use. She paraphrases Barlow when she discusses that, "the implicit fear that stems from the generational gap that has emerged around technology." The idea of generational tension is present throughout much of boyd's other work. From my own perspective, the narrative of foreign vs native is one of tension and hostility. Throughout history, these relationships are often fraught with problematic power dynamics that leave one group disadvantaged at the hands of the other. By framing the digital media literacy debate from an inherently unequal power balance, we stop having meaningful discourse and begin perpetuating an us vs them mentality.
Rather than discussing digital technology in regards to immigrants or natives, I prefer framing it around the 5 Stages of Technological Adoption. The idea behind technology adoption is that their are 5 stages of adoption for new technologies, that being innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority and laggards. Though this does not translate directly to the immigrant vs native discourse, it is quite similar. In this comparison, late majority and laggards are most similar to immigrants, as they learn or adopt a new technological advancement much later than others, usually due to societal necessity. While it is a consumer model, it can address differences in a user's background in a way that native vs. immigrant does not.
In the debate of digital nativism between boyd and Prensky, I wholeheartedly agree with boyd's perspective. Digital nativism is the idea some generations are digital natives, meaning they naturally adept at navigating and understanding digital technologies and systems. On the other hand, the existence of a digital native implies the idea of digital immigrants, or those who are foreign to the digital familiarity experienced by natives.
In chapter 7 of danah boyd's It's Complicated, she discusses the idea of digital nativism and how it is actually dangerous mindset to have. To start, boyd discusses that the idea of nativism vs immigrant truthfully stems from the fear created by generational gaps which are increasingly illustrated through technology use. She paraphrases Barlow when she discusses that, "the implicit fear that stems from the generational gap that has emerged around technology." The idea of generational tension is present throughout much of boyd's other work. From my own perspective, the narrative of foreign vs native is one of tension and hostility. Throughout history, these relationships are often fraught with problematic power dynamics that leave one group disadvantaged at the hands of the other. By framing the digital media literacy debate from an inherently unequal power balance, we stop having meaningful discourse and begin perpetuating an us vs them mentality.
Additionally, I agree with boyd's assessment that assuming all youth are digital natives by virtue of their age ignores the diversity and inequity present in our society. boyd state's that this narrative, "obscures the uneven distribution of technological skills and media literacy across the youth population, presenting an inaccurate portrait of young people as uniformly prepared for the digital era and literacy ignoring the assumed level of privilege required to be “native.” In other words, being born in an affluent family affords drastically different privileges than being born in a lower socioeconomic background. This can be a dangerous mindset to hold in this debate because if we assume all youth have this same background, we will be less likely to educate them on critical consumption of media. While a select few from affluent backgrounds may understand the algorithms or market manipulation and terms of service agreements for new technologies, many more do not. We need to be able to understand that all media is created for one purpose, and we need to educate everyone on how to critically consume it.
Rather than discussing digital technology in regards to immigrants or natives, I prefer framing it around the 5 Stages of Technological Adoption. The idea behind technology adoption is that their are 5 stages of adoption for new technologies, that being innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority and laggards. Though this does not translate directly to the immigrant vs native discourse, it is quite similar. In this comparison, late majority and laggards are most similar to immigrants, as they learn or adopt a new technological advancement much later than others, usually due to societal necessity. While it is a consumer model, it can address differences in a user's background in a way that native vs. immigrant does not.
Christian,
ReplyDeleteI find that your opinion on the tension between the terms native and immigrant really do match mine. Although Prensky's definition of digital native and immigrant make sense, the terminology is not the best. It brings a historical tension between the two categories that I feel is unnecessary. I feel like we see Boyd's article in similar ways. The assumption that all youth are on the same level is completely wrong. Their knowledge of technology is all based upon their story, and their access; not their generation.
I enjoyed reading the link you posted about the 5 stages of technological adoption. It puts a different spin on where people fall in the digital native vs immigrant and broadens the spectrum. Very interesting!
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