While talking to a friend and a regular reader of this blog last night, I realised how we constantly deal with jargon in our lives. On social media websites which cease to become a healthy platform for debate and discussion, instead we come across abusive language usage by many users who are often prejudiced with gender and religious hatred. To people who are new to this medium, it becomes increasingly a mentally exhaustive and painful routine to take a stand against such troublemakers. How did we come till this point? The evolution of technology especially the easy access in the last five-six years, which means anybody with internet on a mobile phone has been connected with the web world has meant that now the privilege has extended beyond the urban areas. The ICT(Information & Communications Technology) has proven to be a boon for many as it has also exposed the lurking dangers that lay within the tech world. As we move more towards Internet accessibility and availability, we also drift away from society. No longer does it become necessary to question our right to abuse women on the internet or deem it important to malign men-women alike with no apparent fear of law and legal actions. We have become fearless in a way such that anonymity has become a tool for negating presence of an individual, community, religion, nation while propagating hatred to the masses through this global network that connects all, without revealing identities.
I remember when a decade ago, during architecture school projects when there wasn't much internet access available to us, and plagiarism or "getting inspired" by designs was mostly through referencing books, it was easy to pass off as a skilled student in classes then. Because information was so limited in a way and one had to look through 10 books at least for studying design philosophies and projects worldwide that the process itself was exhaustive. Not many students I knew would willingly sit in libraries, rummaging through books that insisted on the written word. With the advent of easily available architectural websites that featured design projects right from plans, elevations, sectional details to design concepts, it became easy for everyone to point out "inspired" design projects that often were the star projects of the class. It also broke away the illusion that one need not spend much time analysing comparative works through books in the library when an architecture website was enough to guide through every little detail of the projects published and executed globally. We were presented with the easy way out to knowledge and we took it so much so that now libraries from Europe that are closing down send their books to India and they get sold here in exhibitions that boast of heavy discounts for the buyers.
Speaking of jargon, the myth that clear and simple writing is preferred also burst since we have motivational seminars and workshops that tend to stick out with their big, complicated usage of terms and words that leave audiences baffled and perhaps, pleased on having been a part of such complex talks. When I am asked to write recommendation letters by architecture colleagues, it becomes a ritual of not veering towards the complex and keeping it simple so as to any performance expectations don't get fanned by the excessive good praise seen in these letters. I have seen fellow colleagues and professionals using the most complicated jargon to describe their work and academics while writing in publications or typically on their resumes. It is unnecessarily driven to the point that they themselves in later years perhaps would shun away from association with such OTT achievements. We all long to be perfect and desired by all, and that's human tendency as long as we don't stay away from truth and reason in projecting our falsified images to the world. Because the world won't lose us as people, but we ourselves will as individuals.
On your first topic, Yes, I agree, FB can be sometimes frustrating. It appears to be more of "Hates" than "likes". Sarcasm dominates certain comments. And to top that, they are liked by others. But then to use a technology to our benefit, rather than it using us, is only in our hands. Thus making me wonder that the people who behave weirdly on FB have always been thus. They now have a media to promote their other side. Perhaps they do not feel embarrassed by this exposure because, they are so busy criticizing the image of others, rather than monitoring their own.
ReplyDeleteI am okay with a technology phasing out old practices. That has always happened and will continue to happen. In fact, my next blog post would be along similar lines. I think we must adapt to the changing world rather than claiming our nostalgic experiences as the best way of doing things; after all we have heard that from our previous generation and we are on our way to becoming them. Nevertheless, there are downsides of everything. One has to be intelligent enough to pick the best researched version from the pool of information available on the net.
I have always remained fascinated by new words that allow me to express myself in better ways. However, I also agree with you that a writing should not be forcibly improvised with complicated words. In my writing, I have always endorsed complex ideas against complex writing.
Good collection of thoughts here. Though, all the three topics appear unrelated, I have a feeling that the experience that triggered your writing links these three together.
When I expounded my thoughts here, I went into a flashback of events that have consistently made me feel angry about their existence. I do not unnecessarily ever get into any debate about and against technology with people I know have prejudice about it. Also, the very fact that websites like Twitter are also adding fuel to the fire created by the current scenario in our nation irks me a lot. I tried to be mild about my anger here in the post. Glad you could understand the anguish.
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