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From the article: "About midway through my graduate program, I had to sit for a general exam—an hours-long cross-examination conducted by three professors. The

From the article: "About midway through my graduate program, I had to sit for a general exam—an hours-long cross-examination conducted by three professors. The exam was based on a reading list, distributed a year in advance, that spanned nearly the whole of English literature, from Beowulf to “Beloved,” and included items like “Joyce, Ulysses,” and “Yeats, Poems.” I read day and night; to persevere without eyestrain, I had to buy a special lamp, and a magnifying glass on a stand." And get off my lawn. Actually, young people are writing more. Before the Internet, many people out of school never again wrote a full paragraph. Now they write a few every day.

pessimizer 1y ago
People are so much more literate than they were even a short time ago. Having to type in order to participate on the internet and the Harry Potter phenomenon both seriously upgraded world literacy in general. edit: > [...]the number of thirteen-year-olds who read for fun “almost every day” fell from twenty-seven per cent to fourteen per cent. Also, the number of thirteen-year-olds who read 10-50K words on the internet daily but don't consider it reading shot up to 100%
- Loughla 1y ago
  Are 13 year olds reading on the Internet though? My experience working with the youth is that they consume video, not written material
- SamBam 1y ago
  Evidence?
- coliveira 1y ago
  You have no idea what teens are doing, it is mostly video all day long.
- tolerance 1y ago
  The issue is reading comprehension. Not the mere ability to read.
d0odk 1y ago
The article has several paragraphs addressing these points...
- chairmansteve 1y ago
  He almost certainly didn't read it....
Analemma_ 1y ago
> Actually, young people are writing more. Before the Internet, many people out of school never again wrote a full paragraph. Now they write a few every day. I'm not convinced this is providing any value in the way you're implying. When people talk about the cognitive benefits of writing, what they mean is writing which makes you organize your thoughts, and notice when they are messy and disjointed. I think a majority of the writing people do online is not of that form: instead it takes the form of emotional outbursts which essentially go directly from the amygdala to the fingers and barely involve the higher brain functions at all, much less trigger the kind of introspection and reflection that people mean when they say writing is good for you. In other words, just as not all reading is equally valuable, I don't think all writing is either and I think almost all Internet writing is of the low-value kind.
SamBam 1y ago
> Actually, young people are writing more. Is this a feeling, or something you know from statistics? Many of the teens I know (I'm a teacher) aren't writing blog posts, or even comments on Reddit. They're watching YouTube videos and not interacting back with anything more than a thumbs up. Sure, some are writing on anime subreddits or whatever, but I don't want to make generalizations for what teens are doing across the US or the rest of the Western world without some kind of statistics.
- kridsdale1 1y ago
  They’re writing in iMessage, Instagram, and ChatGPT.
  - fishpen0 1y ago
    But not in paragraphs. Their written language in those forums is short form sentences that are a mix of emojis and almost randomly inserted words that are more akin to honorifics sprinkled in to convey tone "no cap" "frfr"
- daedrdev 1y ago
  It's hard to find recent data, but the trend has been far more books were published in the 2010s than in the decades before, by like 10 or 100x. There is an even more enormous amount of fan works published. However, data since ChatGPT was invented is probably poisoned by people using it to write even if I could find it.
  - conductr 1y ago
    Distribution has opened up, so it's not exactly an apples to apples comparison when looking a # of books published statistic I have a friend that published a kids book over the course of a weekend, it's for sale on Amazon. It's sold hardly any copies but it's been published
NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago
> Before the Internet, many people out of school never again wrote a full paragraph. Now they write a few every day. If they could be called paragraphs, that is. A more accurate description might be a random sample of phrases that spontaneously popped into their heads, only loosely relevant to each other in the broadest possible sense, minus anything like grammar, punctuation, or even non-mediocre word choice.
- prerok 1y ago
  Joyce would be proud :P
azangru 1y ago
Yes; this is what university courses in literature do: they force-feed texts to students at a rate that many struggle to absorb. Instead of reading selected texts slowly and with pleasure, students rush through them with curses. It's been bewildering to me, back when I was going through a similar, though lighter, ordeal, why this was the case.

pessimizer 1y ago

People are so much more literate than they were even a short time ago. Having to type in order to participate on the internet and the Harry Potter phenomenon both seriously upgraded world literacy in general. edit: > [...]the number of thirteen-year-olds who read for fun “almost every day” fell from twenty-seven per cent to fourteen per cent. Also, the number of thirteen-year-olds who read 10-50K words on the internet daily but don't consider it reading shot up to 100%

Loughla 1y ago
Are 13 year olds reading on the Internet though? My experience working with the youth is that they consume video, not written material
SamBam 1y ago
Evidence?
coliveira 1y ago
You have no idea what teens are doing, it is mostly video all day long.
tolerance 1y ago
The issue is reading comprehension. Not the mere ability to read.

d0odk 1y ago

The article has several paragraphs addressing these points...

chairmansteve 1y ago
He almost certainly didn't read it....

Analemma_ 1y ago

> Actually, young people are writing more. Before the Internet, many people out of school never again wrote a full paragraph. Now they write a few every day. I'm not convinced this is providing any value in the way you're implying. When people talk about the cognitive benefits of writing, what they mean is writing which makes you organize your thoughts, and notice when they are messy and disjointed. I think a majority of the writing people do online is not of that form: instead it takes the form of emotional outbursts which essentially go directly from the amygdala to the fingers and barely involve the higher brain functions at all, much less trigger the kind of introspection and reflection that people mean when they say writing is good for you. In other words, just as not all reading is equally valuable, I don't think all writing is either and I think almost all Internet writing is of the low-value kind.

SamBam 1y ago

> Actually, young people are writing more. Is this a feeling, or something you know from statistics? Many of the teens I know (I'm a teacher) aren't writing blog posts, or even comments on Reddit. They're watching YouTube videos and not interacting back with anything more than a thumbs up. Sure, some are writing on anime subreddits or whatever, but I don't want to make generalizations for what teens are doing across the US or the rest of the Western world without some kind of statistics.

kridsdale1 1y ago
They’re writing in iMessage, Instagram, and ChatGPT.
- fishpen0 1y ago
  But not in paragraphs. Their written language in those forums is short form sentences that are a mix of emojis and almost randomly inserted words that are more akin to honorifics sprinkled in to convey tone "no cap" "frfr"
daedrdev 1y ago
It's hard to find recent data, but the trend has been far more books were published in the 2010s than in the decades before, by like 10 or 100x. There is an even more enormous amount of fan works published. However, data since ChatGPT was invented is probably poisoned by people using it to write even if I could find it.
- conductr 1y ago
  Distribution has opened up, so it's not exactly an apples to apples comparison when looking a # of books published statistic I have a friend that published a kids book over the course of a weekend, it's for sale on Amazon. It's sold hardly any copies but it's been published

NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago

> Before the Internet, many people out of school never again wrote a full paragraph. Now they write a few every day. If they could be called paragraphs, that is. A more accurate description might be a random sample of phrases that spontaneously popped into their heads, only loosely relevant to each other in the broadest possible sense, minus anything like grammar, punctuation, or even non-mediocre word choice.

prerok 1y ago
Joyce would be proud :P

azangru 1y ago

Yes; this is what university courses in literature do: they force-feed texts to students at a rate that many struggle to absorb. Instead of reading selected texts slowly and with pleasure, students rush through them with curses. It's been bewildering to me, back when I was going through a similar, though lighter, ordeal, why this was the case.