Earlier in the year, I remember talking about the digital divide and how technology divides families. Family is a very important interpersonal relationship, if not the most. People usually spend more time with their families when they are younger than when they are grown up. When they grow up, they have their own lives, have new friends, and possibly families of their own.
During the time when we are young, we spend time with our families in a variety of ways...dinners, trips, shopping, home evenings, etc. Back in the old days - before the digital divide - families would do more things together like sing songs, play games, or just converse. Enter the digital era...
Now, instead of spending time with family kids are either on their computers, chatting it up with friends or playing video games, or totally tuned out with their iPods on.
The main point that I would like to get at with this post, is the isolation that people - particularly younger people - put themselves in with their iPods (or other forms of mp3 players).
As I am writing this, I am sitting in the Box Canyon Lodge in Ouray Colorado. I came down here with my family yesterday, and it was about a 6 hour drive. 4 of those hours, I had headphones on. My sister had hers on for probably 5. I thought about this subject while we were going through Grand Junction... I thought back to every road trip I had been on with my family, and from what I can remember, as long as I have had a portable music player, I have listened to it the majority of the time, if not the entire time. Ever since my first Walkman at the age of 10, complete with Nirvana tape...haha. After that it was the Sony Discman, and my only memory of that on a trip was going to Las Vegas when I was 16, with only two cd's. But the whole time, I had my headphones on. Why? I don't know exactly, but it has something to do with the digital divide, and me wanting to isolate myself for some reason. It does make the trip go by faster, but I think it goes deeper than that...
I notice people around campus, as well as throughout the city with headphones on a lot too, even if it is just in between classes, or walking to work/school. Maybe it offers some sort of escape to be able to listen to whatever you want, whenever you want.
Anyway, the point I am getting at is: When we have the option of being tuned out from our families, and focusing on our own personal music choice, we take it. It must be something about our generation that likes to be isolated, and in our own world - in a sense. Unlike generations before us, we like to do what we like - and we actually do it instead of talking about it.
Maybe we don't spend as much time talking with our families as generations before us, but it doesn't mean our connections aren't as strong. It goes back to my philosophy of quality over quantity...
I am not sure exactly why we choose to isolate ourselves, maybe it is because we want to explore what else is out there, or maybe we want a change of pace. If anyone has some insight on the subject, please reply.
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I love the point you bring up jake! I didn't even think about the divide in regards to ipods! on all of our family vacations, my brother and I have also always listened to our music, whether it was on a diskman or most recently ipod. The communication goes out the window because we are so engaged in our music. The only time they hear my voice is when I loudly and out of tune sing out loud. Next time, I will converse with the family!
ReplyDeleteYou raise some excellent points. I would have to agree that it is some kind of generational thing. When I was going on road trip with my parents I would put on my headphones whenever it would get quiet in the car or they started playing some lame music. I know personally I like to be isolated when I'm on campus pretty often just because it can kind of help me stay focused. Also I would have to say that in general people do like a change of pace, like you stated in your blog. I personally get tired of the same mundane walks to and from building to building, especially if you are not walking with someone. It really helps the time go by. I can only image that the older generations think that we are ignoring them, but most of the time we arent. I know for me personally I use music more of a background distraction than anything. I never really pay much attention to the music when I'm playing it, it's more like a personal soundtrack.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Shane. Walking about campus is fun for the first week and a half, then it gets boring. The iGeneration has always been plugged into some technology or another. I find that we do isolate ourselves, consciously or subconsciously. It can harm interpersonal relationships, if we don't practice moderation. I have found little speakers for my Zune so I can share my music with everyone in the car I am driving with, or even a large scale FM transmitter to share music with all the cars in my caravan. I found that by switching from earbuds to speakers gives more of an opportunity to create conversations than just silence.
ReplyDeleteI think one of the big reasons, as others have mentioned, for isolating ourselves is boredom. while some people think that people wearing headphones around campus are isolating themselves, I think of it more as utilizing your time better. I'm guessing ~95% of your time walking around on campus you would never run into anybody you know, so you wear your headphones to get some entertainment, then as soon as that 5% hits and you miss a conversation with someone because of your headphones, people consider it isolationist.
ReplyDeleteI know for me, the majority of the time I'd be more than happy to talk to people if I run into them on campus with my headphones on. In fact, I usually take off my headphones as I see I'm getting close to someone I know to indicate I'd like to chat. But all that wasted time irks me a little. I listen to a lot of podcasts to help satisfy my hobbies of technology and politics. I figure, why waste all this time when I could be using it to learn? I'm kept up to date on technology and have been trying to learn more about politics and want to start learning more about sciences (iTunes University has some pretty amazing free lectures).
As you mentioned on car trips, I too put on my headphones, but that's only because a conversation has died down and I begin to get bored. If my parents strike up a conversation or I think of something else to say I take off my headphones right away. I want to ask though, is this particularly evident because of current technology? I know that even when I did have an mp3 player/tape player, I still read the majority of car trips. It's like the classroom distraction argument, if it's not music that I'm listening to, I'll find something else to occupy my time. If you want to interact with your family the entire car ride, that takes some serious/commitment lol.