Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-wq2xx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-16T22:56:20.348Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

“Words with Friends”: Socially Networked Reading on Goodreads

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 October 2020

Extract

Reading isn't what it was. As we enter the “late age of print,” E-Books are still less common than “P-Books” (printed books), but the balance is quickly changing, especially in the world of academic publishing (Striphas xii). While many lament the loss of the p-book's materiality, texts have become more lively as a result of digitization: textual-production platforms like blogging let writers and readers interact with each other and create intimate social relationships. As Kathleen Fitzpatrick found while writing her book Planned Obsolescence using CommentPress, an online platform that enables readers' commenting, writing can become a more social and creative process when done in dialogue with readers. This turn to the social in writing parallels a turn to the social in media generally. Thus, it makes sense to evaluate not how far our devices are taking us from paper—the answer is already pretty far—but rather how digital media are creating new social valences of reading.

Type
The Changing Profession
Copyright
Copyright © 2013 by The Modern Language Association of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Works Cited

Bosker, Bianca. “Inside the Lives of Amazon.com Warehouse Employees: Long Hours, Long Walks, and Heavy Lifting.” The Huffington Post. Huffington Post, 2011. Web. 26 Oct. 2012.Google Scholar
Bowen, Elizabeth. The Death of the Heart. 1938. New York: Mod. Lib., 1984. Print.Google Scholar
Dimock, Wai Chee. “World Literature on Facebook.” PMLA 126.3 (2011): 730–36. Print.Google Scholar
Fitzpatrick, Kathleen. Planned Obsolescence: Publishing, Technology, and the Future of the Academy. New York: New York UP, 2011. Print.Google Scholar
Flusser, Vilém. “The Future of Writing.” Writings. Ed. Ströhl, Andreas. Trans. ErikElsel, . Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 2002. 6369. Print. Electronic Meditations 6.Google Scholar
Goldberg, David Theo. “Praise the Web.” PMLA 126.2 (2011): 448–54. Print.Google Scholar
Juhasz, Alexandra. Learning from YouTube. Cambridge: MIT P, 2011. Video book.Google Scholar
Manovich, Lev. The Language of New Media. Cambridge: MIT P, 2001. Print.Google Scholar
Montfort, Nick, and Bogost, Ian. Racing the Beam: The Atari Video Computer System. Cambridge: MIT P, 2009. Print. Platform Studies 1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shamberg, Michael, and Corporation, Raindance. Guerrilla Television. New York: Holt, 1971. Print.Google Scholar
Shteyngart, Gary. Super Sad True Love Story: A Novel. New York: Random, 2010. Print.Google Scholar
Sterling, Bruce. “On Favela Chic, Gothic High Tech, and Where We Are Heading.” Reboot: The Best of the Reboot Festival. Reboot, 2011. Web. 26 Oct. 2012.Google Scholar
Striphas, Ted. The Late Age of Print: Everyday Book Culture from Consumerism to Control. New York: Columbia UP, 2011. Print.Google Scholar
Turner, Fred. From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2006. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vinh, Khoi. “My iPad Magazine Stand.” Subtraction. N.p., 27 Oct. 2010. Web. 26 Oct. 2012.Google Scholar