“See Dick and Jane Screen” by Danny Bloom and Nina Munteanu

When my journalist friend Danny Bloom told me about the new term he’d invented to describe reading on the computer screen, I had to take it to the next level and here is what came of our collaboration (a new paradigm and a new book for your kids to learn the ABC’s of English (out soon on Amazon.com... LOL!):

See Jane screen. Jane is screening. Jane likes to screen.
See Dick screen. Dick is screening, too. Dick likes to screen.
See Dick and Jane screening. They are screening because they like to screen.
Screen, screen screen!
Screening is fun.
Hey, Mom and Dad, do you want to screen with us?
We are having fun screening.
Screening is so much fun.
We can screen all our books online now. We love to screen.
See Jane screen. Jane is screening. Jane likes to screen.

See Dick screen. Dick is screening, too. Dick likes to screen.
See Dick and Jane screening. They are screening because they like to screen.
Screen, screen screen!
Screening is fun.
Jane said: "Dick, Dick! Can you do this?"
"See Jane screen!" said Dick.
"See Jane screen on her new computer!"
"Jane is screening an old Dick and Jane book on her Kindle!" said Dick.
"See Jane screen!"

Dan, being who he is (see my post on his Polar Cities concept regarding Climate Change or go to his site) took it further (as in to the New York Times and the Blogosphere!). I am currently preparing for my next lecture at Scribblers (on St. Simon’s Island, GA, August 14-17, 2009) on “the Hero’s Journey”. If I was using Dan as an example, I’d assign him the archetype of HERALD: catalyst, subversive instigator or just plain **** disturber (you’d know that this is a true compliment, Dan, if you attended my lecture ... )

Well, not to stop a rolling stone or “random blooming”, Dan stumbled on Bill Hill’s site entitled “The Future of Reading”. Hill was a professional newspaper writer in Scotland for close to 20 years and saw the oncoming wave of desktop publishing in the 1980s. After helping set up the European operations of Aldus Corporation (Pagemaker) he worked for the Typography group at Microsoft. When he first started talking about reading on screen, people thought he was crazy. In May of this year Hill left Microsoft (I get the feeling it was a mutual parting) and he has recently applied his skills in typography and layout to a multi-column blog. You can see it here. More on this in a few paragraphs…

Dan and Bill had a most interesting discussion on the merits of using a new term for reading on screen. This prompted a blog response from Bill entitled “Why Creating A New Word for Reading On Screen Is a Terrible Idea.” (Well, it’s obvious what Bill thought of it from the title!)

“Creating a new term for reading onscreen is not only unnecessary, but actually counter-productive,” says Bill. “The term ‘screening’ is like admitting defeat—that somehow ‘reading on screen’ is different to ‘reading on paper’.” Well, it IS…at least right now. And it certainly is perceived as different, which is where Dan is coming from and addressing: our perceptions; and, in his activist style, changing them. Bill admits that “reading on screen is not as comfortable as reading from paper.”

“Screening” will not likely achieve that wonderful touchy-feely sensation of the smell and texture of paper, of cracking open a book and smelling those pages (I love that smell!). But, let’s look at the ways that screening being different is a good thing: web-based reading offers many things that orinary paper cannot. Depth. Choices. Links. Sound. Motion. Etc. Etc. The stuff that is bringing people, youth particularly, back to reading. That’s not to say that “smart” paper won’t do some of these things. The upshot is that our whole paradigm of writing and reading is changing and the internet plays a major role.

Consider this:

• Reading and writing remain the primary means of human communication (check out your kid’s main choice for cell phone communication: texting
• Primary sources for information gathering has moved from paper and paper establishments (e.g., physical libraries) to digital sources (e.g., google, online libraries) for various reasons, including saving storage costs, rent and not to mention the trees
• Despite this major move, reading onscreen is still inferior to reading on paper

Hill claims that a multi-column layout is much more suited to the screen than single-column (because of the way human vision works). It needs pagination though and, with many different sizes and shapes of screen, information has to be paginated “on the fly” for each device, which requires adaptive layout. You can see examples of this in the New York Times Reader. But no one’s done it on the Web yet.

“I happen to believe that the first Web browser to do this properly will leave others sitting in the dust, wondering just where their market share disappeared to.” (Bill Hill)

Check out Bill’s multicolumn layout here and tell me what you think. Says Bill: “Fixing reading on screen is vitally important for the human race. You can instantly create the Library of Congress in a village in West Africa. Digital information can be easily translated into minority languages. Books will cost less. Information can be kept up to date. And so on.”

So, to borrow from yet another literary quote, “to screen or not to screen, that is the question…whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageously boring script or to design layout against a sea of scribbles…and by opposing end them? Perchance to dream…for in that sleep what dreams may come…”

In a recent issue of "The Cord Weekly" Wilfred Laurier University's paper, Allie Maxted lamented on the copious grammatical errors in the winning poetry submissions. "It's up to people to take control of their own language use and in doing so, take control of meaning."

Using words impeccably resonates with me, given the power of language and its importance in defining our cultures, in forming our thoughts, and directing the evolution of our species in a changing world. Language forms our very “way of life”. Think of it. Think of how you speak to your children, to your peers, to your leaders. Think of the great orators and the not so great ones. Our choice of words—or lack of attention to them—says a lot about our heritage, our philosophy, our education, our beliefs and our morality and ethics. Use of vernacular. Use of vulgarity or profanity. Use of multi-syllable words. Use of words that describe beauty vs. ugliness or positive vs. negativity. Use of passive vs. active verbs. All these identify us and define us. Perhaps most importantly, our language projects where we are going. Language, like art, reflects our humanity and affirms our life choices. Where are YOU going?