Under the “Digital” subheading in Eyman’s article he talks about digital rhetoric being an open ended concept. When thinking of the term digital I believe most people would associate the term with technology. However, he explains that even traditional written communication can be forms of digital media. Eyman says, “print texts have traditionally encoded human knowledge”. When looking at it from that perspective I can agree that we should be thinking about traditional communication as digital for its time. Although information transfers much more easily on computers, traditional writing was our first way of being able to exchange knowledge. So with respect to history, I believe traditional communication forms should be references as digital media.
From his reading I gathered that “digitality” can take on multiple different meanings. It can also present itself in many different forms of media. To make up an example, I can hand write an entire essay. Then I can take what I have written and type it into my computer. Although the content is the same, by entering it into my computer I am able to accomplish different things with my writing. I can take my essay and post it for anyone to read or even email it directly to someone. However, I can take my handwritten essay and bring it to a journalist to publish in the newspaper (outdated I know but once upon a time!).
I say all of this to say, by doing both of these things I have encoded the information written in my essay in two completely different ways. Yet I was still able to accomplish the same goal in the end which is publishing my writing. The term “digital information” will actively reshape and change around as technology advances. The cycle will also continue on as we continue to advance our use of technology.
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