Technology & African Americans
I won't say I was surprised about what the article had to say but I guess I had never realized that there really are very few African Americans in careers involving technology. I believe the main reason for this is the lack of computers in the homes of these children due to high poverty rates. If I grew up in a home without a computer, I'm sure I would have no interest or skill in using them. My question though, is what about video games? I have yet to see a lack of the latest systems in the homes of many of my friends and people I know who are black. Yet, when it comes to what's behind the scenes of those games, there is still a major underrepresentation. Maybe there is some cultural belief that even learning video game programming is somehow dorky. Maybe, though, that field is only just becoming popular and the there could in fact be a better number that just hasn't been seen yet.
The thing that bothered me about the article was that I just didn't see why the history of African Americans having to fight technology rather than embrace it had any real direct connection to why they aren't involved or good at it now. Times have changed for everyone and computers are much different than the cotton gin. To me, it's about poverty and accessibility, not something that seemed to be pulled out of thin air. To use my stats class terminology, correllation does not imply causation.
Comments
I agree with you that computers are different than the cotton gin differs greatly from computers and that poverty has definitely affected the African American’s accessibility to computers and technology. However, I would like to point out that technology such as video games have little if any education value, even though frequent video game players have proven to have a higher eye to hand coordination, this proves little. Overall, it is important that we make computers and computer based classes in schools more available to everyone of every race. Of course there is always the argument that public libraries have computers that are available to everyone, but I don’t believe that many people are motivated to take advantage of these resources. I know that if I didn’t have a computer, I wouldn’t take 3 buses just to use one. My point is that in order to make African American’s more technological literate we would need to expand such resources.
Posted by: Sarah Stackley | November 19, 2006 11:11 PM
Your points about video games brings up a very interesting argument. I think the fact that African-Americans as familiar with video games as everyone else shows that they are familiar with a certain kind of technology. This is a step in the right direction. If African-Americans are literate with one kind of technology (video games) they either are or have the potential to be literate in other types of technology.
Posted by: Kate Cowger | November 20, 2006 8:42 AM
I agree with you on the fact that correlation does not imply causation. I do not understand the authors use of slavery and the cotton gin to the use of technology. I do not though believe that the thought of games or computers being dorky is what is seperating blacks from technology. I do not think it as anything to do with a train of thought I think it is more of what is available to people. The more you do something the better you become and if you don't have a computer is hard to excel on how to use one.
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