When we read literature, it is an individual action. It is between the reader and the text. Sure there are ways to
discuss a piece of literature such as publishing an anthology or writing a
research paper, but these avenues take time. Digital culture makes it bigger. With literature, we are able to
see the world through one book’s perspective and as a critically thinking
community, interpret the book’s ideas and either agree or disagree with them.
In digital culture we do the same, but now on a massive scale where people from all different backgrounds come together to collaboration and give feedback on literature. It turns an independent reading to a global one.
In the introduction of Moby
Dick it reveals that “Melville himself certainly believed that all men are
united by the bond of reciprocal dependence, by a community of function and
responsibility” (xv). The book itself is an example of this “community of
function.” We have discussed in class how the book functions under different
genres: epic, fiction, prose, allegory, play. The compilation of all these
genres makes it impossible to identify it as one genre. In digital culture,
people are represented by the different social media sites they use. As Aleesha
demonstrates in her research, Pinterest is a way for pinners to repin a variety
of pictures, outfits, recipes, etc. Identifying a person by one pin will not be
a full representation of who that person is or their pin board. It would be
like identifying Ishmael as only a sailor and ignoring his obvious knowledge of
cetology, his background in teaching, and the fact that he is the narrator.
As a community, men “united by the bond of reciprocal
dependence” create subcultures in which members mutually depend on one another
to not only consume content, but to create and curate it as well. In Lizy’s
research on fandom collaboration, crowdsourcing materials such as memes or
articles on a particular show or book creates a wider fan base in which content
can be remixed and shared to an even larger crowd. Information is shared and
spread through curation tools such as Tumblr or Facebook or Twitter. Captain
Ahab gathered his crew together, all of them dependent upon finding Moby Dick
to complete their whaling mission, and together they sailed in search for the great white whale. Ahab used "every means at his disposal to find and kill the white whale" (30), including sea charts, books, and logs to determine where to find Moby Dick. He was crowdsourcing information when he spoke to fellow captains on the Rachel for example to get spotting information. It was a community effort for one common goal. The subcultures within digital culture come together as a community to read, review, comment, and remix content found in literature. Reading is no longer independent, or at least it doesn't have to be.
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