Ryan Norton Assignment 1B Rhetorical Reflection Section HB- McGough September 18, 2013 Comment A comment was made

by E. B. White near the beginning of the electronic age. The comment describes a great concern of many scholars, the eventual decline of reading due to electronic advancements. Years later, the audience and context have both changed and the purpose has become ironic. The context of this quote has changed from a whole new technology being invented to the current technology only being refined. When this comment was made, most any citizen was rushing to buy the new electronics of the day; this is still true in the current times. That is only a minor change, but the amount of people that have been through or plan on attending college has grown exponentially since the this comment was made. As the amount of scholars grows, E. B. White's comment attempts to persuade more and more people to read often and limit their use of technology. Today, the use of technology is a lot more difficult to avoid than in the time when the comment was made and reading continues as both a meaningless hobby and a menial task that accompanies technology. Reading is still rooted into everyday life. Due to this, the fear of becoming lost without reading has gradually changed to being surrounded by more words than ever before. Originally this comment was directed towards scholars and those intelligent beings concerned with the future of reading; the audience has turned towards any of those whom would read, as it happens, a textbook that contains E. B. White's quote. Many of the original readers may have seen the quote in a newspaper. The opinion generated by these readers could very easily influence the generations that would come after them. After all, citizens would form opinions and find meanings in anything and everything that they read in a paper or saw on television; they could find very strong meanings and messages in E. B. White's comment. The purpose once was to more or less scare teachers and parents have their children read every so often, but at the same time the comment seems to imply that those who rely on electronics are no better than a bee blindly serving its queen, no more than a serf or peasant. It is ironic that the comment is still read mainly by college students; collegiate students are forced to read books and such in their required courses, but they read websites and texts everyday as well. These students may find ideas that are possible, or they might feel the ideas are discredited by the current familiarity with technology. One point made by the comment is that the time constraint almost makes this quote irrelevant because reading is linked to many pieces of the advancing technology, but there, technically, is still the possibility of an event like the fall of reading occurring in the, a bit more distant, future. Most collegiate students will probably find E. B. White's comment to be out-of-date, but not without meaning.

Considering the changes in context and purpose, this comment may be rendered as a learning experience more than a relevant insight. The audience's change from a small society of scholars educated at a collegiate level to the large abundance of students attending college has affected the credibility of a few claims that the author makes. This comment may never have the same effect it once had, but there are a few points made that are, possibly, able to occur.

Works Cited E. B. White. "Comment." Convergences: Themes, Texts, Images for Composition. Ed. Robert Atwan. Boston: Beford/St. Martin's, 2009. 60.