Running Head: POSTMAN PAPER 1

Postman Paper

Jessica A. Stith

Loyola University
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Definition

The crux of Postman’s position on technology, as evidenced from the quote on pages

192-3, is that all technology is a tradeoff. He is advocating for the responsible and educated use

and adoption of new technologies, after a careful examination of the variables he identifies as

being inherent in technological change. These variables can be broken into three primary types:

advantages and disadvantages, the nature of technology, and the biases inherent in technology.

According to Postman every advantage that a new technology offers has a corresponding

disadvantage, and these advantages and disadvantages are not equally divided. Some populations

will benefit more than others and some populations will be harmed more than others. Therefore,

any decision that is made about a new technology should take into consideration who will be

advantaged and disadvantaged, and to what extent, by adoption of that technology.

The second variable that Postman identifies I’ve loosely named the nature of technology.

This category focuses on the way that technology inevitably operates. Included in this category is

the idea that technology is “not additive; it is ecological” and will therefore change everything,

quite possibly in ways that we can’t accurately predict in advance (192). New technology also

attacks existing technology, “it competes with it for time, attention, money, prestige, and a

‘worldview’” (192). These ideas combine for the understanding that new technology changes the

existing landscape as well as the use, favor, and accessibility of old technology. Also within this

variable is the idea that technology comes with a philosophy. This philosophy is evident in how

the technology was conceived and how we interact with it, as well as how the technology

encourages us to think and act, and in the ways in which the technology enables or disables our

ability to do, feel, think and/or observe certain things. These understandings about the nature of

technology reveal that one of the tradeoffs in adopting new technology is likely to be the change
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or elimination of existing technologies and/or the emotions, empathies, abilities or other

characteristics of those who adopt it.

Finally, Postman argues that all new technology comes with inherent biases. These biases

are intrinsic to the technology and are there because of the way the technology operates,

interacts, is structured, or is utilized. These biases include intellectual, emotional, political,

sensory, social and content biases. When adopting new technology, individuals need to be aware

of these biases and the ways that these biases will affect the individual, the content and/or the

experience when using that technology.

Framework

Given this understanding of Postman’s position on technology, we can use this definition

as a way to evaluate and understand technology in education. The categories of the definition can

serve as strands for evaluation of new technologies.

This evaluation should start by examining the nature of the technology. Educators should

ask themselves: “What disadvantages does adopting this technology have? Who will benefit

from this technology? Who will not benefit or even be harmed by this technology?” After

determining the answers to the above questions, stakeholders should move on to evaluating the

nature of that technology. Stakeholders should determine the answers to the following questions:

“What ideas are embedded in this technology? What philosophy does it represent or endorse?

What philosophy does it disregard or devalue? What existing technology will this compete with?

How will this technology change the way the system/school/classroom operates?” The final

strand for evaluation examines the biases inherent in the technology. Individuals should seek the

answers to the following questions: “What intellectual and emotional biases are present in the

way information is encoded using this technology? What political biases are present in this
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technology? What sensory biases are present in this technology? What are the social biases

inhere in this technology? What are the content biases inherent in the technology?”

Once all three strands have been evaluated, then the individual can make an educated

determination about the suitability of that technology and whether or not the disadvantages of

adoption outweigh the advantages thereof. This approach requires that individuals carefully and

closely evaluate new technologies and adopt them only when they are reasonably sure of the

consequences of doing so. The use of this framework would limit the use of technology simply

for the sake of new technology and would require a more reasoned and careful approach towards

technology adoption in education.

Application

When I think of new technologies in schools, I’m invariably drawn to the specifics of my

own situation. My school is currently in the process of being renovated and part of the

renovation includes a substantial investment in technology. This technology is actually being

chosen by a third party, a centralized 21st Century office through the district, and they have

begun to make choices about the types of technology we will receive. In a recent meeting, our

point person began to tell us some of the specifics about what we will be provided. One

technology which has been identified is drones.

Considering the framework I proposed earlier, there are three components that we should

consider before adopting drone technology in our school. The first component, advantages and

disadvantages are relatively easy to identify. Beyond anything else, one disadvantage of this

technology is other technologies we cannot adopt because we have chosen to adopt this one.

There is also the question of how these disadvantages and advantages will be distributed amongst
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our population. I assume that their use will be confined either to the multimedia program (for

filming and aerial footage) or possibly some of the more advanced science courses (perhaps

physics). This means that the technology will not be accessed by the vast majority of the school

population. In fact, as these things go, they are likely to be used very rarely and potentially only

by staff. This means that the advantages are largely on the side of the adults and upper-level or

advanced students, who already receive a disproportionate share of the advantages.

The second strand for evaluation is in the nature of the technology itself. If we look at the

drone technology, one thing that is inherent in the nature of the technology is the concept of

surveillance. There is an inherent belief that one has the right to surveil others and act on that

information. It certainly makes war with the concept of privacy and prefers the public, although

the identity of the individual operating the drone can be concealed. The technology that this most

obviously competes with is that of videorecorders or digital cameras. It’s unclear how the

adoption of this technology will change education, in part because it’s unclear how the

technology will be used or is intended to be used. However, one thing that it is likely to change is

the setting of school. With drones, students would be able to expand the classroom to the local

community and neighborhoods. This would be a rather dramatic change from the current

understanding of the classroom as a physical, identifiable space with four walls.

The final strand to consider for evaluation is that of bias. The use of drones has clear

intellectual and emotional biases. Drones allow for a certain intellectual and emotional

detachment from the uses to which they are put. Because they are most commonly controlled by

computers, there is also a certain technological bias inherent in the use of drones with students.

Students would have to have or acquire a certain comfort with the technology. Drones would

also have a sensory bias. Their use privileges a distance or interface between the user and the
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source of the data. This means there is a de-emphasis on the act of seeing and observing first-

hand the data and/or content. The social biases of this technology depend entirely on how it is

used. If students sit in the classroom and interact with the drones and resultant information only

via an interface, then there is a clear bias on individualism. The content bias of this technology is

for things that can be observed and/or quantified. This has a resultant effect of diverting focus on

those things which are more difficult to quantify and/or measure—for example the arts.

The second technology I decided to consider using this framework is that of virtual

reality. This is something we used in our previous class, and I’m still a bit uncertain about. The

advantages of using this technology are that users can see and in some ways experience things

that they might otherwise not have access to. The disadvantages are that the technology is only

accessible to those who have the required viewer. Individuals who are not able to see or who

have vertigo would be unable to use the devices and/or experience the technology.

In considering the nature of the technology it’s important to note that the only

experiences that individuals can have are determined by others who have created them. That is to

say that if someone with the technology does not deem a site to be worthy of being experienced

in that way, it cannot be experience via virtual reality. The old technology that this challenges is

a bit unclear, in some aspects it is the field trip, in others it is the video recorder. Widespread use

of the technology probably means that there is less emphasis on experiencing things in person. It

may potentially also devalue the experience of doing things first hand.

In terms of biases, there are some obvious ones. The experience of virtual reality, as it is

now, is largely an individual one. This is a bias towards the individual’s experiences and needs.

There is also great potential for bias and abuse in how potential experiences are determined. In

order to experience something in virtual reality, that experience has to be created. The people
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who create those experiences do so based on their own values and biases. Because their values

and biases inform what is available to consumers of the technology, there is great potential for

magnification of those values and biases throughout the consumers. Additionally, currently, in

order to experience something in virtual reality you have to have a strong and reliable internet

connection and newer, if not newest, technology. This means that those individuals who don’t

have access to those things likely do not get to experience the technology.

There is one additional piece that I think should be considered, but which is not currently

in Postman’s framework (or my own), and that is the educational value of such a technology as

well as its potential for misuse. Drones and virtual reality technology both have some

educational applications and could potentially provide educational value. However, when I think

of the TPACK model, I’m not certain that their advantages are compelling enough or exclusive

enough to outweigh their potential for misuse or disadvantage. There is also the issue that if

these technologies are presumed to be of sufficient educational value to justify their use,

although current curriculums do not require either, what will be moved, accelerated or ignored in

order to make space for them in the curriculum? These considerations should also be part of a

realistic framework that is used to evaluate educational technology.