Journal Response #2 (Melissa Kimball)

Writing is a message. Most of the time, messages are written words, but messages can also be images and videos. Materiality is where the writing, or the message, is used on. Paper and pen, Facebook, a movie preview at the theater—all are different materials used to produce the writing. A network is the connections that writing can travel through. Today, networks are massive, since anyone in the world can connect through internet. Nearly the entire human population of the world makes up one, huge network. In the past, however, networks were made up of families, neighborhoods, cities. According to Henkin, networks were small because communicating over long distances was more trouble than it was worth. Sending letters across the Pacific Ocean was possible, but it took so long that such a form of communication wasn’t efficient, and therefore, made networks smaller.

Writing, materiality, and networks are connected because they depend on one another. To have a message, it must be put on something whether that is an Instagram post or an email. For the message to be accessed, there needs to be a network for it to circulate in, pathways it can travel on to reach other people. Of course, there would be no purpose for materials and a network if there was no message.

All three are connected and dependent on the other two, but they can also fluctuate. Writing can be about different things and send different messages. The materials used to capture writing increase every day—more and more ways of delivering a message are created at astonishing rates. Twenty years ago, there was no Facebook or Twitter, etc. Networks required to pass out the writing change based on the purpose and audience of the message. A text is usually meant for one person. A Facebook status is meant for friends most of the time. Movie previews are delivered to the audiences that have already shown an interest in the age group in genre by being in that theater—which is why you don’t see the trailer for Insidious 3 when you’re waiting for Inside Out to begin playing.