Tae

By: Kennyben M. Gallogo, BMED-4

10:30-12:00 TF

Explores the influence of technology in modern day society. Turkle aimed to explain to the reader how
technology has altered day to day human communication and sought to propose a way that we should
be reacting and approaching this change. The central point of the article is a distinct lack of
communication among people as technology is allowing for faster and shorter bursts of connection.
Turkle claims that we have perfected being “alone together” and this has caused people to tend towards
being always plugged in and always online. She uses minor blurbs and anecdotes that she has picked up
over the years from students and others to explain how people’s mentalities towards communication
has changed. She also uses information gained from her time researching others to explain how people
think. Intending to strike the mentality of the modern-day

Turkle spends the majority of her argument exploring the influence of popular social media sites such as
Facebook and Twitter. Turkle explains how the use of social media has relaxed the requirements of what
constitutes human communication. She argues people no longer communicate their feelings, they
communicate in order to have feelings. In essence, Turkle attacks the widespread use of technology in
every social situation imaginable and claims that it is deeply harming us as both individuals and as a
society. Turkle’s argument is effective in delivering its intended point to the general public. She explores
the world as it is right now and proceeds to explain why and how our tendencies may be problematic
(Alvarez 2018).

today’s society, Technology is the main player in the way we communicate. Cell phones and social
media made the communication easier for people to contact each other. It extends time less to connect
between long distance friends. Also, it helps people to spread and enlarge circle of friendships around
the world. However, people are losing the way of face-to-face conversation. Sherry Turkle is an expert
on culture and therapy, mobile technology, social networking, and sociable robotics argued in her article
“the flight from conversation” how using technology can affect our behavior in conversation.

Turkle releases this article talking about a currently problem in our society which we live in a place full of
technology. She explains how technology have “sacrificed” our conversation time. She sees how people
use it in everywhere and anytime. In her 15 years of experience, she indicates how the cellphone and
social media can change the person behavior. People have become habitual to “alone together” that let
us be connected to each other anytime anywhere. (Sherry trurkle)

It let us design and have control in our lives by paying attention in the thing we want and ignore what
we don’t like. Also, she explains why “sips” connection does not work instead of conversation because
“The word itself is kinetic; it’s derived from words that mean to move, together.” Face-to face
conversation raises our learning skill and self-reflection; but with the technology, it decreases these
skills and lose the trust of conversation.Turkle believes that constant connection make us lonelier that
what people believe. She shows some solutions for this issue by giving specific time.
She used many real life examples to support her claim that cell phones and other technology have
inhibited face to face communication. Although technology has given us many forms of communication,
I feel that the most important way to communicate is by talking face to face. As Turkle stated in her
article, we tend to “dumb down our communications” when we use digital technology because we feel
the need to have a quick response. When we need to have a serious conversation with a person, we
want to hear their true feelings and full answers, not a shortened, bland version of one hundred and
forty characters or less. Also, when communicating over the phone, we do not get the full sense of
feeling or inflection of that person’s words. We do not know if they are using a sarcastic tone or if they
are being completely serious. This can cause many problems between friends and colleagues, and can
even lead to cyber bullying. (Tyler 2018)

The one quote that stuck out to me the most in Turkle’s article was: “We expect more from technology
and less from one another and seem increasingly drawn to technologies that provide the illusion of
companionship without the demands of relationship.” I think this quote perfectly describes many people
in our culture, which is sad. People need to build meaningful relationships with others to succeed in life.
Without these relationships, people feel lonely and seek companionship, which they find through
technology, and the cycle just keeps repeating. Technology is such a great advancement in our society,
but certain aspects of day to day life cannot be attained through these online techniques. I feel that face
to face communication needs to be emphasized in our lives before we entirely lose the ability to speak
with others in person.

Hence,
References

Alvarez, Alfredo (2018) A Critique of The Flight from Conversation, an Article by Sherry Turkle retrieve
from https://www.kibin.com/essay-examples/a-critique-of-the-flight-from-conversation-an-article-by-
sherry-turkle-ufGminsr

Turkle, Sherry (2018) flight from conversation retrieve from https://www.123helpme.com/flight-from-

conversation-by-sherry-turkle-preview.asp?id=540610

Tyler (2018) Response to “The Flight from Conversation” Retrieve from

https://sites.psu.edu/arleseman/2014/09/01/response-to-the-flight-from-conversation/