I found the article "Does Information Really Want to be Free? Indigenous Knowledge Systems and the Question of Openness" to be wonderfully written. The topic in also incredibly provocative.
Does information really want to be free? I don't think information wants anything. Having information as the subject is an anthropomorphizing of an abstract concept, a reinforcing of a trend where "Human agency is muted, and technology becomes the revolutionary figure" (Christen 2877).
Gregory Bateson said that "Information is any difference that makes a difference." He categorized everything else as noise. Since different things matter to different people differently, whether or not something is information is entirely contextual. It's not really information if there is a "lack of an adequate historical context within which to anchor these systems" (2878).
When language is concerned, there is no such thing as true open access. You have to know the language, you have to be invited to understand the vocabulary, you have to have a handle on the whole complex symbol-system. No matter how open something is, it is open to misinterpretation if you do not understand the cultural systems that created it.
Even from the generous perspective of knowledge as a "non-rivalrous good" (2878), this generosity is not realistic when we still employ competitive tactics in education where language learning is concerned. Language itself is not considered free to trade--after all, most of what we do in writing instruction is evaluate it for levels of competency, rank it relation to often-arbitrary standards, and exclude dialects and discourses that could add verve, color and perspective--so how will we make knowledge free to trade if we have not yet done that with language?
The "information wants to be free" rhetoric reminds me of the posthuman "utopian" idea that suggests that once information is liberated from its corporeal body (from whatever binds it to a material structure) then it is free to liberate us from all those cumbersome restrictions. But everything needs a boundary, a body, to contain it, to give it limitations. Limitations are usually created as representative of a set of values. When everything is free it is unattached to a set of values, a discipline of respect.
I do, however, agree with Noam Chomsky, who (in his delivery of the Potter Memorial lecture) at WSU in 2005, argued that information created on state time (funded by state dollars) should belong to the state and not to the individuals creating (discovering, inventing) it.
If we thought about information in social and moral ways rather than in economic ways (Christen 2875), it could be possible for more information to be absorbed into an intellectual commons, or at least possible for more equitable discussion to occur relative to that information. But we don't. In this culture, information is not even free when the state has already paid for it.
This obsession with ownership has over-taken public education (particularly in the university) where the comprehension of information is deemed of less importance than the giving of credit to the person who first (or best) articulated it. But again, it depends on who that person is. If the person is a state-supported scholar, the information is so valuable that we all-but tape dollar bills onto our in-text attributions. If the person is (was) an indigenous artist, well, then that work should be in the free museum and belong to everyone. (Read sarcasm here, and also read that this thought evolves from Kim Christen's assumed perspective.)
For me Digital Resource Management and the issues it grapples in the management of subaltern resources, is a microcosm of the larger truth that culture-controllers, by having a voice in what is and isn't important in people's historical records, use technologies to script who people can and can not be. It is crucially important to be aware that what has been decided as "public domain" (or not public domain) has not been a consensual or communal process. The decisions have been made by people who have the economic clout to control, highlight or subordinate resources in ways that best benefit them.
"The framing of the digital landscape promotes a type of historical amnesia about how the public domain was initially populated. In the United States, the rise of public domain talk is linked to Westward expansion and the displacement of indigenous people" (Christen 2897).
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| This image is hard to see and the resolution gets worse when it is enlarged, but it is the "information" of small pox being sprinkled on a set of "free" blankets |
Information is like intention. You can have a lot of it; you can manifest a lot of good things with it. You can make a big old destructive mess with it.
Wisdom is knowing what to do with what you have, it's not about what you have. Wisdom is not free.
"We live in an age when the growth of the Internet has made it easier
than ever to gain access to information and accumulate knowledge. But
information is not the same as meaning, nor is knowledge identical with
wisdom. Many people feel engulfed by a tsunami of facts in which they
can find no meaning" (McGrath).
Hi Lisa,
ReplyDeleteThis post--while a good summary and thought piece, doesn't follow the blog prompt that I provided....the prompt asked you to find example (s) of the "information wants to be free" meme online and unpack those in relation to the argument of the article.
Hi Lisa!
ReplyDeleteYour posts are always so thought provoking. I love your infusion of quotes with your own ideologies and responses to the arguments. I do have one area where I kind of disagree in your post:
"When language is concerned, there is no such thing as true open access. You have to know the language, you have to be invited to understand the vocabulary, you have to have a handle on the whole complex symbol-system. No matter how open something is, it is open to misinterpretation if you do not understand the cultural systems that created it."
I suppose that proficiency in language and symbols does help us to understand information, however, I do think that there are intersections between different discourse communities, and how we are able to obtain new proficiencies and understandings of different discourses stems in our access to those different discourse communities. I wrote about this a bit in my post, and how it can at times create a sense of othering when we allow access to only a portion of the public. In a sense I do think it kind of refutes the "open access" initiative.
You always give me so much to think about in your posts!!
Lucy
Your post makes me think of the open access initiative in Higher Education. I agree that everyone should have access to a college education. But there is so much more to it than just walking in the door. This University, for example, is often working at cross purposes --it welcomes a new demographic in high #'s (almost 40% of new WSU students are first generation college students), but on the other end of this the tenure requirements (research and publication) get stiffer and stiffer. So you have teachers who have less time to teach (since this is not what they are rewarded for) at the same the institution is welcoming more and more students who need devoted teachers to help them manage the information processing protocols of this environment. So I guess my point is that, Yes, access should be open, but there needs to be some recognition that just because you can "get in," doesn't mean you can "fit in," and energy needs to be devoted to making sure than once you get in someone cares enough to help you succeed. In other words, someone cares enough to teach you the vocabulary or to converse with you so you can learn the vocabulary (the language,the discourses). I kind of think of open access like wilderness. Anyone can go into the Frank Church Wilderness. Not everyone has the skills to find their way out. That's what good teachers do: they teach you how to survive out in the open :-).
DeleteHi Lisa,
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of the state owning information it funded. I mean, when you think about how many incredible research institutions are funded by tax payer money, so much valuable research would be available to the public not associated with a university. I think this also goes back to what Lucy discusses in her blog concerning the socioeconomic-based othering that occurs when information, particularly scholarly research, isn't available to those outside of the higher education system.
My question for you is, do you think a project funded by a government (whether state, local, or federal) should be free if it in some way conflicts with a specific culture?
That's a great question. I guess I'd have to say that every state or government funded project conflicts with some culture (because its such gross-motor thinking), but an overt admission of information as culture-threatening is usually subordinated or "rhetoricized" to make it sound legitimate. The education of Native Americans is case-in-point; schools like the now defunct Desmet school in Tensed Idaho (not more than 40 miles from here) were funded by the feds to enforce English as the only language, but I am sure they didn't sell their vision as culture threatening. I am sure they packaged it as something good for everyone because governments rarely think in humanistic terms.
DeleteBut I am not sure what you mean by "free" in your question: Do you mean shared widely? The problem I see is that there is often such unconsciousness about motives; when people share information (like the English only vision as the be-all-and-end-all of educational visions) they often aren't sharing information about the real intention (its a hidden agenda). But your questions makes me think about the state-funded versus personal scholar as owner. Perhaps the only way to keep an intention clean or to keep information free is to have individuals own it. Governments like to control things too much.
Lisa,
ReplyDeleteAs I return to your blog entry after having read Lacy's blog entry, similar thoughts and/or questions come to mind regarding what you're saying here, particularly in your discussion of "culture-controllers" and the "obsession with ownership." I just can't shake all of the colonial implications seemingly woven into the very fabric of education, research, and composition. As an administrator yourself, and one that is overseeing the emergence of the CLASP Commons as a complement to the Writing Center, what are your thoughts on how this space does or does not deviate from these colonial implications? I know that's a difficult question to answer, but also, I think, an important one, and one that I am personally invested in. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts.
Mark
Thanks, Mark, great question.
DeleteThe Writing Center (and CLASP Commons) occupy institutional space, but they don't adhere to the same pedagogy as most of institutional education. The WC is a Commons (and in that way, it and CLASP are really the same initiative) in the sense that the only goal is to improve the circulation of information, to improve access to the academic conversation. There is no goal to evaluate or rank students relative to an ideal or a standard behavior in the conversation--only to provide access to the conversation in a way that lets students practice and receive response and support from compassionate facilitators who are trained in the art of listening. So the difference is not in the "space," but in how energy flows in the space (in a circle). The only difference in the CLASP Commons and the WC should be that the Commons are facilitated by consultants who have a better understanding of a population of students new to the academy (and consequently have more skills in knowing how to listen for their unique needs). Ideally the Commons will someday be just one cohesive thing where all are trained to be good listeners and facilitators of any student. (And listening without judgment is the key.) My response to your great question makes me think that the WC could be the meme for the "Information wants to be free" blog post I did incorrectly :-). Thanks again.