Ong and the world of tomorow

Walter Ong makes a very interesting point about the development of our ‘global village.’ We constantly hear about the role of capitalism or commerce in expanding borders. We hear how the world is made smaller by our use of the telephone or video technology. But, according to Ong, the real source of our current world-wide community is our dependence on secondary orality. Ong argues that we have transitioned form a culture that first was only concerned with the group. Because our communication was limited only to what could be spoken to one another, cultures held the group as the primary focus. The group was where we spent our time. Our thoughts centered on those around us. It wasn’t until the introduction of the written word that we began to turn our focus inward. We began to think and process the world around us on our own terms. We moved the focus of understanding away from the group and turned it on ourselves. People were able to interact with ideas, concepts and beliefs in the privacy of their own mind. This transition was expanded with the invention of the printing press. More people were able to access words in a standard format. We could disseminate information to entire people groups. This allowed the greater portion of our community to begin to think. It was not just the elite and wealthy who had the opportunity to touch and hold knowledge. The lowliest peasant could learn to understand the written word because it was readily available. Even with this widespread access to words, we continued to turn inward. People focused on their own thoughts and only entered the realm of public discourse on specific occasions. It wasn’t until we had spent a significant amount of thinking in the confines of the individual that we began to look outward to the rest of the world. With the introduction of what Ong calls secondary orality, we began to reach out to those around us. We feel an obligation to look at the world around us because we have first looked at ourselves. We have a need for spontaneity because we have decided that it is beneficial. We find this spontaneity in others. It is this transition from the group to the individual and back to the larger group that has lead to our current system of discourse.
We continue to develop this realm of secondary orality in order to keep up with the changes in technology that accompany it. As the means of communication advance, we must adjust our use of them in order to make the most of these systems. We must learn to interface with a new system every few years. This time frame is decreasing steadily. As the technology drives forward, we must scramble to keep up.