First Memory Descriptive Writing

Have a question regarding President Obama? Google it. Don’t know if the pizza place around the corner is good? Yelp it. The quick access to the internet, contacts, apps, and social media all at your fingertips is remarkable! Yet, it’s also destroying human connection and friendships. Now, I will be the first to admit, technology has made my life easier in every possible way. There is no longer a need to spend several hours reading books for a research paper, to pull out the phone book to search for someone’s contact information, or to spend time calling someone. For that, I am truly grateful—yet, I have noticed my self being confused in every day situation when I don’t have my phone with me. For example, in my hometown, I went driving alone and ended up lost—without my phone. My dad, being the genius he is, made sure to equip my car with a few maps in case anything were to happen. I, being the smartphone dependent teen that I am, had no idea how to use a map. Needless to say, I spent hours driving around aimlessly until I caught sight of familiar signs. To this day, I am still unable to use a map correctly.

Social media has changed our culture in ways many, in years past, would have thought to be impossible. With the advent of social media, people are connected around the world. Using the internet we can have “face-to-face” conversations, write “letters”, play games, and much more with others instantly without the need of being in the same room as them. Even though we are all constantly connected, some feel our technological innovations are causing us to become lonelier. Many feel physical interactions are key to creating emotional bonds. Some even feel left out because they are not technologically incline. Those who believe technology is making us lonelier often note how some people say they have friends that they have never met in real life, or cite shows like “Catfish” where people fall in love with others over the internet, but the person they thought they were talking to is not actually who they were talking to. Though some may think technology is making us lonelier, in actuality it bring us closer together.

Technology has helped connect people and created friendships that without technology couldn’t happen. A big way for people to connect with each other is by using social media like Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram. Facebook connects more of us to more of our friends and family than we have ever been connected before (Document 2). Every "Like, every Share, every comment is a way for us to renew on a tiny scale our connections with our friends (Document 2). Our phones are devices that can connect us to anyone around the world in the matter of seconds (Document 5). Technology is not only connecting us with other people it is also connecting us to more information.

Social media has become one of the greatest developments of human technology history. In today’s society, human are surrounding by the social media and wireless devices. In Shannon Matesky’s spoken word poem “MySpace”, the poet explains “physical contact is more important than our number of contacts” (Matesky). According to the poet, Shannon Matesky successfully redefines the word “Myspace” from a formal definition of “the distance from other people or things that a person needs in order to remain comfortable” (Merriam-Webster), to an operational definition of the contact created on the social media. People now forget how to stay with face-to-face relationship, social media become the new way of communication. “We can’t deal with the face-to-face so we let technology replace the space that people are supposed to fill”(Matesky), said Matesky, we are losing the ability to connect each individual face to face, and socially connection has been taking over through social media by using technologic device. Shannon Matesky has successfully redefined the actual meaning of “Myspace” from the distance between two to the space one’s create on the social media. MySpace no longer refers to distance between two, but to

The low ceiling cowered above and the black plastic chairs formed a restless crowd around me. From my seat, I could smell the acute scent of cleaning fluid, whiteboard markers, and the nauseating perfume of the girl sitting next to me. Like so many other students, she exuded concentration. Her brows were drawn as her hand moved rapidly over the testing booklet, only pausing to reposition herself or cast an almost imperceptible sidelong glance. The effortlessness of her actions furthered my anxiety as I began tapping my foot uneasily against the speckled linoleum floor. Through the dusty shades that hung precariously in front the only window in the room, I could see the outline of a solitary building shadowed by the dense gray fog that clung to the courtyard outside. At that moment, I would have given anything to be able to run and scream at the top of my lungs. I had an inexplicable urge to break free from the confinement of that room and what it

Social Media is taking the life out of our youth’s every day. More and more of our youths is turning into big couch potatoes because they are always on an electronic device. It seems like everything that have a colorful touch screen they are on it. What happen to the good old days when you can go outside and enjoy nature? What happen when you can easily communicate to them without texting them or spelling words right. We all are capable of communicating with words; we don’t need emoji’s.

One can argue that social media lets us connect to one another. Yes, this is true to some extent but social media can also be the source of people driving each other away. When we are so busy having our noses in our phone constantly we miss everything that goes on around us. We lose a sense of communication when falling into this temptation of always having to know to what is happening on our phone. Thomas Freidman stated that he feels technology is dividing us instead of uniting us after experiencing a taxi ride gone wrong in the sense of the driver constantly chatting on his phone. After Apple introduced the iPod it seems the world has slowly drifted to a state silence. In Steve Johnson’s essay Social Connections, he tells of the time before

Not only teenagers and middle-aged adults, but even young children are addicted to staring down at a blue screen. How many times during the past year have you walked by a playground and heard the contagious laughter of young children playing? I bet that this number is very small. When I was nine years old, I remember what my favorite thing to do after school was. It was to play. Similar to every other child at the time, running around an open field or zipping down a slide was all I wanted. But today, the hushed silence I experience as I walk past the devoid park gives me chills as I watch the swings and slides wait to give joy to laughing children that used to frolic here everyday, but now remain quiet in their secluded houses. Not because it’s cold outside, but because nine-year-olds today are copying our technological obsession. Did you know that on average, children get their first cellphones at age eight? Our generation is becoming the most antisocial generation yet. Although many people disagree and believe that using technology, especially cell phones, make them more social, I don’t understand how sitting at home on a Friday night, texting or blogging, is more social than hanging out with your friends and enjoying the company of others. Although numerous people disagree with me, stating that technology is making people more social, I remain committed to my belief. For people who

According to Keith Hampton, “Since 1985 people have become more socially isolated.” This isolation is due to the dramatic increase of electronic communication including the popular smart phone. What most people do not realize is that technology affects not only their community but themselves as well. When people think about a community they usually think of the area which surrounds their home; but not only is a community a particular surrounding area, but it is also when people who share a common interest or a goal can come together and rely on one another. Many researchers claim that this new technology has had a dramatic impact on many American’s lives along with their communities. Due to the advances in technology, it has become easier

Instead of walking down the street talking to someone or meeting someone new, people are plugged into a device and ignoring the world around them. In “The Flight From Conversation,” Sherry Turkle discusses how millenials spend all day every day at a desk right next to someone else and never speak more than a couple words to them (85). People just aren’t engaging in much conversation today due to technology. Any conversing today is done via text message, email, or instant messaging on various social media websites or apps. Turkle also talks about how the rare times when people do communicate, it’s just in small blurbs and snippets. She complains about millenials and their idea that a quick text, letting someone know that they’re thinking about them, is suffice enough for a large chunk of conversation (85). People should not let technology come in the way of having a good

Text messages, iMessages, and direct messaging have made it all too simple to communicate with one another. These modern means of exchanging information have led to a drop in the amount of verbal discussions. “A generation of e-mailing, followed by an explosion in texting, has pushed the telephone conversation into serious decline” (“Texting Generation”). Though talking on the phone requires technology, a level of closeness exists, whereas in a text message, there is an absence of this. Voice calls have become “old-fashioned” in recent years, but hearing someone’s voice instead of reading a combination of letters on a tiny screen brings the intimacy factor to a whole new level. Many people in recent generations refrain from phone calls by virtue of being put on the spot and not having time to conceive an acceptable response. “Young people say they avoid voice calls because the immediacy of a phone call strips them of the control that they have over the arguably less-intimate pleasures of texting, e-mailing, Facebooking or tweeting” (“Texting Generation”). The avoidance of these immediate response ways of communication creates a divide in the community. Wrapped up in portraying themselves as a “perfect” human, people lose themselves and their values in the new virtual world, making it considerably easier for people to depict themselves in a finer way but at the same time, losing personal connection to the people in their lives. Technology continues to take place of the simple things people enjoy with one another. For example, a walk in the park on a cool, breezy day seems to be a rare thing people take pleasure in in recent times. The latest technological devices have subdued these “old” ways of finding entertainment and spending time with others. In “The Pedestrian” by Ray Bradbury, Leonard Mead lives in

I woke slowly, eyelashes fluttering gently as I blinked my way into reality-- gently rising from the slumber I had plunged into the night before. Sunlight was just barely sneaking through the bamboo blinds of my light pink room, leaving my bed in a shadow of deep purple as if it was afraid to pull me from my dreaming too soon. The room was still chilly and the floorboards a frigid slate of ice as I pulled on the slipper-socks that my mother had set beside my bed, and sleepily padded over to the window.

Over the past few years, technology has become a significant part of people’s every day lives. It helps people connect with those far away, but in the process, disconnects themselves from others close with them. Technology has helped improve the lives of many people through transportation and more, but overall has torn us apart. The constant usage of technology has people’s eyes glued to a small screen; they often forget to communicate with those around them.

Since the beginning of time humankind has been revolutionary in the arts of technology. The invention of the wheel in cavemen times to the iphone in today 's world, human beings are always inventing new gadgets to help our society or destroy. For instance, since the breakthrough of Facebook millions of users have subscribed to this social media, with it comes with “friends” however most of them are strangers. It is important to realize society has been so engrossed in the social media and internet that there has been a lost of human contact.

Just buying your groceries, you can encounter dozens of people texting, emailing, or posting, because we live in a world where this is considered commonplace and natural. Cell phones have taken over the planet to the degree that of the 7.5 billion people on the planet, roughly 6 billion have cell phones, while only 4.5 have access to working toilets (ASAPScience, 2016). While you yourself probably text and use social media multiple times throughout the day, have you ever considered trying to live a month without it. Per day, U.S. teens spend about 7.5 hours on their phones, computers, and other devices, and the number has likely increased (Learning to Talk, 2). Technology has replaced countless chore, but now electronic communication is replacing human relationships. The escalating use of electronics to interact is eroding tangible human connection and depriving people of necessary social skills and wrecking your health.