Language and Learning in the Digital Age [Paperback]

In Language and Learning in the Digital Age, linguist James Paul Gee and educator Elisabeth Hayes deal with the forces unleashed by todays digital media, forces that are transforming language and learning for good and ill.

They argue that the role of oral language is almost always entirely misunderstood in debates about digital media. Like the earlier inventions of writing and print, digital media actually power up or enhance the powers of oral language.

Gee and Hayes deal, as well, with current digital transformations of language and literacy in the context of a growing crisis in traditional schooling in developed countries. With the advent of new forms of digital media, children are increasingly drawn towards video games, social media, and alternative ways of learning. Gee and Hayes explore the way in which these alternative methods of learning can be a force for a paradigm change in schooling.

This is an engaging, accessible read both for undergraduate and graduate students and for scholars in language, linguistics, education, media and communication studies.

1. Introduction 2. Language 3. Literacy 4. Language and Interaction  5. New Kinds of People and Relationships 6. Literacy and Interpretation 7. School 8. School and Passionate Affinity Spaces 9. Play and Theory Crafting 10. Cats, Passion, and Expertise 11. The Return of the Amateur and the New Capitalism 12. Words, Images and Experiences 13. Three Social Formations 14. Multitasking, Diversity and Commonality

In the context of moral panics surrounding social media, the internet and video games and concerns over how digital media are affecting the young and their ability to learn and communicate effectively, leading educationalist, Jameslój