‘From the weakness of our senses we cannot judge the truth.’
(Anaxagoras)
As we saw in Chapter 4, ‘digital literacy’ remains an ambiguous term despite having a longer history than other, related, terms. In a similar way to the term ‘digital native’, the use of the term ‘digital literacy’ can be seen as existing within (what I shall introduce in this chapter as) a ‘continuum of ambiguity’ that features productive, creative and generative parts. These terms are not merely vague, but ambiguous in ways originally identified by Empson (1930:2004) and subsequently augmented by Robinson (1941) and Abbott (1997).29
This chapter explores Empson’s seven types of ambiguity, originally used in literary criticism, along with subsequent work in the area. The concept of ‘digital literacy’ is juxtaposed with the ‘digital native/immigrant’ dichotomy that has followed a trajectory through the three stages of ambiguity. The idea of ‘dead metaphors’ is used to explain those terms that have dropped out of the continuum through overuse and reside mainly in dictionaries rather than in productive discourse. My aim is to show that almost all terms are defined in ways that could be considered ambiguous; as we saw in Chapter 3, this can be true of well-known terms such as (traditional, print) ‘literacy’. Such ambiguity, I shall argue, is especially important to consider when it comes to the examples of ‘digital literacy’ and Prensky’s ‘digital native/immigrant’ dichotomy. Given the inescapability of ambiguity, I shall make the case for embracing ambiguity and using it in a productive and pragmatic way.
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