In Rita Raley’s writing, she explores the connection between our bodily movements and digital spaces. She also contrasts our connection to digital spaces with that of “traditional” spaces, such as paper and pencil. On page 5 of the reading, she specifically discusses a large difference between these two: humans leave marks on the real world wherever we traverse, whereas in digital spaces such marks are absent.
“but unintentional mark-making is at the very least a sign of our human presence.”
This quote makes me think of how unintentional and intentional human mark-making has connected me to media in the past. My first thought went to old reused textbooks I would borrow for classes. As I flipped through the pages, I would occasionally see writing from past students layered over the top of the printed text. Highlight marks indicating what that person deemed important, or even small engravings left by their pencil while writing on a piece of paper atop the textbook pages. I’m not sure what it is about this, but knowing and having tangible evidence that someone else once possessed and utilized this book in the same manner as I am now connects me to it more.
The quote also makes me think about past memories of myself. When I pull out old projects from elementary school, I can see my awful handwriting and my bad spelling, and I can see how much I have grown. I feel like you can’t get the exact same thing with digital media. Digital spaces often carry an added sense of perfection, thanks to features like auto typefaces and spell check. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate these attributes of digital spaces quite a bit; I mean, I’m using them right now. Yet, there is just something different about being able to hold proof of someone’s existence in your hands.
https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2019/10/25/leaving-your-mark-autograph-selfie