by
Obododimma Oha
If one used to think that manual writing was a kind of magic, now electronic writing using the computer keyboard has brought an interesting possibility in which the human finger can be thought of as extended. That extension also means that writing has continued and that one cannot stop with manual writing on slate and paper. In an interesting way, the human and the machine have stopped quarrelling but are now allies in the production of written discourse. In other words, are the computer and the human brain not imagined as analogies of the other? Is the computer not imagined and created as a more powerful brain and the human brain sometimes not metaphorized as a computer if amazing in calculation? Yet the computer, interestingly, is a product of human brain.
If the keyboard is a kind of addition to the social robot that is the human being for processing texts, then we have to think seriously about modifying the board a bit more to suit our needs, even our vanities.
I think the human finger started it all with chalk and pencil and pen on surfaces. Those surfaces that can voice out our meanings need attention. That is not to say that those surfaces are all that matter. But one needs to keep observing surfaces of meaning-making and the modes they employ.
If the human brain has finally reconciled with the artificial intelligence that is the computer and they are thought of as siamese twins,why can't the human finger reconcile with the computer keyboard in putting together ideas and conveying them to an audience?
The designs of some keyboards could be intriguing and interesting. The other day, I was typing on my wife's telephone and making mistakes. Why? The keyboard was small and was obviously designed for slender fingers. My stubby and big farmer's fingers could not find the tiny keyboard of the device funny. I eventually handed it over to her with some annoyance, asking her to type instead, while I dictated. It was not the fault of the makers of the keyboard. The user should have known that there was size constraint and take a better action. All the same, design may be for attraction, aesthetics, or physiology. Whichever may be the case, what is more important is that there is a keyboard for the text one is producing.
What seems to be even more crucial is the availability of keyboards for indigenous languages not commonly used on the computer. Although some computer companies, like HP, have started adding these languages as templates or languages of initial configuration, there are still many not included. The development of their keyboards for electronic writing in them is one way they are developed and modernised, instead of being allowed to die. Initially, it was a case of the combination of many keys to get characters and their sub-dots. Now, one can install and configure devices with indigenous keyboards, not just install them as applications. But the main point is that the indigenous language is given a future by technology through the development of a reliable keyboard.
Keyboards are still predominantly linguistic; that is, their options still favour the selection of graphemes for forming words and meanings in languages.
What of the inclusion of people or beings that have to process meanings outside human language? You can see why emoticons that combine letters and other signification may be necessary. That obviously involves a very complex combination. But we trust our artificial intelligence. As we probe space and hope that other beings (if there are any) can understand us, it becomes necessary to think of alternative or upgrading of our human communication modes.
This is to say that, as keyboard development looks towards the future, one has to think also about the future of human communication. That future calls for some possible modifications in our communication system, communication among ourselves as intelligent beings, and communication with other non-human beings. Is the later still strange? Why do people sometimes speak in glossolalia in their prayers, hoping God will be moved to action?
But what bothers us more is even how keyboard development points towards literacy. Humans have to upgrade their literacy and begin to read and write with these electronic keyboards. It is inevitable that the new human should know how to read and write, and also do so electronically.
One would like to see modifications that show that the human being is growing up, not retreating and moving round following lower animals in bushes. One would like to see more challenging additions to electronic writing, for instance, the wonderful development in chatting online, in which someone can even see that the other person is around and present, if the person is scribbling, emotions accompanying the linguistic signs, etc. Is the context not compensating in a wonderful way for what may be lost if the interaction were purely linguistic?
I like the way that keyboard has come to the rescue. But that suggests that we as humans have a lot of thinking to do.
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