Response to Wesch and Postman - What does it mean to be smart?

Wesch and Postman have me thinking about what it means to be smart. More specifically, what does it mean to be intelligent in our 21st century media culture, as the "Age of Typography" declines and the "Age of Television" ascends?

Perhaps Wesch would argue that during a technological revolution intelligence is the ability to not only rethink information, but also “harness, create, critique, organize, and understand” it. As information changes and our basic assumptions are challenged, Wesch believes it is necessary to “rethink ourselves.”

Postman’s response to the question of what it means to be smart might be even more theoretical, as he believes that “intelligence is primarily defined as one’s capacity to grasp the truth of things” (p.25) and that “‘truth’ is a kind of cultural prejudice” (p.22). We explored this idea today in class when we asked the following questions: How do I decide what to believe? When can I believe what I read, see, hear, or experience? How do I know what I know?

In thinking about what it means to be smart, I’d like to alter this last question slightly and ask: How do I know what I should know? How do I, as a teacher, decide what my students should be taught? And how do I go about accurately measuring and assessing it? I believe Postman would argue that intelligence can’t be measured, or that such a measurement is dependent upon the form of communication and the value it is given in a culture. He writes, “Intelligence does not have the quantity or magnitude, except as we believe that it does” (p.15). This is important to me as I think about my course-related project concerning people with disabilities. Is there a true definition of intelligence? How do media support and reinforce ideas of intelligence, ability, and disability? Are these social constructions or simply relative terms?