Descriptive Essay: Generations. Communications & Media Essay

Descriptive Essay: Generations
Name
Institution
Due Date
Descriptive Essay: Generations
Marina Keegan’s essay The Opposite of Loneliness is nothing if not inspiring. The essay is to the young people, those who the society believes are out of touch or are rebels. Marina is simply telling them not to despair because they are still young and the world is there for them to conquer. “We’re so young. We can’t, we MUST not lose this sense of possibility because in the end, it’s all we have.” These are words that my generation will indeed subscribe to because a lot has been said about my generation. Some call us digital natives, others say we do not like reading, others say we are rebels, and still, there are some who say we dislike connectivity. Well, I will not try and defend my generation and say we are different. Actually, I believe some of these attributes fit us quite perfectly. However, the question I would like to ask is whether being a digital native bad? What is wrong with being a rebel? I will not say the same for reading and connectivity because today, access is not a problem as it was years back. So, like everyone else, I am trying to understand why we struggle to read and appear less reachable in spite of the technological advancements.
Even though the range of years is not yet determined, I believe that my generation is made up of people born between 1996 and 2005 (2005 is not a universally agreed year). So, many of us grew up in an era when technological advancement was at its peak and hence the name digital natives. For those born in 2001, they have grown up believing that iPods have been in existence all along. This lot even found Google already up and running. For me, I cannot fathom a world where Google did not exist. How would I find information online? How would I find some of the fast-food joints? How would I find my way to a new city or town? My parents often tell me that they used to engage strangers when they were new in town. Apparently, back then people had time to spare for those who stopped them and asked for directions. Today, everyone is trying to be the next millionaire. Everyone wants to drive the latest car before they get to 25. How else would you explain the many YouTube channels with no meaningful content? No one has time to spare for those who appear lost. Google has indeed been great at giving some of us ‘a sense of direction.’
It is often said that millennials killed print. Well, if this is the case, why is everyone saying that Gen Z does not like to read? Those who make this claim often say that we have become used to reading Twitter’s 280 characters (initially 140). However, as Perez (2018) notes, even though Twitter allows 280 characters, “The most common length of a tweet is 33 characters.” What this means is that my generation h...