My friend Meghan Kish, Chief of Interpretation for the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, recently sent me a link to an NPR story about these new glasses with voice-controlled computing power, where graphics and images pop into your field of view with a tilt of your head. Right out of science fiction films like Terminator or Minority Report, Google apparently has a “beta” product which could put smartphone capabilities such as GPS maps, weather, time, Web streaming, and more inches from your eyeball.
I won’t lie; I find this both scary and exciting. It is also a reminder of how much and how fast times are changing, and how important it is to keep up if our programs are going to remain meaningful and relevant.
Each August for the past 11 years, Beloit College in Beloit, Wisconsin, has released the Beloit College Mindset List. It provides a look at the cultural touchstones that shape the lives of students entering college. It is the creation of Beloit’s Keefer Professor of the Humanities Tom McBride and Public Affairs Director Ron Nief. The list is shared with faculty to remind them of rapidly changing frame of reference for this new generation. This is an important resource for us as interpreters as well.
According to the Beloit website the class of 2012 has grown up in an era where computers and rapid communication are the norm, and colleges no longer trumpet the fact that residence halls are “wired” and equipped with the latest hardware. These students will hardly recognize the availability of telephones in their rooms since they have seldom utilized landlines during their adolescence. They will continue to live on their cell phones and communicate via texting. Roommates, few of whom have ever shared a bedroom, have already checked out each other on Facebook where they have shared their most personal thoughts with the whole world. 
It is a multicultural, politically correct, and “green” generation that has hardly noticed the threats to their privacy and has never feared the Russians and the Warsaw Pact.
They are the same age as Harry Potter and the H.P books and movies were a huge part of their childhood.
GPS satellite navigation systems have always been available.
There is no expectation that a gas station will fix their flat, but they do expect cappuccino.
Electronic filing of tax returns has always been an option.
Films have never been X rated, only NC-17.
The Tonight Show has always been hosted by Jay Leno (with a brief interlude by Conan O’Brien).
They may have been given a Nintendo Game Boy to play with in the crib.
Lenin’s name has never been on a major city in Russia.
Caller ID has always been available on phones.
Windows 3.0 operating system made IBM PCs user-friendly the year they were born.
A complete list can be found at: http://www.beloit.edu/mindset/2012/
Meaningful and relevant means we have to stay on top of trends – cultural trends, media trends and certainly trends in technology. While I don’t feel any different than when I was 22, the fact is, I am. I was shaped by the times I grew up in. As a child, Pluto was my favorite planet and the Brontosaurus was my favorite dinosaur. My first computer was a Kaypro (Anyone? Anyone?). My life experience is as different from these college freshmen as theirs is from the fifth graders on our school programs. Don’t get me started on 5th graders, that’s another blog!
Before you test run your program with a real audience, I recommend that you test your references, and your language, with people younger than you.
Peace Out!
(No one says that anymore!)
– Amy Lethbridge, NAI President
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