I really am not sure what I want to focus on for my final project. I feel like I have a bunch of very broad ideas that i’m not sure how to narrow down.
Something i was interested in earlier this year was codes within letters. that lead me to my topic of censorship for the last project.
i also think that love letters are still a fun focus but i feel like we’ve dived really deeply into love letters so i don’t know what i could focus on that would be new material.
Another broad topic i have is letters in the modern day. How have letters changed since the invention of email and then texting. how do we communicate with one another as a society. Letters are a very personal means of communication but texts are very impersonal. I am a firm believer that you can have a really meaningful conversation through texts. But you hardly have to think when sending one.
Separately, we have worked so hard to get to this point. there are times in letters where the authors lament that they cannot communicate through a faster means. we have achieved that, but at what cost? in an age of instant gratification, how would we cope if we couldn’t rocket off 3 emails over the course of our lunch break without batting an eye. Our society would collapse! we are so reliant on the ability to be as up to date as possible about everything, but that hasn’t always been the case.
I think something interesting is that letters have always had an impact. Because it is a slow type of communication, when you receive a letter, it is always exciting. when there was no other means of communication, letter meant the world to people. you could move to a different state and still be able to have some way to hear from friends and family. Today, in a time where letters are not the primary form of communication, letters are like a little gift. Someone thoughtfully took time out of their day to write to you.
