Different Worlds

I found the most interesting part of this essay, Getting Close to the Machine by Ellen Ullman, to be how different the writer thought from everyone else. Not going to lie, I was rather confused for the first few pages of this essay. They way the author talking in the language of her field, I just didn't understand it. I knew what was going on for the most part, that they were creating a system for filing information about people with AIDS, but the detail of what they were doing flew over my head. However, when Ullman sat down with the actually people to discuss it, was when the essay got interesting. She had to keep slowing down her thought process in order to communicate with the users. Her mind worked on a more

technical level, while everyone else in the room worked on a more socially aware level.

This is kind of like comparing different areas of work, or even just majors when in college. We are all learning different things and can talk in different "languages" depending on what discourse community we are in. We operate in different ways and speak differently on if we are with those in our major compared to our roommates which can be compared to student activities that we participate in.