Locus Communis: Twitter as Digital Commonplace “Each commonplace will be very short: how pleasant it would be to feel copious as well as fluid! the modern mind takes such small flights.” ~E.M. Forster, Commonplace BookCommonplace Book of Francis Grosvenor, circa 1620. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Beinecke Flickr Laboratory, licensed by Creative Commons. Commonplace books are staples of western thought; in and through their pages many of the world's most renowned writers and thinkers cobbled together bits of information gleaned from their studies and observations, from literary quotes to tables and measures. Maintaining a commonplace book was an inventional and creative learning endeavor, a means by which an individual could make sense of the world around her . Through the cobbling, information gained new meaning by juxtaposition and alternate contextualization, so that connections could be made upon a theme or themes. In terms more congruent with our contemporary, digitally-networ ked society , the commonplace book was an analog aggregator of external content.
