For the research paper choose a novel from among the following:
1. Borges, Jorge Luis, “The Garden of Forking Paths” and “The library of Babel”, in Labyrinths: selected stories and other writings (New York: New Directions Pub. Corp., 1964).
2. Gibson, William, Neuromancer,(New York: Ace Books, 1984).
3. Cronenberg, David, Consumed,(New York: Scribner, 2014).
4. Dick, Philip K. Ubik, (New York: Doubleday, 1969).
or
A scanner darkly (New York: Doubleday, 1977).
CLASS SCHEDULE
SECTION ONE - TALES AND MYTHS OF THE INTERNET
Week 1. Introduction and course overview: What is digital media and what's new about it?
Selected readings from:
Tim O'Reilly What is web 2.0, blog post.
Lindgren, S. ‘Digital Media and Society’, London: Sage, 2017.
Watching:
Selected clips from “Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World” (2016), “The machine is US/ing US” (2007)
Week 2. The origins of computer culture
Selected readings from:
Curran, James, “The internet of history: rethinking the internet's past”, in Misunderstanding the Internet, eds. James Curran, Natalie Fenton and Des Freedman, London and New York: Routledge, 2016.
Barbrook, Richard, and Cameron, Andy, “The Californian Ideology”, Mute Magazine, 1995.
Watching: selected clips from “Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World” (2016), “The Social Network” (2010)
Recommended readings:
Barlow, John Perry, A Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace, 1996.
Packer, George, “Change the world”, The New Yorker, May 27, 2013.
Week 3. Technodeterminism, cyberutopias, and the myth of the Internet as a public sphere
Selected readings from:
Toffler, A. ‘The Third Wave’, London: Collins, 1980.
Lindgren, S. ‘Digital Media and Society’, London: Sage, 2017.
Watching: Mac’s 1984 commercial; ‘Dans la tete de Aziza’ Tunisian remix
Week 4 From early hacker cultures to Anonymous.
Selected readings from:
Coleman, E. Gabriella, Coding Freedom: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Hacking, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013).
Coleman, G. (2013) ‘Anonymous and the Politics of Leaking’, in Brevini, B., Hintz, A., and McCurdy, P. (eds.) Beyond WikiLeaks, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan; pp. 209-228.
"Hacker", in Ryan, M., Emerson, L., & Robertson, B. (Eds.). (2014). The johns hopkins guide to digital media. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Watching: selected clips from Anonymous, “Ghost in the shell” (1995), “The Matrix” (1999), “Revolution OS” (2001), “Mr Robot” (2015)
Recommended reading:
Wark, McKenzie, A Hacker Manifesto, version 4.0.
Week 5. Free software, open source movement, and remix cultures
Selected readings from
Lessig, Lawrence Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy,(London: Bloomsbury, 2008).
"Free and Open Software", in Ryan, M., Emerson, L., & Robertson, B. (Eds.). (2014). The johns hopkins guide to digital media. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Watching: selected clips from “Good copy bad copy” (2007), “RIP!A Remix Manifesto” (2008), “Re-examining the Remix: Larry Lessig's TEDTalk” (2010); ‘This is America’’s user-generated remixes (2018)
Recommended reading:
Stallman, Richard, The GNU Manifesto, 1985.
Week 6. Participatory cultures and DIY communities
Readings:
Selected readings from
Jenkins, Henry Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide, (London and New York: New York University Press, 2006).
Davidson, Patrick. "The language of Internet memes", in Mandiberg, M. (Ed.). (2014). The social media reader.
"Mash-up", "Participatory culture", in Ryan, M., Emerson, L., & Robertson, B. (Eds.). (2014). The johns hopkins guide to digital media. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Watching: user-generated remixes, mash-ups, memes case studies
Week 7. * Midterm test*
SECTION TWO -METAPHORS AND LANGUAGES OF DIGITAL MEDIA
Introduction to Section Two: Metaphors and languages of digital media.
Selected readings from:
Manovich, Lev, The Language of New Media (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002).
Watching: clips from “The man with the movie camera” (1929)
Week 8. The five principles of digital media: Representation, Modularity
Selected readings from:
Manovich, Lev. The Language of New Media (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002).
Miller, V. Understanding Digital Culture, London: Sage, 2011.
Watching: clips from “Videodrome” (1983), “Histoire(s) du Cinema” (1988), “Minority report” (2002), “Blade runner” (1982),
Week 9. The five principles of digital media: Automation
*Workshop for the research paper
Selected readings from:
Manovich, Lev, The Language of New Media (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002).
Miller, V. Understanding Digital Culture, London: Sage, 2011.
Watching: clips from “Histoire(s) du Cinema” (1988), “Goodbye to language” (2014), “Immemory” (2002), “How algorithms shape our world” (TedTalk 2011), case studies of algorithms and A.I.s
Week 10. The five principles of digital media: Variability and Transcoding
Manovich, Lev, The Language of New Media (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002).
Miller, V. Understanding Digital Culture, London: Sage, 2011.
Watching: case studies from Instagram, Snapchat, selfies, etc
Week 11: Virtuality, Simulation, Remediation
Readings:
Selected readings from
Bolter, Jay David, and Grusin, Richard, “Remediation”, Configurations: A Journal of Literature, Science, and Technology 4, 3 (1996 Fall): 311-358.
Baudrillard, Jean, Simulacra and Simulations, in Selected Writings, ed. Mark Poster (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), 166-184.
Watching: clips from “Strange days” (1995), etc.
* Video exercise due
SECTION THREE – THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF DIGITAL MEDIA
Week 12. Sharing economies or free labor?
Selected readings from:
Shirky, Clay, “Gin, Television, and Social Surplus”, in The Social Media Reader, ed. Michael Mandiberg, (New York: New York University Press, 2012), 236-241.
Benkler, Yochai, "Sharing nicely", in Mandiberg, M. (Ed.). (2014). The social media reader.
Terranova, Tiziana, “Free Labor: Producing Culture for the Digital Economy”, in Social Text 2, 18 (2000 Summer): 33-58.
Watching: “How cognitive surplus will change the world: Clay Shirky's TED Talk” (2010), “Smart mobs: the next social revolution” (2002); “Facebookistan” (2016).
Recommended reading:
Ippolita, In the Facebook Acquarium: the Resistable Rise of Anarcho-Capitalism, Institute of Network Cultures (Amsterdam: 2015).
Week 13. Social media and its discontents: a case study of the Arab Spring's "Facebook revolutions"
Selected readings from:
Van Dijck, José, The Culture of Connectivity: a Critical History of Social Media, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013).
Della Ratta, Donatella. On the narrative of Arab 'DIY revolutions' and how it fits into out neoliberal times, in Bennett, P., & McDougall, J. (Eds.). (2017). Popular culture and the austerity myth : Hard times today (Routledge research in cultural and media studies, 98). New York, NY: Routledge.
Watching: selected clips and user generated content from the Arab Spring
Recommended reading:
Lovink, Geert, Social Media Abyss: critical Internet culture and the force of negation, (Cambridge UK: Polity Press, 2016).
Week 14. Wrap up and final discussion
Final exam (check exam schedule): research paper & oral presentations
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