I'm almost done with the syllabus I blogged a few weeks back. But I still need some help from all you smart folks out there. Please take a look, and let me know what I'm missing. Feel free to borrow, as well. Remember, this is for Masters students in Media, Culture and Communication.
UPDATE: Here's the final version:
Topics in Digital Media:
Visions and Revisions of Cyberspace
Dr. Aram Sinnreich
Description
Today, for the first time in
history, computer-mediated culture has become mainstream for a majority of
individuals in technologically developed societies. From email to texting, from
online gaming to online banking, from YouTube to Hulu, from DoS attacks to
Second Life sit-ins, nearly every traditional aspect of our lives has found a
new expression in its digital proxy.
In order to understand the
cultural, social, political and economic consequences of this development, we
must look to the origins of today’s cyberculture, in the futuristic visions
(both dystopian and utopian) that shaped the development of today’s networked
technologies. We will trace the genealogy of these visions, as they developed
in tandem with the growing digital communications infrastructure over the past
three quarters of a century, and evolved into new forms that even the most
forward-thinking of visionaries could not have predicted. Ultimately, one can
argue that the Internet has both exceeded and fallen short of the hype that
surrounded its birth and development, and, by comparing the myth to the
reality, we may better understand what aspects of the human condition are
likely to persist regardless of technological development.
Class will be conducted as a seminar. Students will be responsible for leading discussions on the readings, and are encouraged to critically engage the readings and class conversations.
Schedule
9/9: Introduction
9/16: The Memex and
the Mushroom Cloud
- Bush, V. (1945).
As we may think. The Atlantic.
AND 2 OF THE FOLLOWING:
- Borges,
J. L. (1941). The library of Babel.
- Rifkin, J. (1995). A view of the future. Utne Reader.
- Slouka,
M. (1996). Reality is death. (from War
of the Worlds)
- Leiner,
et al (2000). A
Brief History of the Internet.
9/23: The Metaverse
- Nelson,
T. (1974). Computer lib/dream
machines.
[excerpt]
- Baudrillard,
J. (1988). Simulacra and Simulations
[excerpt]
- Dibbell, J. (2008). Mutilated Furries, Flying Phalluses: Put the Blame on Griefers, the Sociopaths of the Virtual World
- Pendragon, H. (2008) Griefers: Why Dibbell’s Wired Article Was 1-Sided.
OR
- Neil
Stephenson, Snow Crash (Bantam,
1992)
9/30: Rules and
Regulation
- Internet Society, DNS Root Name Servers Explained for Non-Experts
- Mueller, M. (2002). Dancing the Quango: ICANN as International Regulatory Regime.
- Sinnreich & Zager (2008). E-Speech: The (Uncertain) Future of Free Expression
- Wu, T. (2005). Network neutrality, broadband discrimination.
OR
- Lawrence Lessig, Code v2 (Basic Books, 2006)
10/7: Freedom to Hack
GUEST: Karl Fogel, founder, questioncopyright.org
- Christopher
Kelty (2005), Geeks, Social Imaginaries, and Recursive Publics
- NY
Times (1995), A
Most Wanted Cyberthief is caught in his own web.
- 2600,
Interview
with Kevin Mitnick (video)
- Stallman, R. GNU manifesto
OR
·
Doug Thomas, Hacker
Culture (U. Minn Press, 2002)
10/14: dot-com
Fantasies
GUEST: Gene DeRose, CEO, HouseParty, former CEO, Jupiter Research
FOUR OF THE FOLLOWING:
- Dyson, E. (1995). Intellectual value. Wired.
- Sinnreich, A. (2001). Remixing the Distribution Chain for Digital Music. Jupiter Research.
- Meeker, M. (1995). The Internet Report. Morgan Stanley. [Read part 1. The rest is skimmable].
- CNET, Top 10
dot-com flops
- Anderson, C.
(2004). The Long Tail. Wired.
- O’Reilly,
T. (2005). What is Web 2.0?
- Schiff,
S. (2006). Know it all. The New
Yorker.
- boyd, d. (2007). Viewing American class divisions through Facebook and MySpace.
OR
- Nicholas
Negroponte, Being Digital (Vintage
Books, 1996)
10/21: Our Second
Selves: Video Games and Identity
FOUR OF THE FOLLOWING:
- Gee, J. P. (2003). What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. Palmgrave Macmillan. Introduction, Conclusion and Appendix (20 pages)
- Smuts, A. (2005, November 2). Are video games art? Contemporary Aesthetics. (11 pages)
- Seabrook, J. (2006). Game master. The New Yorker, November 6, 2006 (14 pages)
- Bogost, I. (2006). Playing politics: Videogames for Politics, Activism and Advocacy. First Monday. Special Issue number 7. (10 pages)
- Jones, Saving Worlds with Videogame Activism. [unpublished paper]
- Ito, et al (2008). Living and Learning with New Media (pp. 18-39)
- Brathwaite, B. (2007). Sex in video games. Charles River Media. Chapter 4, pp. 89-122.
- Parisi, D. (2007). Playing the Interface: Video Games as Bodily Techniques [Unpublished paper]. (19 pages)
OR
- Dibbell, J. Play Money. (Basic Books, 2006)
10/28:
Remix/Configurable Culture
· Aram Sinnreich, Mashed Up (U. Mass Press, 2010)
OR
· Henry Jenkins, Convergence Culture (NYU Press, 2006)
OR
· Lawrence Lessig, Remix (Penguin, 2008)
11/4: The Cloud
· Downes, S. The Cloud and Collaboration
· Zittrain, J. Lost in the Cloud
· Golden, B. Clueless on the Charles: How Zittrain’s Cloud Missive Got it Wrong
·
Doctorow, C. Not
Every Cloud Has A Silver Lining
OPTIONAL:
· Google Blog, Introducing the Chrome OS
· Chappell, Windows Azure Whitepaper
11/11: Surveillance,
Sensors and Semantics
- Brin, D. (1998). The transparent society.
- Berners-Lee, et al. (2001). The Semantic Web.
- Dodson, S. (2008). The Net Shapes Up to Get Physical.
- EFF, Surveillance Self-Defense Project
11/18: Adventures in
MeatSpace
GUEST: Dennis Crowley, founder, Dodgeball.com
· Doctorow, C. (2004) Anda’s Game
· NY Times (2004). Quick, After Him, Pacman Went Thataway
· Laura Forlano (2010). WiFi Geographies: When Code Meets Place
· Area/Code, Big Games Manifesto (1 page)
· Patti Maes, The Sixth Sense (Video)
11/25: MOVIE/FIELD
TRIP
12/2: Presentations
12/9: Presentations
Comments