English 184: Winter 2006 This course is in part a "practicum," meaning that it emphasizes practicing or participating in the the object of study. In this case, what you'll "practice" is writing for digital publication to the world wide web: Personal website: including a home page, pages for other interests, schoolwork, career needs (such as a resume, recommendations, or writing sample) etc. Weblog: you can create one of your own and participate to a greater or lesser extent in the class blog, Equality Monitor Nonlinear "hyper" essay: a website comprised of 1500-2000 words, spread out over ten or more web pages hyperlinked together. On a topic suitable for inclusion in the class project site, "Living the Low-Wage Life." Multi-media final project: incorporates a critical hyperessay (academic writing involving research) with other design elements: weblog, wiki, graphic display, web-delivered video, photography, sound, etc. On a topic suitable for discussion on the Equality Monitor (other topics okay with my approval). Things You’ll Need: A flash “thumb,” “stick,” or “keychain” drive to store your work in progress. Attendance, academic integrity, and disability accomodation. Because of the participatory and hands-on nature of the learning you'll do in this class, I suggest that you miss no more than 1 3-hour class, and arrive late no more than twice. Unexcused attendence problems beyond these guidelines will be reflected by a reduction in your final grade (usually 1/2 to 1 1/2 letter grades); attendance issues affecting 30% of scheduled classes will usually result in a failing grade. SCU maintains a detailed policy on academic integrity that applies to this course and which you may consult in the University Bulletin or on the Provost's web site. Coursework & Grading At the end of the term, you’ll prepare a hypertext letter linking to your web-published class work and discussing what you’ve learned. You’ll also send me an email proposing a final grade, based on assessment criteria we’ll develop over the course of the term. I'm always available to talk if you have questions about your grade and will always take time to help you figure out how to do as well as possible. As long as your participation remains satisfactory, extra credit is usually available. My approach to grading is holistic: I prefer to take all of the assignments together, including participation, and consider the context of your personal goals for the class, your growth as a writer and, especially, your self-assessment. There are many good things about this approach: most people feel that it’s fair and they appreciate that it’s individualized, and they usually appreciate that I take their opinions seriously. Most people also feel that it helps to keep the focus on the writing process. On the negative side, we sometimes prefer what feels like the clarity, simplicity, and familiarity of a universal grading rubric that focuses on the results of your efforts: (“A C paper fulfills the assignment, but lacks sophistication,” etc). My way of handling that is to ask you to develop a set of goals for yourself this quarter, and to describe the way those goals connect to the sort of grading possibilities you envision for yourself. You’ll share those goals and ideas with others and with me, and those exchanges may motivate you to revise your goals. Eventually that statement will be part of your portfolio: your concluding letter will reflect on the work you’ve done and on your goals. While I retain full responsibility for assessing your final grade, I take your assessments and grade proposals seriously. In the past I have agreed—within the range of a full letter grade---with the vast majority of student self-assessments. In many classes, though not all, it has been more common for me to raise the grade students proposed for themselves than to lower it. In most cases where there appears the possibility of a substantially different assessment, or in cases where you feel that you haven’t been meeting your goals for a variety of reasons, you can request (or I may suggest) extra credit activities.
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Internet Culture and the Politics of Information What is an information society? Is it a place where information technology creates a vast new “digital public sphere”? If so, who’s left out and whose voice matters? We'll look at several dimensions of the electronic mediation of speech, writing, and human interaction: from weblogs, gaming, and political organizing, to the generation and distribution of academic and professional knowledge. We’ll make a special study of information capitalism--of the relationship between "knowledge workers" and other kinds of workers, and the tension between intellectual property claims and the hopes for a "knowledge commons." We'll also look at internet-mediated community and sociability, including the proliferation of subcultures and countercultures. This course meets weekly in the journalism laboratory (A&S 128). Offered as a "special topics" course this term, it will be a permanent offering next year. It fulfills the university core technology requirement, and the rhetoric and writing requirement for English majors. We'll use a variety of web-authoring tools, principally the widely-used html editor in Macromedia's Dreamweaver Studio 8. Week 1 Introduction: Hypertext theory and practice In the lab: Introduction to Dreamweaver by Gloria Hofer. Goal: creation of a personal home page, at least one activities or interests page, and a school projects page, linked together. Key thought: “self” presentation: the self as a member of groups; participation, community, and activities as guides for personal website design. Homework: Download Dreamweaver 30-Day Trial; purchase license. Read: Daniel Chandler, "Identities Under Construction" Week 2 Personal web sites, weblogs and spheres of publicity Discussion of reading, website design experiences. Week 3: Hypertext poetics Homework: propose an essay for "Living the Low Wage Life" work on final draft of personal website, make up blog assignment, propose a blog. Doing more with weblogs (anonymous political reporting, the video blog, eg): Resource Center for Cyberculture Studies Digital Storytelling Project (for Living the Low Wage Life?) Innovative digital storytelling (links thanks to H. Rheingold): Hypertext poetics (and web design) Academic use of the web/poetics and scholarship: Reading habits: Gaming: Massively Multiplayer Online Games series by Gamespy: Women and Gaming:T.L. Taylor, "Multiple Pleasures: Women and Online Gaming" ask students to write a wiki entry? (one option in final project?) Class weblog: Equality Monitor. For discussion of selected readings and assignments (but not all). More blog info: We Blog Rebecca Blood Currents Lev Manovich, What is New Media Virtual communities II Subcultures, countercultures, "alternative" zapatistas, the well, sexualities, fan and "slash" culture. (gaming as community)-- the stanford environment, mud/moo, MySpace. Hypertext poetics and hypertext scholarship. Scholarly section: Chris Carlson's website, shaping SF. Counterpulse. Design: hypercomics Indymedia--Adbusters-RTmark. Alt-X. Greenpepper. Intellectual property: Yomango--Greenpepper, Machinima? or else in games section. Open source (Mute issue). Creative Commons--my own stuff? Discuss wikipedia in IP section Precarity and the knowledge worker: --flash mobbing. Digital divide? Flash mobs: Brainworkers and chainworkers--digital divide-precarity-flashmobbing, knowledge economy. (2 weeks, lead into game section, also 2 weeks?) Digital Divide: Autonomedia? "game on" for Volvo. Weeks 3-10 The blogosphere and "digital publics" * Hypertext poetics * Digital capitalism * *electronic subcultures and countercultures * Intellectual property, originality and copyleft * “knowledge workers” and the “knowledge economy” * social-impact gaming * hypertext and professional writing For English 2: possible hypertextual edition of a poem? Give students a choice of a poet--Sandburg? IWW? Blast? Anvil? The NuYorican poets? Radical poets website? Go with edition--academic hypertext--printable version (versioning, rather than drafting). Living the Low-Wage Life. Essay. How researched? One's own experience? Globally? Precarity as an assignment? After the brainworker/chainworker/precarity link? Publish links and summaries to the class blog. (If the student is doing a different weblog, then this assignment can be different?) The inequality project: Possible use of Ulmer's mystory method for Living the Low-Wage life? Scholarly essay for E quality Monitor: income, wealth, schooling--or literature? the literature of inequality? The web as commercial space. Google and Yahoo as television networks. Broadcast model. Mass media model. Final project: 3 choices: 1. Rebel poet critical edition 2. Inequality Report 3. Research topic of choice relevant to our class reading. Other topics selectively approved.
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