G. Thomas Goodnight
Tentative Syllabus
Summer 2009
CRITICAL STUDIES IN THE DIGITAL AGE: 610
SCOPE OF COURSE
This is a course that focuses on the transformation of critical/cultural inquiry to the digital public sphere. The aim of the course is to develop strategies of critical inquiry into interactive spaces providing venues of public participation, social movement, and cultural change. The course joins theory and practice. On the theory side, discourse analysis, visual communication, and context studies are reviewed and adapted to digital environments. On the practice side, studies move from the initial critical studies read of the digital world, through transformation of communication theory to deal with the arts and practices of politics, activism, interest representation, and social change. The course ends with raising issues of critical intervention. As fitting for the subject, the course is composed of numerous, short readings (rather than singular in-depth theories). The aim is to engage discussion in topics related to communicative practices but given new visibility, trajectories, circulation and strategic power due to location in virtual space.
There are a number of articles available through common research data bases on the Internet. The books for the class include:
Arthur and Marilouise Kroker, eds. Digital Delirium,New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997; Barbara Warnick, Rhetoric Online: Persuasion and Politics on the World Wide Web, New York: Peter Lang, 2007;Cass R. Sunstein, Republic 2.0, Princeton University Press, 2007; Carolyn Handa, Visual Rhetoric in a Digital World. Boston: Bedford, 2004; Axel Bruns and Joanne Jacobs, Uses of Blogs, New York: Peter Lang, 2007;Kevin A. Hughes & John E. Hill, Cyberpolitics: Citizen Activism in the Age of the Internet: People Passions and Power. Readings will emphasize selections from relevant texts. Order these online. Listed is a tentative reading schedule. Adjustments will be made to summer schedule to achieve focus within selected texts and topics listed
COURSE REQUIREMENTS: Students should come to class prepared to read topics identified in the syllabus. Each session will examine one or two web sites or blogs and critically engage the design/discourse/visual composition. Priority for reading preparation will be identified for summer seminar work. Not all readings will get equal emphasis, but core readings trajectories will evolve. A final paper is due (10-12 pages) that addresses a particular case in line with discussion of discursive, visual, and other critical techniques developed in the class.
TENTATIVE SCHEDULE
1. W May 20 Introduction: Critical Studies of Digital Culture
2. T May 26 THE RHETORICAL ARTS GO DIGITAL: The rhetorical practices of invention, arrangement, memory, style and act are beginning places to address critical explanation, appraisal, and intervention into a visual/design/niche networked world. Building on techniques of visual and discourse analysis, this class concentrates on the critical rendering of websites.
Paul Prior, “Re-situating and Re-mediating the Canons: A Cultural-Historical Remapping of Rhetorical Activity,” Kairos 11 (2007):
Kevin Brooks and Andrew Mara, “The Classical Trivium: A Heuristic for New Media and Digital Communication Studies,” Kairos 11 (2007):
Susan H. Delagrange, “Wunderkammer, Cornell, and the Visual Canon of Arrangement, “Kairos, 13.2 (2009)
Jim Diolfo and Danielle Nicole DeVoss, “Compsing for Recomposition: Rhetorical Velocity and Delibery,” Kairos, 13.2 (2009)
3. W May 27 THE VISUAL : IMAGE & DESIGN
Digital sites on the internet blend words, pictures and graphics in compelling ways. This session is designed to acquaint us with techniques of criticism for images and visual designs. What sort of messages can visuals and graphics communicate?
Rudolph Arnheim, "Pictures, Symbols, and Signs," in VRDW 137-151.
Roland Barthes, "Rhetoric of the Image," VRDW 152-163
Hanno H. J. Ehses, "Repesenting Macbeth," VRDW 164-177.
Punyashloke Mishra, "The Role of Abstraction in Scientific Illustration," VRDW 177-195
Scott McCloud, "From the Vocabulary of Comics," VRDW 195-208
Barbara Stafford, Visual Pragmatism for a Virtual World," 209-223
Richard Buchana, "Rhetoric, Humanism, and Design," VRDW 228-260
Jessica Hefland, "Electronic Typography: The New Visual," VRDW, 277-282
J E Porter & P. A. Sullivan, "Repetition and the Rhetoric of Visual Design, 290-302
4. M Jne 1 THE VISUAL: ARGUMENT & CULTUREPictures argue. This session develops techniques of visual analysis that are useful in reading the invitations to participate in online cultures or respond to visually rendered assertions and provocations.
DS Birsell and L Groarke, "Visual Argument," VRDW, 309-321
Michele S. Shauf, "The Problem of Electronic Argument," VRDW, 364-369
Richard A. Lanham, "Figures of Rhetoric," VRDW, 369-372
J. Anthony Blair, "The Possibility and Actuality of Visual Arguments,"VRDW, 344-364
Irit Rogoff, "Studying Visual Culture," VRDW, 381-395
Marita Sturken, "The Wall, the Screen, and the Image, The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, VRDW, 401-417
N Lutehaus and J Cook, "The 'Crisis of Representation' and Visual Anthropology," VRDW 434-455
Richard A. Lanham, "The Implications of Electronic Information for the Sociology of Knowledge," VRDW, 455-475.
5. T Jne 2CULTURAL ANTICIPATIONS OF DIGITAL FUTURES
Networking popular participation made its public debut in 1994, and by 1995 postmodernity was anticipating a digital age. This class gets Lebkowsky, Sterling, Baudrillard, Virilio, Zizek, Lovink, Lantz, and Shaprio’s early takes on cultural prospects of digital age—from a cultural studies view.
Ron Greene, “Rhetoric in Cultural Studies, Rhetorik und Stilistik, inHalbband vol 1 Ula Fix et al eds. (2008) 959-570.
Jon Lebkowsky, “It’s Better to be Inspired than Wired: An Interview with R. U. Sirius,”
in Digital Delerium16-25.
Jean Baudrillard, “Global Debt and Parallel Universe,” in Digital Delerium, 39-41.
Louise Wilson, “Cyberwar, God and Television: An Interview with Paul Virilio,” in Digital Delerium, 42-49.
Caroline Bayard and Graham Knight, “Vivisecting the 90s: An Interview with Jean Baudrillard,” Digital Delerium, 49-64.
Geert Lovink, “Civil Society, Fanaticism, and Digital Reality: An Interview with Slavoj Zizek,” Digital Delerium, 64-73.
Frank Lantz, “Panic Quake Servers,” Digital Delerium, 73-74.
Alan Shapiro, “Captain Kurk was Never the Original,” Digital Delerium, 74-84.
W Jne 3 Research Day
6. M Jne 8 PERSUASION GOES DIGITAL: Kenneth Burke and Stephen Toulmin constitute two traditional authors that ground contemporary rhetorical inquiry. This session examinesWarnick's effort to transfer these theories to the digital world.
Barbara Warnick’s call for WWW studies by redeploying these theorists. Particular emphasis is given to a unique issue, trust.
Barbara Warnick, “Chapter 1. The Internet and the Public Sphere,” in Rhetoric Online: Persuasion and Politics on the World Wide Web.
Barbara Warnick, “Chapter 2. Online Rhetoric: A Medium Theory Approach,” in Rhetoric Online.
Barbara Warnick, “Chapter 3. The Field Dependency of Online Credibility,” in Rhetoric Online.
Josh Boyd, “The Rhetorical Construction of Trust Online,” Communication Theory 13 (2006) 392-410.
7. T Jne 9 CRITICAL DISCOURSE STUDIES This session will feature develop of discourse analysis techniques. Questions as to the transferability and limitations to contexts of digital dissemination through hypertext, multimedia channel construction will be pursued. The class will feature development of techniques transferrable from discourse studies adapted to WWW conditions.
Norma Fairclough, Critical Discourse Analysis: The Critical Study of Language. Chapters on Ideology and Power, Social Change, Textual Analysis, and Critical Language Awareness.
8. W Jne 10 POLITICS & ACTIVISM ON LINE This class shifts us from the study of critical techniques to analysis of practices. The initial inquiry examines the range of political interests made available by the Web—from mainstream to activist politics. What kind of critical interventions are warranted? Kevin A. Hughes & John E. Hill, Cyberpolitics: Citizen Activism in the Age of the Internet: People Passions and Power.
Barbara Warnick, “Chapter 3” in Rhetoric Online.
9. M Jne 15BLOGS & INTERNET INTERESTS: Websites and blogs are strategies that businesses and conservative think tanks use to ground and disseminate messages in self-defense of activities and interests. This session will examine the practice of blogging and web-presence among select modern institutions.
Joanne Jacobs, “Publishing and Blogs, in Uses of Blogs, 33-35.
Trevor Cook, “Can Bloggin Unspin PR?, in Uses of Blogs, 45-57.
Suw Charman, “Blogs in Business: Using Blogs behind the Firewall,” in Uses of Blogs 57-68.
John Quiggin, “Economic Blogs and Blog Economics,” in Uses of Blogs, 69-81.
Ian Oi, “Blogging the Legal Commolns,” in Uses of Blogs, 81-90.
James Farmer, “Blogging to Basics [for onlined Education] in Uses of Blogs, 91-104.
Jean Burgress, “Blogging to Learn, Learning to Blog,” in Uses of Blogs, 105-114.
10.T Jne 16SOCIAL CHANGE AND ONLINE REVOLUTIONS
The dividing lines between conventional and fictional worlds are stressed through blogs in the digital age. The course concludes by discussing three vectors of social change. How will scholarship, the remediation of community, and the elaborating engagement of fictional worlds generate ever more complex social spaces?
Alexander Halvais, “Scholarly Blogging: Moving toward the Visible College,” in Uses of Blogs, 117-127.
Jill Walker, “Blogging from Inside the Ivory Tower,” Uses of Blogs, 139-151.
Melissa Gregg, “Posting with Passion: Blogs and the Politics of Gender,” in Uses of Blogs 141-160.
Gerard Goggin & Tim Noonan, “Blogging Disability: The Interface between New Cultural Movements and Internet Technology,” in Uses of Blogs, 161-162.
Jaz Hee-jeong Choi, “Living in Cyworld: Contextualizing Cy-Ties in South Korea,” in Uses of Blogs, 173-186.
Paul Hodkinson, “Subcultural Blogging? Online Journals and Group Involvement Among U.K. Boths,” in Uses of Blogs 199-210.
Angela Thomas, “Fictional Blogs,” in Uses of Blogs, 199-211.
11. W Jne 17 QUESTIONS OF MEDIA LITERACY: Is the Internet the long sought for free market place of ideas, or is there more sinister news for the Republic. This session is designed to posit a discussion ins scholarship driving critical intervention. How should critics intervene into the digitally transforming world? To what purpose with what ends in view?
Cass R. Sunstein, Republic.com 2.0 [selections]
MacArthur Foundation. Participatory Culture
12. M Jne 22 COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE & CASCADESThe Internet may be viewed as the culmination of the ‘market place of ideas’ where collective intelligence is realized through memes. Audiences exchange views across communities. Rhinegold makes the case. Earl, Peng and Potts beg to differ.
Howard Rhinegold, Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution, 1-112, 133-157.
Peter E. Earl, Ti-Ching Peng and Jason Potts, “Decision-rule Cascades and the Dynamics of Speculative Bubbles,” Journal of Economic Psychology 28 (2007): 354pp.
13. T Jne 23 THEORIZING ONLINE ACTIVISM
The session outlines Cathcart’s Rhetorical Movement Theory, then investigates how traditional social movement theory needs to be adapted to virtual spaces, opportunities, and constraints.
Lee Salter, “Democracy, New Social Movements, and the Internet: A Habermasian Analysis,” in Cyberactivism, 117-144.
Michael D. Ayers, “Comparing Collective Identity in Online and Offline Feminist Activists, “ in Cyberactivism, 145-164.
Maria Garrido and Alexander Halavais, “Mapping Networks of Support for the Zapatista Movement,” in Cyberactivism, 165-184.
Wyatt Galusky, “Identifying with Information: Citizen Empowerment, the Internet, and the Environmental Anti-Toxins Movement, in Cyberactivism, 185-208.
14. T Jne 23 COUNTERPUBLICS OF A DIGITAL AGE Is the World Wide Web a space where counterpublics can gather in privacy, safety, consciousness
sharing, and support? Or is it a space that transforms the politics of difference?
Laura J. Gurak and John Logie, “Internet Protests, from Text to Web,” in Cyberactivism 25-46.
Dorothy Kidd, “Indymedia.org: A New Communications Commons, in Cyberactivism 47-70.
Sandor Vegh, “Classifying Forms of Online Activism: The Case of Cyberprotests against the World Bank,” 71-96.
Larry Elin, “The Radicalization of Zeke Spier: How the Internet Contributes to Civic Engagement and New forms of Capital,” in Cyberactivism, 97-116.
Joanne Lebert, “Wiring Human Rights Activism,” in Cyberactivism, 209-232.
Steven McLaine, “Ethnic Communities Online,” in Cyberactivism, 233-255.
Joshua Garrison, “Gay Media, Inc,” in Cyberactivism, 255-279.
ALTERNATE READINGS
A. INTRODUCTION: DISCOURSE AND PRODUCTION
The class will focus on the architectonic arts of discursive productive--systems of making, doing, inventing discourses that are historically and culturally variable. The goal of the session is to develop a grounded view of discourse for the digital age.
Richard McKeon, “The Uses of Rhetoric in a Technological Age: Architectonic Productive Arts,” Rhetoric: Essays in Invention and Discovery (Woodbridge, Ct: Oxbow, 1987): 1-24
Richard McKeon, “Discourse, Verification, and Justification,” Rhetoric: Essays in Invention and Discovery, 37-56.
B. THE CONTEXTS OF WOR[L]DS
This class will focus on the rhetorical sociology of Boltanski and Laurnet Thevenot by reading several texts that sum the work of their larger study On Justification. The contextual perspective should provide practically situated, self-organizing “worlds” for networking connections.
Luc Boltanski and Laurent Thevenot, “The Sociology of Critical Capacity,” European Journal of Social Theory 2 (1999): 359-377.
Laurent Thevenot, “Which Road to Follow? The Moral Complexity of an ‘Equipped Humanity,” in Complexities: Social Studies of Knowledge Practices, John Law and Annemarie Mol eds. (Durham: Duke UP, 2002): 53-87.
Laurent Thevenot, “The Plurality of Cognitive Formats and Engagements: Moving Between the Familiar and the Public,” European Journal of Social Theory 10 (2007)
Clay Shirky, “The Latent Community in Every Webpage,” 2008. cc/latent_community_every_webpage
C. POLITICS OF DIGITAL DELIBERATION: The Web is thought to be transforming the capacity of the public sphere to engage in deliberative politics. This section presents a range of views as to whether the internet creates are discourages deliberative democracy. The section concludes with Warnick’s analysis on Bush.
S. L. Clift, “Hosting online Political Discussion: Emerging Lessons from Minnesota. Democracies Online Newswire, 1999.
S. Coleman, “The Lonely Citizen: Indirect Representation in an Age of Networks,” Political Communication 22 (2005) 197-214.
L. Dahlberg, “Exploring the Prospects of Online Deliberative Forums Extending the Public Sphere,” Information, Communication and Society 4 (2001) 615-633.
L. Dahlberg, “Computer-mediated Communication and the Public Sphere: An evaluation of the Prospects of Online Interaction Extending Rational-Critical Discourse,” Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 7 (2001)
P. Dahlgren, “The Internet and the Democratization of Civic Culture,” Political Communication 17 (2000) 335.340.
P. Ester & H Vinken, “Debating Civil Society: On the Fear for Civic Decline and Hope for the Internet Alternative,” International Sociology 18 (2003): 659-680.
D. MEME’S AND MIMESIS: The Internet is a space where 2.0 rhetoric invites interactivity, through repetition, variation, and recreation. This session traces the generative qualities of internet pictures, graphics, and argument games.
Walter Benjamin, “On the Mimetic Faculty,” in Reflections, trans E. Jephcott, ed. P. Demetz (New York: Schocken, 1978).
Paul Marsden, “Mimetics and Social Contagion: Two Dies of the Same Coin,” Journal of Mimetics: Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission, 1998.
Davide A. Levy and Paul R. Nail, “Contagion: A Theoretical and Empirical Review and Reconceptualization,” Genetic, Social, and General Psychology Monographs, 119 (1993): 235-279.
Bikhchandani Sushil, David A. Hirshleifer and Ivo Welch, “A Theoyr of Fads, Fashion, Custom, and Cultural Change as Information Cascade,” Journal of Political Economy 1000 (1992): 1-26.