Dr. Petra Dierkes-Thrun

Department of Comparative Literature

Stanford University

Office: Pigott Hall (Building 250), room 232

Literature in the Age of Digital Culture

COMPLIT 224 (undergrad & grad students welcome), 3-5 units or C/NCR, WAY A-II

TIME: Mondays and Wednesdays, 11am-12.30pm

CLASSROOM: 380-381U (Sloan Mathematics center, Math corner on the Quad)

OFFICE HOURS: By appointment

Are you interested in thinking about how literary theory about print texts might need to change and adapt to new contexts and ways of reading and writing in the digital age? Would you like to try out a project-based approach in an innovative humanities course and publish a digital book together?

This course invites you to studyliterary classics (by Mary Shelley, Oscar Wilde, Virginia Woolf, T.S. Eliot, Jorge Luis Borges, Alice Bechdel, and others) alongside central literary theory concepts and compare them to digital reading and writing today: changing notions of "author,” “reader”, “work”, fan fiction and online expansions of "the book,” literary collaborations online, literary-social interactions. How does literary theory need to change and adapt in the digital age to capture all these new phenomena, while building on important preexisting concepts and insights?

Along with the literary texts, the course will introduce you to some seminal concepts of traditional literary theory, as well as selected new digital tools and methods for literary studies (e.g. for annotation, editing, and research, web-based public and social interactions).

This course is arranged around a continuous, project-based learningapproach that allows you to pursue, develop, and publish a substantial piece of writing on a topic of your choice from the syllabus. In Week 2, you will decide on a specific literary theory theme or topic that you will study in depth this quarter and keep thinking about all quarter long (such as “the author” or “intertextuality” or “the body in/as text”). The syllabus readings are a start, but you will dig deeper as the course develops and also do some independent reading in literary theory (in consultation with me). Several interlaced, staggeredassignments will help you progress from your initial ideas to a polished digital project: an annotated concept map (Week 1), an informal blog post to map out your initial thoughts and interest in your concept or theme (Week 2), and, after consultation with me in Week 5, a research proposal in Week 6 (listing directions of inquiry and further readings to help you explore your concept in literary theory). Your quarter-long work on your project, which will also get peer feedbackin Week 10, will eventually lead to a polished research project published online (combining text/audio/visual components as needed and desired). If we do our job well, each of your projects will become a chapter (or two) in a collective, self-published Field Notes Guide to Digital Literary Theory at the end of the class. Just think, we’ll publish a digital book together that rethinks and reinvents some central concepts of literary theory for the digital age! Who’s excited?

If you are a graduate student, I will also encourage and guide you to develop your research project into a potential conference paper for presentation at a professional conference, so you can make use of what you have learned and developed this quarterfor your professional career.

No technical prerequisites.The course website will be housed on Stanford’s exciting newLacuna Storiesannotation and reading collaboration platform, which will be introduced in the first session. All are welcome!

All materials, assignments, the syllabus, and your blog posts and research projects will be housed on our class website, digilit.lacunastories.com.

Primary literary readings:

  • Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
  • T.S. Eliot, “The Waste Land” (excerpts)
  • William Blake, Songs of Innocence and Experience (selections)
  • Robert Coover, “The Babysitter” (short story)
  • Oscar Wilde, “The Portrait of Mr. W.H.” (short story) with selected sonnets by Shakespeare mentioned in the story
  • Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own
  • Angela Carter, The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories (selections)
  • Jorge Luis Borges, “The Library of Babel” and “The Garden of Forking Paths” (short stories)
  • Alison Bechdel, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic (award-winning queer graphic novel)
  • Various fan fiction literary projects online (selections to be announced)

In addition to these primary texts and the individualized readings you’ll do on your own for your project, there will be sharedsecondaryreadings on some selected literary theory aspects:

  • Walter Benjamin, “The Task of the Translator,” “The Work in the Age of Mechanical Reproducibility”
  • Michel Foucault, “What is an Author?”
  • Roland Barthes, “The Death of the Author”
  • Reuben Brower, “Reading in Slow Motion”
  • Selections from Fanfiction: Why Fanfiction is Taking Over the World by Anne Jamison et al. (2013)
  • Various handouts on central literary concepts, schools, and historical developments in literary theory (these will be added to our website throughout the quarter)

Learning Outcomes

  • Students will demonstrate understanding of theoretical literary concepts, such as: the author, the medium, the reader, purpose and audience/ways of reading, intertextuality/hypertextuality, beginnings/forks/endings, word and image, the body in/as text. Students will demonstrate this understanding through writing (blog posts, research projects, informal written assignments), class discussions, and application of concepts in annotations/tags to texts throughout the course.
  • Students will read, annotate, and write with purpose by focusing their attention on a particular literary theme or concept throughout the course.
  • Students will develop in-depth expertise of a particular literary-theoretical theme or concept through reading responses and demonstrate that expertise by facilitating the learning of their peers through class discussion and in research projects.
  • Students will synthesize and transform the traditional literary concepts to apply to the digital literary space.
  • Students will participate in and reflect on literary-social interactions by creating or contributing to digital literary works (i.e. Twitter role play, fanfiction project, Frankenstein website) and reflecting on their activities through class discussions and written work.
  • Students will collaborate to adapt traditional literary frameworks to digital literary landscapes, thereby creating a collaborative new literary theory. Students will research and take advantage of self-publication opportunities online by actually publishing the results of their new literary theory as a collaboratively edited Field Notes Guide to Digital Literary Theory at the end of the course.

Grading and Assignments

This course is available for 3, 4, or 5 credits, or for the C/NCR option. Detailed descriptions of each assignment will be posted online at digilit.lacunastories.comsoon. Sign up for research project themes/topics during the second week of class (email or in person).

Requirements for 5 credits:

  • Attendance and active participation in class, online10%
  • Participation in Twitter role-play, small Frankenstein website contribution

(shelleysfrankenstein.wordpress.com), mandatory homework assignments10%

  • Final learning statement of 500+ words: This will be based on your review of your Lacuna Stories “sewing kit” (more on this on the first day of class) and a personal reflection on your learning highlights from this course. 10%
  • Research project for one specific theme or concept of your choice from

our syllabus (such as “purpose and audience,” “collaboration”, “intertextuality,” “the author,” “the body in/as text,” etc.): 1,250+ words for undergrads/2,500+ words for grads,plus bibliography posted online, with added images/audio as desired, plus informal discussion leadership on day that theme or conceptis discussed in class. Your individual, revised project may be published as a chapter in our class Field Notes at the end of the course if you wish to participate. 30%

  • 8 individual blog posts, 400-750 words each (no more than 1/wk), and 8+ comments on other people’s blog posts (at least 1/wk). 40%

Requirements for 4 credits:

  • Attendance and active participation in class, online10%
  • Participation in Twitter role-play, small Frankenstein website contribution

(shelleysfrankenstein.wordpress.com), mandatory homework assignments10%

  • Final learning statement of 500+ words: This will be based on your review of your Lacuna Stories “sewing kit” (more on this on the first day of class) and a personal reflection on your learning highlights from this course. 10%
  • Research project for one specific theme or concept of your choice from

our syllabus (such as “purpose and audience,” “collaboration”, “intertextuality,” “the author,” “the body in/as text,” etc.): 1,250+ words for undergrads/2,500+ words for grads, plus bibliography posted online, with added images/audio as desired, plus informal discussion leadership on day that theme or concept is discussed in class. Your individual, revised project may be published as a chapter in our class Field Notes at the end of the course if you wish to participate. 40%

  • 4 individual blog posts, 400-750 words each (no more than 1/wk), and 8+ comments on other people’s blog posts (at least 1/wk) 30%

Requirements for 3 credits:

  • Attendance and active participation in class, online10%
  • Participation in Twitter role-play, small Frankenstein website contribution

(shelleysfrankenstein.wordpress.com), mandatory homework assignments10%

  • Final learning statement of 500+ words: This will be based on your review of your Lacuna Stories “sewing kit” (more on this on the first day of class) and a personal reflection on your learning highlights from this course. 10%
  • 8 individual blog posts, 400-750 words each (no more than 1/wk),

and 8+ comments on other people’s blog posts (at least 1/wk).70%

COURSE SCHEDULE (subject to change as needed)

Any blog post you write in a given week of your own choosing must be posted no later than midnight on Saturdays (earlier if possible).

WEEK 1

Introduction to course and to Lacuna Stories

Monday, January 5, 2015

Introduction to the course and tools (Lacuna Stories: digilit.lacunastories.com).

Why do we need a new or expanded literary theory for textuality in the digital age? Identifying crucial literary-theoretical concepts and initial features of digital textuality.

Wednesday, January 7

  • Read and annotate with observations, questions for today: Borges, “The Library of Babel” (add at least 5 annotations/questions/comments)
  • Read Lacuna Stories student guide, explore website to find your profile, the annotation feature, the sewing kit, and reading materials.

Mandatory homework assignment, due no later than Saturday (midnight or earlier):

Annotate the “Concept Handout” page in “Materials” to think through the concepts we will be covering. The “Concept Handout” will have a simple listing of the major ideas we will cover in the course: Author, Narrator, Reader, Purpose and Audience, Intertextuality, Hypertextuality, etc.

  1. Create basic annotations for three of these concepts, in which you attempt to define the concept and consider why it seems important/interesting to you. They can be brief—2-3 sentences each are fine. Make these annotations public.
  2. Respond to at least 3 annotations made by other students, to practice this feature in Lacuna Stories (and start thinking with others).
  3. After you have finished exploring the concept map, think about which concept you might possibly want to focus on throughout this quarter. As we read literary and theoretical texts, you will be annotating and responding to them with an eye toward this concept and its role or relationship to the topics we discuss. Eventually, your research project will involve re-conceptualizing this element by carefully thinking through its applicability to the digital space. Next week, I’ll be asking you to pick “your” concept/theme for the quarter. Feel free to talk to me about this (email is fine).

WEEK 2

Monday, January 12 – The Author, the Narrator

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Michel Foucault, “What is an Author?”
  • “Authors and Narrators” handout: Examples from various literary classics of an “author” or narrator talking directly to readers, as well as literary examples for different types of narrators; definitions and conundrums from literary theory.

Wednesday, January 14 – The Translator

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Walter Benjamin, “The Task of the Translator” (essay)
  • Explore the parallellit.me website: study different translations of “The Library of Babel” by side, think about the differences; find at least one good example (sentence- or word-level) for the hypothesis that each translation is in fact an interpretation. We will discuss our findings in class, so please be prepared with your example.
  • In class, we will also discuss different selected blogs and Twitter handles to think about the notions of “author”, “narrator” or “translator” in class today. The selections will be posted in our online syllabus soon. Please look at these websites before today’s class.

Mandatory homework assignment, due by Saturday, January 17: Write an informal blog post (500-750 words) exploring the concept/theme you have chosen for this quarter. What are your initial thoughts on the topic? Why are you especially interested in this? How and why does this concept seem important to you to reexamine in light of the new digital textual landscape? You will be thinking about your concept/theme all quarter long and gather research items as needed and in consultation with me. At a later point in the course (Week 6), your full research proposal is due. We will consult on this in Week 5; please make an individual appointment with me for that week.

WEEK 3

Monday, January 19 – Martin Luther King, Jr. Day (no class)

Wednesday, January 21 – The Medium

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Robert Coover, “The Babysitter” (short story)
  • Walter Benjamin, “The Work in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (longer essay)

WEEK 4

The Reader

Monday, January 26

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Oscar Wilde, “The Portrait of Mr. W.H.” and selected Shakespeare sonnets mentioned in Wilde’s story

Wednesday, January 28

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Roland Barthes, “The Death of the Author”
  • Reuben Brower, “Reading in Slow Motion”

Mandatory homework assignment, due Saturday January 30:Start a Sewing Kit.Create a thread with 10 annotations that you think will be useful for your final project.

WEEK 5

Purpose and Audience, Ways of Reading

Monday, February 2

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Mary Shelley, Frankenstein: Author’s Introduction, Preface, Letters 1-4, and Chapters 1-16
  • Handout on Shelley and Frankenstein

Wednesday, February 4

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Mary Shelley, Frankenstein: finish the novel

Mandatory class assignment: Contribute to shelleysfrankenstein.wordpress.com (details TBA), due: no later than Saturday, February 7.

Please note: you may post a blog post this week if you like (that doesn’t replicate the contribution to shelleysfrankenstein.wordpress.com).

Mandatory individual office hour appointment with me this week (for anyone signed up for 4 or 5 credits) to talk about fine-tuning your research project and getting suggestions for readings and further research. Please contact me for an appointment.

WEEK 6

Intertextuality, Hypertextuality

Monday, February 9

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Feminist fairy tale revisions: Angela Carter, The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories (selections TBA in online updated syllabus)
  • Find and add fairy tale websites online (traditional or other kinds), add them to the “Fairy Tale Websites” doc I will create. Write a brief description of each example you find (1-3 sentences is fine): what sort of fairy tales are these, how are they presented visually, what are some features of this website?

Wednesday, February 11

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land (short excerpts with notes from the Norton edition)
  • Find some great examples of enriched, literary-visual hypertextuality online, e.g. (as compare with “simple” hypertext annotations, such as the many examples that exist for purely text-oriented hypertexts of T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land). Add these to the common “Hypertext Comparisons” document I will create in our “Materials” section and add a sentence or two of description for each one you add. Please add at least two.

Research proposal due: 1-2 pp. (250-500 words) of rationale and research questions, plus initial project bibliography. Due by Saturday midnight, as usual.

WEEK 7

Monday, February 16—President’s Day, no class

Wednesday, February 18– Beginnings, Endings, Forkings

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Borges, “The Garden of Forking Paths” (short story)
  • Explore GitHub.com—click around a bit to familiarize yourself with its nature and the way it works.

WEEK 8

Monday, February 23 – Fan Fiction and the Question of Literary “Authenticity”

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Selections from Fanfiction: Why Fanfiction is Taking Over the World by Anne Jamison et al. (2013)
  • Explore (collaborative rewriting, forking of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice) or another fan fiction project of your choice

Wednesday, February 25 -- Word and Image

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Alison Bechdel, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic (whole graphic novel)
  • Explore word-text relations on Instagram (#acertainslantoflight), Tumblr (details TBA)

WEEK 9

The Body in/as Text

Monday, March 2

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own, chapters 1-4

Wednesday, March 4

Read and annotate with observations, questions for today:

  • Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own, chapters 5-6
  • Gloria Anzaldúa, excerpts from Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza (excerpts)

WEEK 10

Monday, March 9

  • Twitter role-play (in-class launch, ongoing all day, mandatory participation), details TBA
  • Research self-publication book opportunities, limits, and legal terms (amazon.com, hastac.org, others)

Wednesday, March 11

Course wrap-up. Group/peer work on revising contributions to Field Studies Guide to Digital Literary Theoryin class (details TBA).

Final version of revised research projects (i.e. contributions to Field Notes Guide to Digital Literary Theory)due on or before Thursday, March 19. Post on Lacuna Stories (final version) and send link to when ready.

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