PTC 603, Fall 2007 |
|
Greetings,
As the faculty mentor for this hybrid distance learning course, Technological and Cultural Change, I welcome you. There are a number of books assigned for this course (listed on the course syllabus below), which I hope will provide you with a fertile reading and thinking experience. Besides reading, we will also be doing a lot of writing. There will be weekly postings, some of them authored by a group and some of them by you alone, and there will be an end-of-term research paper and a final exam that will be essay in format (and, related to the research paper: an annotated bibliography, and a term paper "announcement").
We will be conducting our group discussions on the WebCT conferencing system, so you will need to have a WebCT account and also to be enrolled in this class’s "conference." You MUST have a WebCT account, and must use it for class conferencing, in order to receive credit for this course. To get this account, go to http://webct.njit.edu and follow the instructions you will find there. If that isn't working for you then phone 973-596-2900 or try obtaining directions from NJIT's Computing Services website: www.njit.edu/csd/. As a last resort, you may be able to get technical help by writing to webct.admin@njit.edu. Once you have the account—or if you already have the account—please contact me through the WebCT e-mail and provide me with an e-mail address where if necessary you can be contacted other than through the WebCT environment; I may have occasion, if for some reason Web CT were not working, to write to you at your NJIT eddress, via Highlander Pipeline, so make sure to check that eddress regularly or else to have your mail forwarded from there to an eddress you use often.
After you have accomplished what is specified above, and once you have read over the materials waiting for you at the course site (the greater portion of which is not redundant relative to the message you are reading now), please then send a message to the class conference to introduce yourself, in the Discussions section of the class conference and in the subsection designated "Introducing Ourselves" (you need not introduce yourself until the first day of the sprng semester). Throughout the duration of this course, you will need to log on to the WebCT conferencing system. You should sign into our on-line conference discussions at least once a day and respond to the comments and questions that I and/or your classmates have posed. It is STRONGLY recommended that you learn the WebCT system thoroughly right away; you may wish to begin your learning process by following the links listed under “Need Help?” at the main Web CT website. There is also Web CT's "e-Learning Hub" (on the navigation bar within the course WebCT homepage); you should definitely take at least a bit of time to browse there. And, again, please make sure to peruse all of the materials awaiting you at the course homepage, such as can be found in, for example, the course Syllabus, Calendar and Discussions.
Also, please, as soon as possible, read especially the "Introduction to the Course" to be found on the course homepage or here.
CAUTION: ALL ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATIONS YOU INITIATE MUST BE VIRUS-FREE!!
I look forward to getting to know you, to our exchanges, and otherwise to our sharing of our reading experiences that I think you will find enriching and enlightening.
Yours cordially,
Burt Kimmelman
COURSE DESCRIPTION
The purpose of this course is primarily to establish an intellectual context within which other, often more advanced, graduate work, such as in the field of Communication, can be put into perspective. The premise of the course is that technology plays a fundamental role in the formation of thinking and generally in all arenas of human enterprise. In seminar format, and with special emphasis on the interrelationship between technology and communication, the course examines the complex ways in which technology constructs—and is constructed by—society. Discussions will focus on how technological change is expressed in literature, art, architecture, philosophy, and social movements, and how they, in turn, influence the future direction of technology. Within these contexts, the course will also consider theories of invention, literacy, ethics and esthetics.
REQUIRED TEXTS
Bolter, J. David. Writing Space: Computers, Hypertext, and the
Remediation
of Print. 2nd Ed. Mahwah, NJ and London:
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2001.
Bronk, Oppen and Schwerner. Sample Poems.
Hayles, N. Katherine. How We Became Posthuman: Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literature, and Informatics. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1999.
_____. Writing Machines. Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press, 2002.
Ihde, Don. Bodies in Technology. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 2002.
Malloy, Judy. its name was Penelope. (This text will be supplied by the instructor.)
Morris, Errol. Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control. Sony Pictures, 1997. (This is a film that can be rented or borrowed from a video store or library, respectively.)
Ong, Walter J. Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word. London and New York: Routledge, 1982.
Stone, Allucquère Rosanne. The War of Desire and Technology at the Close of the Mechanical Age. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1995.
Strickland, Stephanie, The Ballad of Sand and Harry Soot (http://wordcircuits.com/gallery/sandsoot/).
Electronic Literature Directory
Documentation Guides (including annotated bibliography samples)
Abbreviations for Marking Papers
E-Server TC Library (for
bibliographies
of work on technical communication)
Other Recent Books of Interest:
Arseth, Espen J. Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins UP, 1997.
Bolter, Jay David, and Richard Grusin. Remediation:
Understanding
Mew Media. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2001.
_____ and Diane Gromala. Windows and Mirrors: Interaction Design, Digital Art, and the Myth of Transparency. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003.
Boyer, Christine M. Cybercities: Visual Perception in the Age of
Electronic Communication. Princeton: Princeton UP,
1996.
Greco, Diane. Cyborg: Engineering the Body Electric. Watertown, MA: Eastgate Systems, 1995.
Gross, Larry, John Stuart Katz, and Jay Ruby. Eds. Image Ethics in the Digital Age. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2003.
Hardison, O. B. Disappearing through the Skylight: Culture and
Technology
in the Twentieth Century. New York:
Viking Penguin,1988.
Hillis, Ken. Digital Sensations: Space, Identity, and Embodiment in Virtual Reality. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 1999.
Johnson-Eilola, Johndan. Nostalgic Angels : Rearticulating
Hypertext
Writing. Norwood, NJ : Ablex Publishing
Corporation, 1997.
Joyce, Michael. Moral Tales and Meditations: Technological
Parables
and Refractions. Afterword by Hélène Cixous.
Albany: SUNY Press, 2001. http://www.moral-tales.com.
Kurzweil, Ray. The Age of Spiritual Machines. New York: Viking, 1999.
Levy, Pierre. Cyberculture. Tr. Robert Bonnono. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2001.
Lunenfeld, Peter. Ed. The Digital Dialectic: New Essays on New Media. Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press, 2000.
_____. Snap to Grid: A User's Guide to Digital Arts, Media, Cultures. Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press, 2000.
Mitchell, William J. City of Bits: Space, Place, and the Infobahn. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1995.
Rothenberg, David. Hand's End: Technology and the Limits of Nature. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.
Ullman, Ellen. Close to the Machine: Technophilia and Its Discontents. San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1997.
Rutsky, R. L. High Techne: Art and Technology from the Machine Aesthetic to the Posthuman. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 1999.
Mitchell, Robert, and Phillip Thurtle. Eds. Data Made Flesh: Embodying Information. New York and London: Routledge, 2004.
Shaviro, Steven. Connected, or What It Means to Live in the Network Society. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2003.
Tabbi, Joseph. Cognitive Fictions. Minneapolis and London:
University
of Minnesota Press, 2002.
Turkle, Sherry. Life on the
Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet. New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1997.
_____. The Second Self:
Computers and the Human Spirit. New York: Simon and Schuster,
1984.
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
* Weekly Group Summaries and Discussion Questions; each group will
summarize
a portion of the weekly reading and will
furnish one question based on the group's reading
each week, the question subsequently to be answered by each other group
in the class. Follow-up questions, posed by the
instructor or any class member, are to be
answered individually, forming the
basis for open-ended and otherwise unstructured
examination by the class of the week's
reading. Summaries and questions
are to be posted separately. Summaries should point
out a text's main motifs
and salient features. Group work will be posted
by one member of the group. All group postings
should be signed by all
members of the group who have participated in the work
leading to the posting (i.e., a posting will be
followed
by the name of the group and the names of all participating group
members).
* End-of-term research paper of no less than four thousand and no more
than seven thousand words, topic to be decided
and developed in conference with instructor. The paper
must be argumentative.
* Term Paper Announcement (consisting of: Working Title, one-sentence
Thesis
Statement,
One Paragraph Description of writing
strategy to be adopted in the term paper, and Bibliography
of at least five sources, one of which must have originated as hard
copy).
* Annotated Bibliography of sources to be used in the research paper.
* Final Examination of no less than two thousand words (to be done
at home).
All writing must be spell checked, and to the best of one's
ability
grammar checked. If on occasion use is made of the ideas or
words
of someone else in one's writing, then the source(s) of those ideas
and/or
words must be cited; that is, when appropriate, papers must be fully
documented
(you must cite sources--using footnotes, endnotes, or parenthetical
documentation,
which include specific page numbers keyed to particular passages in
one's
text, and complete bibliographical information). Papers not meeting
these requirements will not be credited. The expectation is
that participants in this course will adhere fully to the NJIT Honor
Code (see: http://www.njit.edu/academics/honorcode.php).
N.B.: Lack of participation in weekly class activities will
result
in term papers and exam being disqualified.
COURSE SCHEDULE
I. Course Introduction. Class meets on-site, in room 411 Cullimore, at 6 on Sept. 4th.Course Grade:
Class participation, 30%
Final Examination, 30%
Term Research Paper, 30%
Term Paper Announcement, 5%
Annotated Bibliography, 5%
Link to NJIT's chapter of the Society for Technical Communication
(where
there are job postings, and postings about the latest trends and other
information relevant to Technical Communication): http://web.njit.edu/STC/.
ABBREVIATIONS FOR MARKING PAPERS
Key: Abbreviation - Meaning
A - Article
Agr - Agreement
CS - Comma Splice
Dic - Diction
Exp - Explain
FS - Fused Sentences
RO - Run On Sentence
SF - Sentence Fragment
Sp - Spelling
SS - Sentence Structure
Syn - Syntax or Word Order
Tr - Transition
Un - Unclear
Uncl - Unclear
Us - Usage
V - Verb
Va - Vague
VF - Verb Form
VT - Verb Tense
WW - Wrong Word
Sample
Book
Report
Sample
Poems
Poems and
Book Report
Essay on
literacy and identity by Prof. Kimmelman
Syllabus Only
Introduction
to the course
Links
for Bolter, Strickland, Malloy, and Morris
Histories of
Writing,
Art
Semiotics Links
How-To
Guide for Student Presentations
Abbreviations
for Marking Papers