Department of English - Valparaiso University

Department of English > Courses > Engl 400: New Literacies, Cultures, and Technologies of Writing

: Course Descriptions Engl 100: Exposition and Argument Engl 101: English for International Students Engl 200: Literary Studies English 200: Literary Studies--Language, Form, Inspiration English 200: Literary Studies--Crime Fiction English 200: Literary Studies--Utopian/ Dystopian Literature English 200: Literary Studies--Into the Wild English 200: Literary Studies--Banned Books and Novel Ideas English 200: Literary Studies--Horrible Husbands and Wicked Wives English 200: Literary Studies--Innocence and Experience Engl 231: Film Aesthetics Engl 300: Introduction to Professional Writing Engl 301: Introduction to Creative Writing Engl 310: Introduction to Technical Writing Engl 321: Intermediate Composition Engl 365/565*: Studies in American Literature Engl 380/ 580*: Topics in Writing Engl 386: Internship in English Engl 389: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages Engl 390/590: Topics in Literature Engl 396/596: Traditions of Giving and Serving in American Life Engl 400: New Literacies, Cultures, and Technologies of Writing Engl 401: American Literature 1 English 402: American Literature 2 Engl 405/505*: Masterpieces of World Literature Engl 408/508: Methods of Literary Criticism and Research Engl 409/509: Literature of the Medieval Period Engl 410/510: Shakespeare Engl 420/520: Literature of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries Engl 423: Short Story Writing Engl 424: Poetry Writing Engl 425: Creative Nonfiction Engl 430/530: Literature of the Restoration and Eighteenth Century Eng 431: Advanced Composition Engl 441/541: History of the English Language Engl 442/542: Modern English Grammar Engl 443/543: Introduction to Linguistics Engl 450/550: British Literature of the Nineteenth Century Engl 456: The Novel Engl 460/560: Twentieth-Century Drama Engl 470/570: Twentieth-Century Fiction Engl 475/575: Twentieth Century Poetry Engl 478: Literature for Children Engl 479/ 579: Literature for Adolescents Engl 481: Cooperative Education in English 1 Engl 482-483: Cooperative Education in English II-III Engl 489: The Teaching of English Engl 491: Seminar in Professional Writing Engl 492: Seminar in Writing Engl 493: Seminar in English Engl 495*: Independent Study in English Engl 497: Honors Work in English Engl 498: Honors Candicacy in English Engl 609: Theory and Practice of Expository Writing LS 610: Seminar in Humanities English 610: Studies in Nineteenth-Century British Literature Engl 615: Shakespeare and His Contemporaries Engl 635: Studies in American Literature

ENGLISH 400: NEW LITERACIES, CULTURES, AND TECHNOLOGIES OF WRITING: Cr. 3
Burow-Flak:

New media—a still-forming term that defines amalgams of text, hypertext, digital image, sound, and video--have been changing the ways we communicate, interpret, store, and retrieve information, much less interact socially and even change the world. In recent decades, the study of how media of expression affect what we say has been experiencing a renaissance: a renaissance that has been changing the shape of English studies as we know it. This, in a nutshell, is what this course is all about: the changes that new media have brought us and how the study and production of English literature have responded.

Sociologist Marshall McLuhan, responding to television culture nearly half a century ago, famously wrote that “The medium is the message.” Literary historians who study the evolution of printed texts in the field loosely defined as “the history of the book” have been making a similar argument. Looking back at the evolution of print culture, they are studying how the printed page has affected the control, characterization, and production of various forms of literature. Rhetoricians and scholars of literacy, incorporating forms of critical theory and anthropology, have correspondingly been studying and defining social networks and other internet communities. Writers themselves, finally, have had to reshape not only the form, but also, sometimes, the content of their work as they construct creative, academic, and informative texts. This process has been true for English majors as well as they enter the job market, take on extracurricular activities, undergo their classes at VU, and otherwise interpret, create artistic work, teach, and communicate in the culture around them.

In response to such advances in communication and theory, this course adopts components of both theory and practice. That is, the course features texts, both traditionally written and electronic, that theorize, imaginatively portray, and encapsulate new media. The course also requires practice writing about, or interpreting new media both in traditional academic formats--that is, written essays--and in new media itself: that is, via electronic discussion, web-delivered hypertext, and digital video. Assignments include a midterm and a final exam, two papers, periodic postings to the course discussion board and wiki, and the shooting and editing, in groups, of a 5-8-minute video.

Units and Selected Texts at a Glance

I. New Media: What Are They?
•    Manovich, Lev. “What Is New Media? Eight Propositions”

II. Literacies: What Kinds of Knowledge and Learning Do Computers Effect?
•    Jenkins, Henry. Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide
•    selected readings and video and new media and education

III. Codex: What Was New About Older Forms of Emerging Media?
•    A World Inscribed: The Illuminated Manuscript (video)
•    Eisenstein, Elizabeth. The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe
•    McLuhan, Marshall. Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (excerpts/ handout)
•    Birkerts, Sven. The Gutenberg Elegies (excerpts/ handout)
•    Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein.

IV. Hypertext and Web 2.0: How Has Non-Linearity Become Part of Our Expression?
•    Borges, Jorge. The Garden of Forking Paths (available online)
•    Videos, Michael Wesch on web 2.0
•    Jackson, Shelley. Patchwork Girl (CD-ROM) and related readings and video
•    John Cayley, "Windsound" and selected Flash poems (online)

V. Visual Arts: What in New Media Is Beautiful? Is Real?
•    Antonioni, Michaelangelo. Blowup (film)
•    Hawthorne, Nathaniel. "The Artist of the Beautiful"
•    Benjamin, Walter. "The Work of Art in an Age of Mechanical Reproduction."
•    Online records of installation pieces
•    Baudrillard, Jean, Simulacra and Simulations (excerpts; available online)

VI. Cyberpunk, Cyborgs, and Comics: What in These Emerging Traditions is Enduring? Innovative? Real?
•    Haraway, Donna "A Manifesto for Cyborgs" (available online)
•    Anderson, M.T. Feed
•    Satrapi, Mariane. Persepolis
•    McCloud, Scott. Understanding Comics

Class blog on Stephen Johnson from previous semesters

Cr. 3