The Culture of Information

Course Goals

As students of literature, we are particularly well suited to critique and understand how our lives have been affected by the Internet. In this class, we will ask:

1. What is the difference between knowledge and information - or is there one?
2. How do media affect modes of thought?
3. What kinds of communities, and indeed, what kinds of selves, will be generated by the Internet, hypertext, instant messaging, email, and chat?

Required Readings

Books to Buy

John Berger, Ways of Seeing (1972)

Albert Borgmann, Holding On To Reality: The Nature of Information at the Turn of the Century

Roger Chartier, The Order of Books

Robert Harris, A Guidebook to the Web

George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By

Purchase a hypertext from Storyspace at

http://www.eastgate.com/catalog/Fiction.html: "Victory Garden," by Stuart Moulthrop, "Afternoon, a Story," by Michael Joyce, or "Patchwork Girl," by Shelley Jackson

Online Materials

• Joshua Berman's online Turing Game: http://www.cc.gatech.edu/elc/turing
• William Blake, The Blake Archive: http://www.blakearchive.org
• Vannevar Bush, "As We May Think": http://www.isg.sfu.ca/~duchier/misc/vbush/
• Chris Cheek, Online Poetry at the Electronic Poetry Center: http://wings.buffalo.edu/epc/authors/cheek/
• Nick Gillespie, "Happy Birthday MTV," in Reason Magazine: http://www.reason.com/opeds/ng080101.html
• Christopher Keep, et. al., "Ted Nelson and Xanadu," in The Electronic Labyrinth: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/elab/hfl0155.html
• Alan Liu, Lyotard Auto-Differend Page: http://www.english.ucsb.edu/faculty/ayliu/research/auto/lyotgate.htm
• ---, "The Tribe of Cool: Information, Culture, and History," paper given at ACH / ALLC 2001 - New York University (a webcast, requiring RealPlayer): http://www.nyu.edu/its/humanities/ach_allc2001/webcast.html, then click on "Webcast of Final Plenary"
• Stuart Moulthrop and Sean Cohen, The Color of Television: http://raven.ubalt.edu/features/media_ecology/lab/96/cotv/
• The Miami MOO: http://miamimoo.mcs.muohio.edu:7000/
• Miracle Device: article on Ted Nelson's Literary Machines at Feed Magazine: http://www.feedmag.com/html/document/98.02nelson/98.02nelson_master.html
• Ted Nelson, "What Is Literature?": http://www.univie.ac.at/Philosophie/vw/literat.htm
• ---, "The Xanadu Ideal": http://www.xanadu.com.au/general/ideal.html
• Jim Whitehead, "Orality and Hypertext: An Interview with Ted Nelson" (1996): http://www.ics.uci.edu/%7Eejw/csr/nelson_pg.html

Electronic Reserves (ereserves)

• Cleanth Brooks, "The Heresy of Paraphrase," in The Well-Wrought Urn
• Michael E. Hobart & Zachary S. Schiffman, "Orality and the Problem of Memory," in Information Ages: Literacy, Numeracy, and the Computer Revolution (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1998)
• George P. Landow, "What's a Critic to Do?" in Hyper / Text / Theory, ed. George Landow (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1994)
• Marshall McLuhan, "The Medium is the Message," in Understanding Media
• ---, "Media Hot and Cold," in Understanding Media
• Janet Murray, Introduction to Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1997)
• ---, "From Additive to Expressive Form," in Hamlet

Videos

• Sut Jhally, Dreamworlds 2: desire/sex/power in music video (on reserve at King)
• Neil Docherty, The Merchants of Cool (on reserve at King)

Attendance Policy

If you miss more than three classes, your grade will drop one grade per absence. You will be dropped from the course after 5 absences.

Grades

Grades will be composed of

1. attendance and participation (20%)
2. listserv and in-class writings (50%)
3. final projects (30%)

Required Work

1. Attendance and Participation: To receive an A, a grade meaning "excellent," you must participate at least once during each class period. If you do not like speaking in public -- or don't get the chance to contribute your ideas to the discussion -- post them to the class email list. Every week I will assign each student a class participation grade which you will be able to see: in Blackboard, click on "Tools" and then "Check Grade"; the grade appears in a column which has a title of the last class date of the week and "Attendance." Please feel free to discuss those grades with me at any time.
2. Class Email List and In-Class Writing: Every Thursday, I will post questions in the folder called "Class Email List Questions," under "Assignments" in Blackboard. Write one or two paragraphs responding to the question and post it to the list before we meet in class on Tuesday. Throughout the semester, I will also ask you to write short essays in class on a particular topic. I will ask you later to fix grammatical problems in the essays in order to raise your grade.
3. Final Project: Each student will design a web page. Don't worry: no technological expertise is required; you can use Dreamweaver, Netscape Composer, or templates that I provide, whatever is most comfortable for you to work with. This web page will introduce first-year Miami students to "The Culture of Information." It will be made up of at least 4 summaries of texts we have read, the ones that you have found to be most useful in understanding how the Internet affects our lives. You will then select a topic -- an author, a philosopher, a director, a musician, a school of thought, an artistic movement, a mathematical or psychological theory, a poem, a play -- and will write a 3-page essay discussing how its presentation on the World Wide Web has affected our understanding of this topic. The summaries and essay, as well as a bibliography, will make up your web page.

What is the Computer Revolution?

Week 1

T, 8/21

Introduction

R, 8/23

Clifford Geertz, "Common Sense" -- handout

[Author to be divulged,] "To the Fair Clarinda" -- handout

Week 2

T, 8/28

Lakoff and Johnson, Metaphors We Live By

R, 8/30

Metaphors

Week 3

T, 9/4

NO CLASS -- EXCHANGE DAY

9/6

Meet in Havighurst Lab, 260 Bachelor Hall: Listserv, Blackboard, Library Reserves, HTML composing tools.

Week 4

T, 9/11

McLuhan, "The Medium is the Message" and "Media Hot and Cold" -- ereserves

Bush, "As We May Think"

R, 9/13

Steven Johnson, Interface Culture, Chapter 1: "Bitmapping," on real reserve at the library

Week 5

T, 9/18

Plato, excerpt from The Phaedrus -- handout

Hobart and Schiffman, "Orality and the Problem of Memory" -- erserves

R, 9/20

Chartier, begin The Order of Books

Keep, et. al., "Ted Nelson and Xanadu,"

Whitehead, "Orality and Hypertext:

Week 6

T, 9/25

Chartier, Order (cont')

Nelson, "The Xanadu Ideal"

R, 9/27

Chartier, Order (finish)

Due: 2 Summaries

Individualism

All Readings (except Miracle Device) in Individualism Binder, handed out in class

Week 7

T, 10/2

Miracle Device

Heinz Kohut, "The Endangered Self " -- handout

R, 10/4

Richard Sennett, "Autonomy, an Authority Without Love" -- handout

Stephen Frosh, "Social Experience and the Constructed Self" -- handout

Week 8

T, 10/9

Jorge Luis Borges, The Garden of Forking Paths -- handout

---, "The Nothingness of Personality" -- handout

R, 10/11

Sherry Turkle, "Identity in the Age of the Internet" -- handout

Sherry Turkle, "Identity Crisis" -- handout

Due: 2 Summaries

MOO

Week 9: MEET IN HAVIGHURST LAB, 260 BAC

T, 10/16

MOOing in 260 BAC

Borgmann, Holding On To Reality, Introduction and Part I

R, 10/18*

MOOing in 260 BAC

Borgmann, Ch. 10 "Realizing Information: Building"

Information

Week 10

T, 10/23

Borgmann, Ch. 8 "Realizing Information: Reading"

Blake, The Blake Archive

Borgmann, Ch. 9 "Realizing Information: Playing"

Berman's online Turing Game

R, 10/25

Borgman, Conclusion, "Information and Reality"

Due: Summary

Literature On Line

Week 11

T, 10/30

Murray, Introduction and "From Additive to Expressive Form" in Hamlet on the Holodeck -- ereserves

Moulthrop and Cohen, The Color of Television

Alan Liu, Lyotard Auto-Differend Page

R, 11/1

Brooks, "The Heresy of Paraphrase" in The Well-Wrought Urn -- ereserves

Nelson, "What Is Literature?"

Cheek, Online Poetry

Week 12

T, 11/6

Group meetings to discuss your hypertext

Roger Harris, A Guidebook

Essay Assignment (we'll go over it)

R, 11/8

Group meetings to discuss your hypertext

Due: a topic and list of URLs for your essay

Literary Criticism and the Internet

Week 13

T, 11/13*

Guest Speaker: Michael-Eberle Sinatra (Univ. of Montreal), editor of Romanticism on the Net

George Landow, "What's a Critic to Do?" -- ereserves

Image Culture

R, 11/15

Video: "The Merchants of Cool"

Alan Liu, The Tribe of Cool: Information, Culture, and History, then click on "Webcast of Final Plenary"

Week 14

T, 11/20*

Video: Dreamworlds 2

Berger, Ways of Seeing

R, 11/22

THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY

Week 15

T, 11/27

Laura Mulvey, "Film and Visual Pleasure" -- handout

Berger, Ways (finish)

R, 11/29

Nick Gillespie, "Happy Birthday MTV"

Guest Speaker: Nick Gillespie

Due: Three-page essay

What's "Cool"?

Week 16

T, 12/4

Course Evaluations

Web-page making Questions

R, 12/6

Web-page making Questions

Class Party

What's Cool?

Final Web Page Due by the Final Exam: Thursday, December 13, 7:45 p.m.