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Our contemporary world is deeply permeated with media and new technologies that inherently influence the way we communicate, transfer knowledge, exchange information, offer representations, and experience reality and its possible imaginaries. This course traces the development of such media technologies (print media, telephony, radio, television, film, internet, mobiles, games) and accounts for their historical transformations, while focusing on their intermedial character and their relation to other arts (literature, photography, performing arts, painting, architecture, music).
In order to do so, the course takes into account archeological and philosophical notions of media and how new forms of communication exert social, cultural and political influences in a global context. In particular the course addresses fandom and popular culture, gender and race in networked spaces, convergence culture, intellectual property, the role and function of social networks in the redefinition of the public sphere, notions of citizenship and democracy, and the future of digital humanities.
Format
The course is highly theoretical, and runs for fifteen weeks, divided into three periods of five weeks. The first period deals with media archaeology; the second period is reserved for media philosophy; the third period discusses the 'digitalisation' of culture. Students are expected to read and analyze the assigned texts, participate actively in class-discussions, give a presentation, and hand in written assignments.
Lectures are used to introduce weekly topics, seminar settings provide emphasis on analysing and discussing texts concerning the week’s topic, and excursions guarantee that students are encouraged to reflect on media use in everyday life. Students present their findings and take turns in starting off group discussions for which all students must have comprehensively read the weekly texts in advance.
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