Schedule | Fall 2017

Welcome to ENGL 5270

What is the nature and status of literature in digital culture?

Through readings, discussion, writing, and digital scholarship, we will pursue this question and its implications. Doing so will not only expand our knowledge of digital literary studies, the digital humanities, popular online culture, avant-garde literary experimentation, and video-game criticism/theory, but shed new light on our sense of history, culture, literary form, reading, authorship, and narrative.

For more, see the syllabus.

Day 1. Introduction:

What is the nature and status of literature in digital culture?

Resources

• Handouts and Assignments
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"

Homework

Read

Adam Hammond. Literature in the Digial Age. Chapter 1. Read actively by marking your text and making marginal notes to yourself thinking about our organizing question for today:

"What is digital culture, and is it destructive to literary writing and reading (and why does it matter if it is)?

Write

On paper, write down three pages numbers for passages from the Hammond chapter which help you begin to answer today's organizing question.

For each page number, write down a few words from the passage (a word-tag to remind you) and some notes to yourself about your choices.

Re-Read

Reread the Alice Walker story I gave you in class. Make notes on it as an example of a text exemplifying literary writing and reading.

Day 2. Hammond C1, Walker:

What is Digital Culture, and Is it Destructive to Literary Writing and Reading (and Why Does It Matter If it Is)?

Resources

• "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature" (note-taking guide handout)
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"

WEEK 2
T 9/5

Homework

Read

Adam Hammond's Chapter 2 of Literature in the Digial Age. Actively read the chapter on paper, marking the text and making marginal comments to track your thinking as you read.

Print and Read

From the course Moodle site (see the link in the menu at the top), download and print the PDF file of Alan Liu's "Introduction" to his book The Laws of Cool.

Actively read the chapter on paper. Bring the printout to class.

Write

Drawn a line down the middle of a sheet of paper to divide it into two columns.

In the right column, write word tags (2 - 5 key words) for at least five passages from Hammond's Chapter 2 that speak to the organizing question for Day 3 (see above right).

In the left column, write word tags for at least five passages from Alan Liu's chapter that either agree with or disagree with (or complicate, or go beyond) Hammond. (2A)

Draw

Draw a regular line to connect apparent agreements between a Hammond passage and a Liu passage.

Show apparent disagreements or contradictions with a line with arrow heads at either end, as in <----------> (2A)

Day 3. Hammond C2, Alan Liu:

How have changes in media affected literary writing and reading in the past--and what does that history suggest about the status of literature today?

Resources

• "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature" (note-taking guide handout)
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"
• Juggernaut

Homework

Read and Mark

1. Adam Hammond's Chapter 3 of Literature in the Digial Age. Actively read the chapter on paper, marking the text and making marginal comments to track your thinking as you read.
2. From the Moodle site, download, print, and read (marking the text as above) Janet Murray's Chapter 3 from her book Hamlet on the Holodeck.
3. Re-read Alice Walker's story "The Flowers," marking and noting passages and patterns that suggest the "narrative." (one of the features of literary writing from your notes on the handout, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature"
   
   Come in prepared to talk about your close readings of some key passages in the narrative, as well as the overall structure or arc of the narrative.

Day 4. Hammond C3, Janet Murray:

What are the consequences of digitalization on issues like democracy, imagination, authority, intellectual property, narrative, etc.?

Resources

• "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature" (note-taking guide handout)
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"
• Sample Midterm Exam format
• What to Remember, Understand, and Be Able to Discuss on the Exams
• Alan Liu's "defining issue for a field like literary studies...juggernaut..." 6.8 (Moodle forum)
• Liu" (Moodle): "Is the very notion of the literary doomed..." 3.1

WEEK 3
T 9/12

No Class Meeting

Homework

Read and Mark

Adam Hammond's Chapter 4 of Literature in the Digital Age. Actively read the chapter on paper, marking the text and making marginal comments to track your thinking as you read.

Write and Bring on Paper

Set Up

In his Chapter 1, Hammond observes that the debate between Carr and Shirky does not simply represent a choice, but dramatizes the "complex interdependence" of print and digital media , and the "paradoxical situation" we find ourselves in when we consider the question of literature's nature and status in digital culture (20).

In Chapter 4, Hammond explores that "closely intertwined" relationship of print literature and digital media. 

The Assignment

Write a paragraph that includes at least two quotations from Hammond's Chapter 4 which explains how and why literature and digital media have a "complex" relationship today, and in what ways our situation as writers and readers is "paradoxical."

Print your paragraph (if you didn't handwrite it on paper) and bring it to class.

(3A)

Re-Read, Mark, and Make Marginal Notes

To continue our attempt to define and illustrate what "literature" means, re-read Alice Walker's "The Flowers."

Mark words and passages that seem to suggest "Humanistic Concerns" (issues having to do with questions of self, society, history, understanding, etc.--in other words, issues of being a human being in the world).

Make marginal notes to yourself on the handout to unpack what at least three examples of these words or phrases suggest to you about humanistic concerns.

Day 5. Hammond C4:

In what ways is the relationship between literature and digital media "complex" and "paradoxical" (rather than being a simple matter of choice)?

Resources

• William Blake Archive
• Emily Dickenson Archive (Alone and in circumstance)
• "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature" (note-taking guide handout)
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"

WEEK 4
T 9/19

Homework

Read and Mark

Adam Hammond's Chapter 6 of Literature in the Digital Age. Actively read the chapter on paper, marking the text and making marginal comments to track your thinking as you read.

(Note that we are skipping over Chapter 5 to read later.)

Moodle Post

Find an example of something online--let's call it a "resource"--that's "literary" in some sense.  What you find might be the resource itself or (if not freely available, as with a video game) a preview, trailer, video playthrough, etc. of it.

Note: What you choose should be primarily an online resource, rather than an online representation of something physical.

In the Moodle forum, "The Literary Online," post a link to that page and write a substantive paragraph that answers some of the questions below. Quote Hammond and/or Murray (and perhaps Liu) at least three times in the paragraph.

• Is the resource born digital or digitalized (see Hammond's C3 and C4)? 
• Is it "bookish" or not (see Hammond C4)? 
• What's literary about it (or not), according to our features of NVFAH? 
• Do you think it intended as literary? 
• Can it be read or interpretated as literary evebn if it isn't intended as such? 
• What's digital about it, according to Murray's PEPS?

Examples of a resource:

• Journey (video game playthrough);
• Black People Love Us (parody of vanity site by Jonah Peretti)

4A

Day 6. Hammond C6:

What is a "born-digital" text and can it be literary?

Resources

• Steve Roggenbuck (YouTube) (New Yorker magazine: "If Walt Whitman Vlogged"
• "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature" (note-taking guide handout)
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"

Homework

S-Town Podcast

1. Subscribe to (or at least access via the web site) the podcast "S-Town."

2. Decide if you want to handwrite or type your answers to the "Listening Guide Questions for S-Town Episodes 1 and 2."

If you're writing by hand, print out the file before listening. If you're typing, open the file on your computer and print it out after you're done.

3. Listen carefully to Episodes One and Two (on a phone, mobile device, or on a computer)

4. In the space under each Listening Guide Question, take notes on details and your impressions. If possible, note down the approximate minute/second mark in the episode where the details are heard (e.g., "E1 5:35" would point to Episode 1, five minutes and 35 seconds from the beginning).

5. If you handwrote answers, scan or photocopy your Listening Guide Questions so you can keep a copy over the weekend. I will collect your original copy in class.

4B

Bring to Class

Please also bring your Hammond book to class.

Day 7. S-Town Episodes 1 and 2:

What are the affordances of a podcast as a born-digital literary form?

Resources

• Steve Roggenbuck (YouTube) (New Yorker magazine: "If Walt Whitman Vlogged"
• Steve Roggenbuck: Cloud Identification
• Film Clip: Turkish medieval song from Homer: Singer of Tales
• "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature" (note-taking guide handout)
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"

WEEK 5
T 9/26

Homework

S-Town Podcast

1. Decide if you want to handwrite or type your answers to the "Listening Guide Questions for S-Town Episodes 3-7."

If you're writing by hand, print out the file before listening. If you're typing, open the file on your computer and print it out after you're done.

2. Listen carefully to Episodes Two through Seven (on a phone, mobile device, or on a computer)

4. In the space under each Listening Guide Question, take notes on details and your impressions. If possible, note down the approximate minute/second mark in the episode where the details are heard (e.g., "E1 5:35" would point to Episode 1, five minutes and 35 seconds from the beginning).

5. If you handwrote answers, scan or photocopy your Listening Guide Questions so you can keep a copy over the weekend. I will collect your original copy in class.

5A

Bring to Class

Please also bring your Hammond book to class.

Day 8. S-Town Episodes 3-7:

What are the affordances of a podcast as a born-digital literary form?

Resources

• 'The "Ode on a Grecian Urn" Is Worth Any Number of Old Ladies'
• S-Town C3
• S-Town C6

Homework

Watch

• You Suck at Photoshop, Episode 1: Distort, Warp, and Layer Effects
• You Suck at Photoshop, Episode 2: Covering Your Mistakes
• You Suck at Photoshop Episode 3: Clone Stamp and Manual Cloning
• You Suck at Photosgop, Episode 4: Paths and Masks
• Hitch and Bledsoe interview on Tilzy.TV

Read

• "Guerrilla Ad Campaign Pushes Boundaries" (National Public Radio) You can listen to the original broadcast from this page as you read.
• "Do You Suck at Photoshop? Go to a Big Fat University" (Theodora Blanchfield, Gigaom)

Write a Substantive Paragraph

How does the "You Suck at Photoshop" series work as an example of digital culture (PEPS) and literary writing (NVFAH)?

Quote or cite details from "You Suck at Photoshop" at least twice in the paragraph.

At least twice, use a quotation from one or more of the following to compare or contrast to something specific from "You Suck at Photoshop":

• Hammond's Literature in the Digital Age
• You notes on "What We Talk About When We Talk About Literature" (note-taking guide handout)
• Alice Walker's "The Flowers" as an example of literary writing.
• "S-Town." as an example of born-digital literary work.

5B

Day 9: You Suck at Photoshop

How does born-digital literature combine and synthesize characteristics of literary and digital cultures?

Resources

• Electronic Literature Collection 3
• George Takai
• Samual Richardson
• Phebco
• In February 2008, fans of You Suck at Photoshop followed contextual clues in the week’s episode and discovered a web site for Donnie's fictitious employer, the waste-management company Phebco Inc. Reporting on the alternative-reality gaming blog Unfiction, contributor Johnnybmuto describes playfully emailing Phebco in the middle of the night inquiring about employment, and receiving the following response:
  
  
• Thank you for you interest in employment opportunities at Phebco, Inc. Your request has been forwarded to our Human Resources department who will determine whether or not an opportunity is available. But as an automated email response mechanism, even I have to wonder what chance you might have having misspelled opportunity. Twice. Good day,
  
  Phebco Automated Email Response Mechanism
• "synthesis": interestiing visualization of the process of dialectic: thesis, antithesis, synthesis (Bruce McTague)

Homework

Read

Max Brooks' The Island Chapters 17 - 22 and Epilogue (pages 196-270)

Challenges and Complications

Questions

If you were a literary writer planning an experimental, video-game-based novel like The Island...

• What could you learn from Max Brooks' example?
• What would you try to imitate or replicate in your own work? How would you do it in your own way?
• What would you try to avoid? How would you do that?
• Generally, what are the challenges and complications of setting a novel in a rule-bound, video-game world, rather than some version of the physical/historical world?

Write on Paper

Write and bring in on paper a substantive, formal paragraph

• answering at least two of the quesitons above, and
• quoting and citing (with page numbers) particular passages from The Island at least three times.

Citations and Documentation

As practice for your paper, use MLA-style parenthetical citations and a bibliographic entry for the Brooks book beneath your paragraph.

10C

Day 18: The Island 3

What can Brooks' experiment tell us about the literary possibilities and challenges of remediation?

Resources

• Assignment page for the paper: "The Challenges of Defining a Video Game as Digital Literature"
• Remediation:
  "the representation of one medium in another" (55).
  Bolter, J. David, and Richard Grusin. Remediation: Understanding New Media. MIT Press, 1999
• Talking Heads, "Once in a Lifetime" (1980)
• Machinema (machine / cinema): "Apartment Huntin'" (2007)
• Karl Marx's Circuit of Ideology (handout)

WEEK 11
T 11/7

Homework

Schedule an Individual Conference Time

In our Moodle site, please use the Wiki "Conference Sign Up" to add your name to one of the available times.

Please do not add times, or delete/move anyone else's name. If you have difficulty finding a time that works for you, please email me.

Bring to Conference

Conferences will be held in the classroom: Heller 216.

• any drafts of--or notes on--the paper,
• books or articles you plan on quoting in the paper
• if possible, a laptop or device on which you can show the video game (or a video play-through or still images of it)
• any questions or uncertainities about the requirements of the assignment, the process of writing the paper, or the substance of your particular project
• a piece of paper on which you've written the following numbered items:

1. A possible title for your paper
2. The name of the video game you're analyzing
3. at least three features of literature--as in "NVFAH" or other features defined in different terms--which you might consider describing in this specific video game
4. at least two sentences that suggest "questions, challenges or problems" that could arise when attempting to describe these features of literature (from item 3 above) in this particular video game.

Post to Moodle ("Yes, And...")

Reply to one of your classmates' postings to the forum "Five Features of Literature Illustrated and Explained." 

Replying both to your classmate's example and ideas on that characteristic of literature, try to extend, enrich, amplify, complicate that discussion (without disagreeing).

Use the philosophy of improv theater, in which every response to a fellow actor's statemet or action is to say, "Yes, and..." and to build on that premise rather than resisting or pulling the skit in a different direction.

Day 19: No Class Meeting - Conferences

Homework

Bring at Least 4 Pages of a Draft

Bring a hard copy of a rough draft of your essay to class: at least 4 double-spaced pages (about 1000 words).

• Do not bring the pages on a laptop or device. Be sure to print.
• In your pages, try to write a sustained and formal enough draft that you can start to hear the voice of the essay.
• Your draft does not necessarily include an introduction or conclusion, though it can if you wish.
• You are not required to have a Works Cited page for the draft. Some writers find it useful, however, to add entries to a Works Cited page as they write.
• Note that the finished paper will need to be 7-10 pages double spaced (1,750- 2,500 words).

Day 20. Workshop

Resources

• Assignment page for the paper: "The Challenges of Defining a Video Game as Digital Literature"
• Jonathan Franzen: "Is It Too Late to Save the World"?
• Quotations and Voices Exercise
• Peer Workshop Prompts

WEEK 12
T 11/14

Homework

Essay Due

Bring to class--ready to turn in at the beginning--a printed copy of your essay.

Be sure you have

• numbered the pages
• printed on one side of the pages only
• be sure your name appears at the top of the essay's first page
• included a "Works Cited" page at the end with all sources documented
• followed all the guidelines and requirements specified in the assignment.

Bring your Hammond book

Day 21. Paper Due; Introduce Digital Analysis

Resources

• Assignment: The Digital/Intellectual Textual Analysis
• Visualization of the First and Second Halves of Walker's "The Flowers" (handout)
• Voyant Tools

Homework

Read

Read Chapter 5 of Hammond's Literature in the Digital Age.

Bring a Laptop Computer to Class

Day 22. Voyant Tools, Hammond C5

What examples or ideas from Hammond give us ideas for what to do with Voyant, or how to make sense of what Voyant shows us? 

What does the "inadequacy" of these tools make us realize about the writing and reading of literature (NVFAH)?

Resources

• Assignment: The Digital/Intellectual Textual Analysis
• Voyant Tools Tutorial
• Alice Walker "The Flowers"
  
  
• Voyant Tools
  
  
• Online OCR
• Norton Safe Web
• 10 Minute Email
• Voyant Tool Index
  
  
• Voyant Guide
• Additional Voyant Workshop
  
  
• Google Ngram

WEEK 13
T 11/21

No Class Meeting:
Online Work on Digital Textual Analysis

No Class - Thanksgiving

WEEK 14
T 11/28

Homework

Read

Read the Introduction and Chapters 1, 2, and 3 of Franco Moretti's book, Graphs, Maps, Trees: Abstract Models for Literary History, pages 1-92.

Bring Your Hammond Book

Day 23: Franco Moretti

Resources

• Assignment: The Digital/Intellectual Textual Analysis
• Clustering
• Voyant: Knots
• Presentations

Homework

Leading Class Through a Close Analysis
(Reading a Book from the Inside Out)

Come prepared to lead the class through a close analysis of one illustration (a graph, map, or tree) from Moretti's book. Choose any illustration that you want.

As described in the steps below, create a cluster on a piece of paper to put together the elements of a fuller understanding of your chosen illustration.

Be prepared to lead a discussion of your chosen illustration and to answer questions about it and how it helps to illuminate Moretti's purposes and methods in Graphs, Maps, Trees.

I will collect your cluster at the end of class to give you credit for it.

Steps:

1. Choose one graph, map, or tree from the Moretti book.
   This is your "starting-point illustration."
2. Look at it closely to see what you understand to what you don't
3. Read the caption if Moretti provides one
   
   
4. Read some pages preceding and following the illustration for the context of the illustration
5. In your book, circle key words, names, or ideas in the caption and pages
6. Put question marks next to important-seeming statements that you don't understand (or that you suspect mean more than you're understanding)
   
   
7. On a blank sheet of paper, create a cluster with the page number and a word or two (a word tag) indicating your starting-point illustration.
8. Add to your cluster words or phrases from Moretti's caption or pages adjacent to your illustration.
9. Look up terms in Moretti's index and find the passages in the book where those terms are used and discussed. Add word tags to your cluster (with page numbers) for what you learn from those pages which helps you explain your starting-point illustraton.
   
   
10. Do a web search for key words, phrases, names. Add word tags to your cluster for ideas and understandings you've gained from those sources.
11. Go back and re-read the pages from Moretti.
12. Look again at your starting-point illustration
13. Make annotating notes in the margins around the illustration about what you now understand about details of the illustration, and why Moretti offers it in his discussion.

Day 24. Moretti 2

Resources

• handout: "Presentations"