2. Description
In this course we will do two things: We will practice the creative and crit-
ical use of media technologies, and we will examine the use (and theory)
of digital media in light of two converging trends: arts-based research in
the humanities, and a related documentary/research turn in contempo-
rary art. To do so, we will engage in a mixed “practice-theory” with digital
media, that undermines the long shaky distinction between the terms
“theory” and “practice.”
Approaching “media theory and practice” this way will allow us to exam-
ine a variety of uses for media technologies in our various creative and
scholarly efforts. Rather than just reading a lot of theory about media
(though we will read a good deal), we will connect conceptual questions
about media with actually enacted practices, while looking at and creat-
ing examples of media-in-use.
To accomplish this, we will study a variety of examples of contemporary
media art practices (especially bio-art, tactical media, and electronically
mediated performance), and documentary aesthetics broadly conceived,
and ask what they teach us about the limits and possibilities there are in
using digital media as modes of expression and investigation.
Dr. Anthony Staglianò
staglian@nmsu.edu • 575-646-2468
OFFICE HOURS: 1-2:30 M EN 105
Course
ENGL 543/643 FALL 2017
Media Theory and Practice:
Creative Research with Digital Media
M 5:30-8:00 CREATIVE RESEARCH CENTER
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3. As a seminar, we will learn the most
through discussion, debate, and some-
times through struggling together with
counter-intuitive and challenging ideas.
Thus, we all need to be in class and have
read the materials and be ready to
discuss them.
Assignments
Participation (5%)
Each week you will post a 250-300 word
response to/summary of that week’s
readings, concluding with a question or
two it raises in your mind for class dis-
cussion. These will be posted 24 hours
before our class meeting for the week. I
will draw these together, and use them to
start our class discussions.
These posts serve several purposes.
First, in having to articulate your under-
standing of the readings, and the ques-
tions they raise for you, you deepen and
sharpen that understanding. Second,
in having these posted before class,
we have already before us a map of the
class’s possible discussion terrain (while
always knowing that travels into unchart-
ed or barely charted territory are often
most valuable). Third is an element of
social knowledge. If there are texts which
you have struggled with, or doubt your
understanding of, a quick survey of what
your classmates have made of these
might help dissolve difficult problems.
At least one, but no more than three, of
your weekly responses will be created in
a medium other than academic prose.
I want you to grapple with the questions
raised by these texts as they push at the
boundaries of common understandings
of conceptual thinking. This requirement
is meant to get you thinking about ways
of responding to textual media with/in
other media. This exercise is one in open
invention; I am agnostic about which
medium you choose. Follow your own
tendencies, affinities, media habits.
Weekly Posts (25%)
Presentation of Seminar Research (5%)
In the last week of class, you will present
your work in progress on your seminar
paper. This will be 5-7 minutes, rela-
tively informal, and serves mainly as an
opportunity for you (collectively) to hear
what each other is working on, and to get
feedback from each other on possible
directions for the future of that work.
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4. Assignments
The seminar paper will be between 5000
and 9000 words, and reflect
graduate-level argument, writing skill,
and engagement with other scholarship.
The paper will engage the course theme
in some way. It does not, however, need
to cite the readings we discussed this
semester. You are free to mobilize other
perspectives, conversations, controver-
sies, and so on.
I take a pragmatic view of the function of
the seminar paper. It should be a space
for you to do the work you need to do in
graduate school, and you are free to use
the seminar paper as an opportunity to
draft an initial version of an argument
important to your research, influenced by
the concepts and materials encountered
in this course.
You are welcome and encouraged to do
some or all of your seminar research in a
medium that is not (only) prose, if you are
inclined to do so. You will, however, still
need to produce work that reflects rigor-
ous engagement with complex questions,
and itself advances some novel interven-
tion. Many of the media objects we will
analyze in the class will be “art” projects
of one sort or another that indeed do
conceptual work in forms other than
academic prose. If these inspire you to
follow such a path, let me know, and I will
discuss with you the form you work will
take (including the prospectus, final
presentation, and submitted project).
Seminar Research/Paper (50%)
In the 10th week of class, you will submit
a brief (3-4 pages, including short bib-
liography) prospectus for the paper. In
this, you will articulate the importance of
your intervention, preview the movement
of the argument you expect to make, and
relate the theories/texts/objects/technol-
ogies you will engage in that argument.
Research Proposal (15%)
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5. Policies
Your written assignments will follow
normal academic standards of reference
and citation.
With respect to non-textual production,
it’s increasingly hard in the multimediat-
ed production and circulation of ideas to
understand fully where the line is
between acceptable and unacceptable
recirculations of texts, thoughts, ideas
and so on. When in doubt, overcite, or
contact me (or both).
Note on Plagiarism
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of
1973 and the Americans with Disabilities
Act Amendments Act (ADAAA) covers
issues relating to disability and accom-
modations. If a student has questions or
needs an accommodation in the class-
room (all medical information is treated
confidentially), contact:
Trudy Luken, Director Student Acces-
sibility Services (SAS) - Corbett Center,
Rm. 244
Phone: (575) 646-6840
E-mail: sas@nmsu.edu
Website: http://sas.nmsu.edu/
NMSU policy prohibits discrimination on
the basis of age, ancestry, color, disabil-
ity, gender identity, genetic information,
national origin, race, religion, retaliation,
serious medical condition, sex, sexual ori-
entation, spousal affiliation and protected
veterans status.
Furthermore, Title IX prohibits sex dis-
crimination to include sexual misconduct:
sexual violence (sexual assault, rape),
sexual harassment and retaliation.
For more information on discrimination
issues, Title IX, Campus SaVE Act, NMSU
Policy Chapter 3.25, NMSU’s complaint
process, or to file a complaint contact:
Gerard Nevarez, Title IX Coordinator
Agustin Diaz, Title IX Deputy Coordinator
Office of Institutional Equity (OIE) -
O’Loughlin House, 1130 University
Avenue
Phone: (575) 646-3635 E-mail: equity@
nmsu.edu
Website: http://www.nmsu.edu/~eeo/
Other NMSU Resources:
NMSU Police Department: (575) 646-3311
www.nmsupolice.com
NMSU Police Victim Services: (575) 646-3424
NMSU Counseling Center: (575) 646-2731
NMSU Dean of Students: (575) 646-1722
For Any On-campus Emergencies: 911
Class Syllabus Notice
A (94-100%)
A- (90-93%)
B+ (88-90%)
B (84-87%)
B- (80-83%)
C+ (78-80%)
C (74-77%)
C- (70-73%)
D+ (68-70%)
D (64-67%)
F (0- 63%)
Grade Scale
I typically do not accept late work or grant
incompletes, except in circumstances
where it is clearly necessary. Should such
a situation arise, get in touch with me as
soon as you can and we will sort out what
arrangements are fair.
Late Work and Incompletes
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6. Schedule
Week 1 (M 8/21): Course Intro/Syllabus
Week 2 (M 8/28): What are (New) Media? What are (Multi)media?
Readings: McLuhan, Selections from Understanding Media and the Gutenberg Galaxy
Manovich, Language of New Media, ch. 1, “What Is New Media?”;
Flusser, “Line and Surface”
Screening/Sounding: Wexler, Medium Cool ;
Albert Ayler, “New York Eye and Ear Control”
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 3 (M 9/11 NB: 9/4 IS LABOR DAY; NO CLASS ): Art/Vision/Knowledge 1
Readings: Halpern, Beautiful Data, Introduction; Heidegger, “Age of the World Picture”
Screening/Sounding:
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 4 (M 9/18): Art/Vision/Knowledge 2
Readings: Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Mechanical Reproducibility”;
Mitchell, “What Is an Image?”; Nam June Paik, “Expanded Education for the Paperless
Society.”
Screening/Sounding: Farocki, Images of the World and the Inscription of War
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 5 (M 9/25): On Presence
Readings: Gumbrecht, The Production of Presence
Screening/Sounding:
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 6 (M 10/2): Creative Research and Being/Becoming
Readings: Deleuze and Guattari, “Percept, Affect, and Concept”; Heidegger, “Origin of
the Work of Art”
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 7 (M 10/9): Information and the Document in Creative Research
Readings: Trinh, “Documentary Is/Not A Name”; Daniel, “Database Aesthetics”;
Cramerotti, Aesthetic Journalism
Screenings/Sounding: Trihn, Reassemblage Curtis, All Watched over by Machines of
Loving Grace
Bridle “New Aesthetic” (Tumblr)
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Note on “Screenings and Soundings”: These items are listed as ‘suggested’ media adjuvants to the
readings on theory and practice we will encounter in the given week—things I think nicely complement the
ideas and themes of the week. In all cases, I will attempt to make these materials available and accessible.
In our seminar discussions, I will occasionally relate these to the readings. I do not wish for these to take
the form of a requirement, however. Given the demands of life in graduate school, your time is short, and
when choosing what to devote your energies to, prioritize the readings above these materials (unless oth-
erwise indicated). You will notice several blanks too. I leave these open for our own invention and discovery
as a class.
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7. Schedule
Week 8 (M 10/16): Networks as Media (of Control)
Readings: Galloway, Protocol, introduction; Chun, Control and Freedom, introduction
and chapter 1, “Why Cyberspace?”; Deleuze “Post-Script on Control Society”
Screening/Sounding: Cronenberg, Videodrome; The Fly
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 9 (M 10/23): The Archive and/as Creative Research Medium
Readings: Sekula, “The Body and the Archive”; Derrida, Archive Fever; Parikka, What is
Media Archaeology?
Screening/Sounding: Marker, Sans Soleil; Morrison, Decasia; DJ Spooky, Girl Talk
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 10 (M 10/30): Creating Identity, Gender, Race, and Self after the Internet
Readings: Nakamura, Cybertypes; Chun, “Race and/as Technology, or How to Do Things
to Race”; Dewey-Hagborg, “Sci Fi Crime Drama with a Strong Black Lead”
Screening/Sounding: 8-Bit Philosophy, “Why Do We Take Selfies?”; Ulman, “Excellences
& Perfections” (Instagram performance art project); Trecartin, “K-CoreaINC.K (section
a)”;Mykki Blanco, “Cosmic Angel: The Illuminati Princess”
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 11 (M 11/6): Sound Media in Creative Research
Readings: Gitelman, “The Phonograph’s New Media Publics”; Barthes, “The Grain of the
Voice”; Dolar, “Che Bella Voce!” and “The Linguistics of Voice”; Hosokawa, “The Walkman
Effect”
Screenings/Soundings: “Serial” Podcast; John Cage, 4’33”
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 12 (M 11/13):Mediating Tactics and #Activism
Readings: Dean, Blog Theory; Wark, “A Hacker Manifesto”; Garcia and Lovink, “ABC of
Tactical Media”; CAE, Electronic Civil Disobedience; Black Lives Matter
documents/tweets
Screening/Sounding: Citizenfour; Monáe/Wondaland Records, “Hell You Talmbout”
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 13 (M 11/27): In/Human Media and Mediating Humanness
Readings: Parikka, Insect Media; Brown “The Machine that (therefore) I Am”
Boyle, “The (Rhetorical) Question Concerning Glitch”
Screening/Sounding:
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 14 (M 12/4): Wearable Media and Biological Media
Readings: Thacker, “What Is Biomedia?”; Kac, “Life Transformation—Art Mutation”
Peterson, “Big Mother Is Watching You”
Screening/Sounding: Harvey, “CV Dazzle” and “Stealth Wear” projects.
Doing: In-Class Media Lab
Week 15 (M 12/11): Presentations and Course Wrap-Up
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