Classweb: Cyberspace, Hypertext and Critical Theory. Material on Windows CD-ROM or Macintosh thumbdrive to be distributed by Landow at first meeting. ELO Material to be distributed on thumbdrive, but is available on the Electronic Literature Website (see below under Related Resources).
14 June. Computing, networked computing, and virtuality
1. What is a medium? What is information technology? Hard and soft media; different forms of text and textuality: writing, print, digital. How new is the internet and the Internet-effect? postal systems, telegraphy, and the internet. Reading: Robert Kendall, A Life Set for Two (available as Windows CD-ROM or Macintosh thumbdrive) Assignment: write 3 interlinked html documents that compare any two works that use moving images or text, explaining the success (or failure) of the animation involved. (The ELO collection is an easy source of materials to compare). E-mail the three docs to me at george@landow.com before 10 am 15 June.
15 June. The effects of virtuality
2. Change the code, change the text. ELO [Electronic Literature Organization] projects: Brian Kim Stefans, “The Dreamlife of Letters,” Don Waber's “Strings,” and Reiner Strasser and Alan Sondheim's “Tao” Jim Rosenberg's “Diagrams Series 6.”
16 June. Cyborgs & the cyborg self. -- Cyborg Bodies, Virtual Bodies.
3. cyborg relationship with computing in which much of the memory has become even more prosthetic than it had been with print, video. Suggested reading: Donna J. Haraway, "A Cyborg Manifesto." Dan Stein's Prosthesis Project. Suggested viewing (at your leisure): Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell (anime), Bubblegum Crisis 8 (anime).
28 June. Hypertext and critical theory
1. The history of hypertext systems and its presence within media ecology, or how it relates to animation and games. Convergences -- Derrida, Bakhtin, Barthes. Reading: (1) Landow, HT 3.0, chapter 1-4. The place of hypertext in the history of textuality; or textuality and technology. (2) Bush, "As We May Think;"
Multimedia and hypertext projects: Steve Cook, Writing as Virus: Hypertext as Meme; Pearl Maria Forss, Authorship; Wee Liang Meng, What is An Author?
29 June. Hypermedia, text, authorship, and narrative
2. HT3, chapters 5-6. "Growing up Digerate," Shelley Jackson's Patchwork Girl and Michael Joyce's Afternoon. Bakhtinian fiction: David Yun's Subway Story; Michael Joyce, Afternoon and Shelley Jackson, Patchwork Girl (both available as Windows CD-ROM or Macintosh thumbdrive).
30 June. Hypermedia, education & politics
HT3, chapters 7-8.
Related Resources
- Alt-X
- Basilisk
- Electronic Literature Organization (ELO)
- Electronic Literature Collection 1
- Electronic Literature Collection 2
- Fiction and Poetry published by Eastgate Systems
- Postmodern Culture
- Hotwired
