Meet the New Medium

Exploring the Technology and
Social Implications of the Internet

Course Description

http://www.scn.org/edu/tesc-97/

Spring, 1997
The Evergreen State College

Doug Schuler
douglas@scn.org
206.634.0752 (office)
206.632.1659 (home)

Revised April 7, 1997.

This description is for Spring. The description for winter 1997 is still available.

Completed research papers from Winter '97 can be found at http://www.scn.org/edu/tesc-97/winter-projects.html.

Texts

• Brook, J. and Boal, I. (1995). Resisting the Virtual Life. San Francisco: City Lights.
• Schuler, D. (1996). New Community Networks: Wired for Change. Addison-Wesley. (Royalties donated to the Evergreen Foundation)
• Schuler, D. (Ed.) (1996). Meet the New Media (Volume II) A collection of readings available in the bookstore.

Please consult the readings list to see when specific readings will be discussed.

Schedule

• Week 1 (April 5, 1997) Introduction to the Course
• Week 2 (April 12, 1997) Introduction to the Internet
• Week 3 (April 19, 1997) Media I
  Project topics must be identified by today.
• Week 4 (April 26, 1997) Media II
  Instructor will be at the "Designing for Democracy" working conference, Racine, WI. The class will still meet on this day.
• Week 5 (May 3, 1997) Economic Trends
• Week 6 (May 10, 1997) Computing at Work
• Week 7 May 17, 1997 Privacy and Civil Liberties
• Week 8 May 24, 1997 Institutionalization
  All individual projects due.
• Week 9 (May 31, 1997) Towards a Global Village
  Virtual Event presentations.
• Week 10 (June 7, 1997) Spring Wrap-Up

Goals

This quarter is the second quarter of a two-quarter course that will introduce the student to a wide range of critical social issues surrounding the use of the "Net" (i.e. the Internet and other networked digital communiation) and to a broad range of thinking and writing on those topics. After completion of this course, the student will also have a solid foundation in understanding networked digital communications technology. This will include hands-on experience including acquiring information from the Internet, communicating with others over the Internet, and publishing on the Internet using the World Wide Web.

This course should help prepare a student for work in social science, government, community development, computer technology, new media, or journalism.

Course Philosophy

The knowledge is this field is very young as the object of inquiry -- the Internet -- is relatively young and changing rapidly. The knowledge in this field must be regarded as tentative and subject to change. The number of "right answers" is small. Since this field is so dynamic it is possible for people that are alive now, students, for instance, to influence the directions that the Internet is taking and what and how people think when they think about the future of the medium.

We will all strive to learn and to report on our research, knowing that our contribution may be as useful or as non-useful as other research that is currently being conducted.

Because of Evergreen's educational philosophy and because of the inherent nature of our field of inquiry this course will be highly collaborative. Nobody has a monopoly on knowledge and we will learn from each other. As bell hooks has written in Teaching to Transgress, "As a classroom community, our capacity to generate excitement is deeply affected by our interest in one another, in hearing another's voices, in recognizing one another's presence." She goes on to say that, "There must be an ongoing recognition that everyone influences the classroom dynamic, that everyone contributes. These contributions are resources. Used constructively they enhance the capacity of any class to create an open learning community."

Since this process is collaborative we can change the course in mid-stream. Also since I am new at this I want to engage the class in some of the decisions as to how we should proceed. We will be doing various projects, "virtual events", lectures, etc. but how exactly we go about accomplishing these objectives can be revised as necessary.

How Will Students Be Evaluated?

• Attendance. Each student is expected to attend all classes. There can be one excused absence without jeopardizing your final evaluation.
• Seminar participation. Students will read all the required readings, prepare an informal paper (1-2 pages) every week on the readings, and contribute to the weekly seminar. The paper will identify the major themes and the supporting statements within the readings. In order of priority, there are three issues to be discussed in the seminars: (1) what the authors are saying; (2) how do the various papers compare or contrast to each oteher; and (3) personal thoughts. Finding out what the author is saying is the main reason for the seminar. Finally, each student will follow the guidelines for appropriate seminar behavior.
• Projects: Each student will complete two of the following three projects (and make at least one presentation to the class):
  • A social inquiry project
  • A technology transfer project.
  • A community-service project.
• Peer-reviews. Students will review each other's reports.
• Virtual event team project: Implementing and evaluating a "virtual event." The choices include virtual group therapy, virtual death, virtual Earth Day, virtual e-zine, or virtual art gallery (although it may be possible to initiate a virtual event not on this list). This is the follow-on to the virtual event planning that student teams did last quarter.
• Other assignments as appropriate.

Specific Course Content (Spring)

We will concentrate on several important issues in the Spring.

Economic Issues -- including issues like

• Unemployment and automation
• Outsourcing and temporary workers
• Communication "redlining"
• Electronic commerce
• Economic networks (ACENET, etc.)
• Commercialization of Cyberspace

Information and Communication

• Why do people communicate?
• Information and communication needs
• What is news?
• Role of technology
• Role of institutionalization and policy
• Journalism and publishing (scholarly and other)

Other topics will include privacy and civil liberties, towards a "global village," and computing at work.

Using this Material

I have made this material freely available on the web to encourage its re-use. Please attribute its source if you use it in any way. I welcome your feedback. Please let me know what you find useful and what you find less useful. How should it be improved? Please let me know if you are interested in future collaboration.

Return / Go to SCN Education home page.

Return / Go to SCN home page.