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Examines ways in which communication technologies shape and structure a culture, and also ways in which a culture, in turn, uses those technologies first to stabilize itself and second to discover meaning
About MDIA 5176 presentations + essay assignments
About MDIA 5176 presentations + essay assignments
This class offers you the opportunity to study a particular author or subject in depth,
followed by a presentation in class and a 1500 – 2000 word essay. Below are some
guidelines you may wish to consider.
1. Study the text you have picked for your assignment in a contextual manner. This is particularly important in the case of literature that was produced decades ago and has matured to become a classic. Such texts can rarely be understood, let alone communicated, without considering the following:
(a) the historical context of the writing, including in some cases the life circumstances of the writer him/herself. Whether something is written by a young refugee author who struggles to survive in a foreign host country, or by an established academic who enjoys the relative comforts of an institutional setting makes a di*erence. Whether something is written during the rise of fascism or at the height of postwar technophilia makes a difference.
(b) the place your text has in the larger body of work of your author. Beginning, middle, end? Is this a central piece about a central topic in the author’s work or an outlying one? Does the author refer to previous work of his/her own?
(c) who are the authors by whom your author is influenced? How can you describe the relationship to this influencing author? Did your author influence others? Are there any major points of criticism that have been raised against your author? This particular work? On which grounds? By whom?
2. Pay attention to language: if you encounter words and names that are new to you, or used by the author in an unfamiliar way, research them until you have clarity. Is this text in its original language, or is it a translation? If so, have you identified any translation problems?
3. What is the key argument presented by the author? How is it established and defended? Can you identify any rhetorical devices used by the author in support of the argument?
4. How would you characterize the writing style? Engaging, accurate, objective, clear, ironic, light-hearted, dense …?
5. What meaning does this work have for you personally? Have you learned anything from it? Are you finding yourself reconsidering assumptions, or being re-affirmed in your thinking? Was this a pleasant or unpleasant reading experience?
6. Create a 1500 – 2000 word essay of the work you selected and submit it on the day of the presentation.
7. Your presentation should be timed to 20 – 30 minutes, followed by 15 min Q&A
On Kittler's _ There is no Software_ - Ardrey.pptxOn Kittler's "There is no Software" v2 - Ardrey.pdf
As an IT Professional teaching Cybersecurity, I found it ironic that Kittler wrote a paper stating "There is no Software" when looking at where technology actually went in the time since then. To demonstrate this, I created an MS-DOS virtual machine and installed a DOS version of WordPerfect to demonstrate what computing looked like at the time the paper was written. I also created a text only copy of my paper to load into WordPerfect and used that virtual machine along with a Linux virtual machine to run the slide show to emphasize that in reality computing had reached a point where there is no hardware. I wanted to emphasize the folly of trying to make bold predictions too far into the future as many were currently doing with technologies such as AI. While the presentation seemed to interest the class, it got mixed reviews from the instructor:
"Greg, I am taking into account that you are new to the style and form of writing used in communication. I also factor in that your use of screenshots was excellent, giving students much younger than we are a visual sense of what computers were like. I greatly welcome students who bring their experience into a class, and who make--like you do--an effort to bridge "two cultures" (J.P. Snow) of engineering and social theory."
Wolfgang Suetzl , Dec 8 2024 at 12:14pm
Potential Impact of the failure of the Next Gen TV ATSC 3 transition .pdfFinal Paper: Potential Impact of the failure of the Next Gen TV ATSC 3 transition
Final Paper: Potential Impact of the failure of the Next Gen TV ATSC 3 transition
My final paper was more relatable to the instructor:
"Greg, I was skeptical of your paper at the beginning, where it is rather technical (as a former radio amateur I do get the basics, though), but it gets interesting in the second part, where it begins to address political and ethical issue that are of great relevance to the way electronic media will made available in the future. Prior to reading your essay I was part of the "public that doesn't even know." The second part also resonated with me because of the possible auctioning of parts of the radio frequency spectrum, still considered a public good (a commons). How we govern the commons is fundamental to how we function as societies, and the role of the FCC seems to be ambivalent in this regard. I hope you will allow me to invite you to one of my future classes to talk to students about this set of issues.
It would have been good to have a more extensive conclusion (more than just hinting at Habermas's theory), and there are some formal issues, so a small loss of points."
Wolfgang Suetzl , Dec 17 2024 at 1:33pm
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