Prospectus

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Digital Media and Machinic Cultures

Course
2024-2025

Admission requirements

This course is open to students from the Research master Arts, Literature and Media, the MA in Media Studies, and the MSc Media Technology, and as an elective at ResMA level provided that the student has a firm grasp and understanding of the debates in (media) theory.

Description

The rise of digital media technologies has been rapid and far-reaching, with new technologies and platforms emerging every day. In this course we will reflect on the implications of these developments on (the way we study) the arts and society today. How does the advent of the digital affect us socially, culturally, and politically? What consequences does it have for the subjects we analyse, for the ways in which we analyse them, and for what counts as knowledge production in the first place?

The aim of the course is twofold. First, you will familiarize yourself with the state-of-the-arts theoretical debates that approach digitization as a global cultural political project, offering new ways of understanding the transforming and transformative relations between digital media, the arts, the social, the cultural and the political today. The key concepts around which these discussions are organized are: machine, algorithm, pattern, data, infrastructure, image, attention, work, disconnection and error or failure. Authors include, but are not limited to, Karl Marx, Gilles Deleuze, Marurzio Lazzarato, Meredith Broussard, Tarleton Gillespie, Sofia Noble, Antionette Rouvroy, Hito Steyerl, Nanna Bonde Thylstrup, Daniela Agostinho, Mel Hogan, Julia Velkova, Alexander Galloway, Lisa Parks, Susanna Paasonen, Aud Sissel Hoel, Lila Lee-Morrison, Yves Citton, Tiziana Terranova, Urs Stäheli, Clare Birchall and Neta Alexander. To anchor our analysis, we will read these theoretical texts alongside and juxtaposed with artworks, films, songs and novels, so as to broach the ethical, political, cultural, and psychological questions that the machine centric-logic of digital media give rise to today.
Second, instead of presenting your research findings in a canonical academic paper, you are invited to explore, engage with, (virtually) contribute to and intervene in a scholarly way in the para-academic domain, that is the online spaces where new knowledge is researched, debated, and produced. Assignments include, besides a presentation, a series of smaller research-based mediations in the form of a listicle, a blog and a podcast.
Third to boost resilience in the face of these at times disconcerting theories and transformations of mass digitization and the economies of attention that they tap into, there is the opportunity (without obligation) to engage in moments of mindfulness and meditation.

Course objectives

Upon completion of this course, you

  • have mastered a critical purchase on the standing debates on digital media, new imaging technologies, and machinic cultures in relation to the arts and society in the modern period and beyond;

  • have acquainted yourself with classical and current debates within this field independently, tailored towards your assignments;

  • have acquired an advanced set of methodological tools and theoretical concepts that allows you to carry out research in the field of digital media, the arts, and theory independently;

  • are able to demonstrate your knowledges and advanced skills in a series of para-academic assignments (a listical, a blog, and a podcast) that aim to explore, contribute to and intervene in the para-academic field;

  • are able to situate yourself clearly both in the scholarly debates as well as in the para-academic field and are able to reflect on that position – inside and out of the academy – as part of your aspired professional identity.

Timetable

The timetables are available through My Timetable.

Mode of instruction

Seminar

Assessment method

Assessment

The final grade is a based on a portfolio/ portfolio in which you reflect on what you hope(d) to get out of this class and what the class has brought you. To this end you are asked to fully engage in class-discussions, do a presentation where you take responsibility for opening up one theoretical text to class, and engage in a series of interventions in the para-academic field. Concretely, you will contribute to a listical, write a blog and together make a podcast. The aim of the assignments is to first find and describe an online space in which ‘para-academic’ knowledge is produced and debated (listicle); then contribute to the para-academic field in the form of a (virtual) blogpost, book review, case study, or thread-response based on your own research and analysis that adds to the field; andfinally, to reflect on the current debates on digital media and machinic cultures by situating yourself within the para-academic discourse in the form of a podcast (based on a research report including an annotated bibliography, a script, and a research question or hypothesis).

Weighing

The final mark for the course is based on the portfolio (100%). To be able to finalize the portfolio, all requirements of in-class participation, the presentation, listical, blog, and podcast must be met. To pass the course the final grade must be 5.5 or higher.

Resit

The resit consists of the same subtests as the first opportunity (portfolio), except for in-class participation and the presentation.

Inspection and feedback

How and when an exam review will take place will be disclosed together with the publication of the exam results at the latest. If a student requests a review within 30 days after publication of the exam results, an exam review will have to be organized.

Reading list

Readings will be made available on Brightspace.

Registration

Enrolment through My Studymap is mandatory.

Contact

  • For substantive questions, contact the lecturer listed in the right information bar.

  • For questions about enrolment, admission, etc, contact the Education Administration Office: Arsenaal.

Remarks

Not applicable.