EXPERIMENTAL WRITING AND TRANSMEDIA THEORY
FOR ARTISTS, SCHOLARS, AND COMMUNITIES
ENGL 6780 • Wed 2:30-4:25 pm • 110 Rockefeller Hall • 3 credits • No prerequisites
Prof. Jon McKenzie • jvm62@cornell.edu • Office: Tues 2:00-4:00 • 104 Klarman Hall
Course Overview
Description: How does one “do theory” inside and outside the book, and inside and outside the academy? This course explores experimental writing and transmedia theory within the context of community engagement. Materials include: Artaud’s “To Be Done with the Judgment of God” (text and radio drama), Debord’s Society of the Spectacle (text and film), Lesy’s Wisconsin Death Trip (text), Marsh’s Wisconsin Death Trip (film), McLuhan/Fiore’s The Medium is the Massage (text and audio), Ronell’s The Telephone Book (text), Reines’s Telephone (play); Trinh T. Minh-Ha’s Woman, Native, Other (text); and the films Barison and Ross’ The Ister, Boutang’s Deleuze from A to Z, and Zizek and Fiennes’s The Pervert’s Guide To Cinema. Students will do theory and make media, including texts, PechaKuchas, and websites. No prior media experience needed.
While many of these texts are highly experimental and theoretical, our goal will be to translate or transmediate them for both other artists, scholars, and public communities, in particular at-risk youth at the George Junior Republic School, where a Cornell undergraduate student has helped to create Poetic Justice, two poetry clubs interested in transmedia poetry. We shall thus explore related book and media forms, such as theory comics, graphic novels, PechaKuchas, and RSAnimates as ways to experiment with writing and theory for both specialized and nonspecialized practitioners.
The course combines creative and critical skills in seminar, studio, and lab activities, as well as a local field trip. As experimental writing and transmedia theory are designed as well as composed, students will learn a series of design frames to develop methods and languages for analyzing, creating, and sharing their work with others. Students will also be encouraged to develop teaching philosophies and digital pedagogies connecting community engagement and their own work while creating an online professional website. The overall goal is to contribute to the democratization of digitality in academia and community life.
Learning outcomes
|
|
Experimental writing techniques
|
Information and experience design
|
Course Requirements
Projects and design frames: Over the term, students complete two projects and a series of design exercises that introduce three design frames that can be used both to analyze and generate experimental writing and transmedia theory:
CAT (conceptual, aesthetic, technical)
UX (user experience: experience design, information architecture, information design)
DT (design thinking’s constraints of human desirability, technical feasibility, economic viability)
In Project 1, students will analyze a work of experimental writing or transmedia theory and translate that work for a public audience using different media. For Project 2, students produce individual projects based on their own work or interests (eg, translate a paper into a media campaign, a method into a service, a theory into an app); or participate in a capstone outreach project. Our goal is producing quality work sharable with others.
Exercises and thumbnails: Exercises grow out of daily readings and materials and for each reading, students write conceptual thumbnails summarizing main arguments, defining critical concepts, and posing critical questions.
Design blogs/journals: Capture and process your learning and its application to the world around you. Use the WP blog function to post content weekly on a publicly visible page.
Conceptual: notes from class and readings, and links to relevant articles, topics, etc.
Aesthetic: work related to design exercises: sketches, mood boards, maps
Technical : work related to software, hardware
Design in Everyday Life: illustrated reflections on media and community in the world around you, using CAT, UX, and DT design frames.
Evaluation
The final grade breakdown is 33% each for Project 1, Project 2, and Participation. Exercises and thumbnails, along with discussion, attendance, comprise the Participation component of the class. Two absences may result in final grade reduction; three in failure. Students will be asked to engage in studio crits and help evaluate presentations.
Academic Integrity
Each student in this course is expected to abide by the Cornell University Code of Academic Integrity. Any work submitted by a student in this course for academic credit will be the student’s own work. For this course, collaboration is allowed for Project 1 and Project 2.
Inclusivity
The English department is committed to providing an atmosphere for learning that respects diversity. While working together to build this community we ask all members to:
|
|
Share their unique experiences, values and beliefs
|
Appreciate the opportunity to learn from each other
|