AmSt 150w

Digital Underground: New Media and

Emerging Cultural Movements
Fall 2013
T Th 11:00-12:20
College Apartments 9
Instructor: Ali Colleen Neff
E-Mail: alineff@wm.edu
Office: 8B College Apartments
Office Hours: T Th 1-3p.m., W by appointment
Overview
In this introductory writing seminar, we will examine the relationship of social
media, mobile technologies, global connectivity, and the digital arts to the
emergence of cultural undergrounds. We will look to subcultural movements of
the past to imagine how they resonate with the undergrounds of today, and
ask how the technologies of the era shape, and are in turn shaped by, them.
With special attention to the role of pan-American artists and industries in
global media, we ask what it means to be part of an underground and how
these movements make their mark on the world. Students will have the
opportunity to integrate new media into their critical writing assignments and
to research the emergence of a particular cultural movement as it moves from
its local, hidden, radical, or otherwise different spaces into an ever-changing
global mainstream.
Goals
In this course, we work toward a dual series of goals as we engage the
topic of media studies in our progress toward becoming better critical
thinkers and writers.
1.We will better understand the role of media technologies in cultural formation, and
how they shape and are shaped by the groups who engage them
2.We will learn to design projects, and to communicate complex, critical ideas clearly and
with a measure of personal and intellectual style.
We will gauge our progress toward these goals by checking in with
course keywords (listed for each week) and through a series of
discursive writing assignments leading to our final research project.
Requirements
You will be graded on a series of five written assignments, a final test,
and course participation.
2.Complete and critically engage all required reading and media
3.Complete all assignments on time and with intellectual and academic integrity
4.Participate fully in the classroom community
5.Communicate your needs and issues with your classmates and teachers responsibly.
6.Turn off all internet and social media when in the classroom (very important)
7.Grow intellectually, as an emerging authority on the world of culture, and as a critical
thinker and writer
Materials
Course materials for this multimedia course can
be found by class date in this syllabus.
1 Most materials are available as articles
through our Blackboard site, or e-books
through Swem Library
2 One book required: How to Wreck a Nice
Beach by David Thompkins
3 It is recommended to print these materials
and mark them up, and to engage them
specifically in class discussion.
Milestones
Unit One
Understand how new cultural movements
emerge, and practice methods in writing about
them
Unit Two
Engage basic concepts and practices in media
studies and articulate critical arguments about
how processes of power work through them
Unit Three
Think about how digital media create emerging
global communities and develop a personal
style in writing about them
Attendance, Participation, Delays
1. Attendance is required at all lectures and
discussion sections; more than two
unexcused absences will result in a full final
grade letter grade deduction
2. While all students prefer different modes of
engagement, participation in classroom
discussion is a must; communicate with me if
you have issues
3. Late work will, unless excused by a
documented medical emergency, be docked
a full letter grade per day
4.As a rule, communicate responsibly and
mindfully about any issues ahead of time
Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground
Lecture Issues/Keywords/Themes Thursday Materials
8/29-8/30 Course/Personal Introductions, Syllabus Fostering Class Discussion
9/2-9/6 Subcultures in the digital age: Why do they
matter? Introduction to essay writing. How to
talk about subcultures, power, di!erence, and
other tricky topics in the classroom. Thinking
about interdisciplinarity and cultural criticism.
Read all of this for this week:
Helen Swords _Stylish Academic Writing_
(Available online through Swem LIbrary)
Media to Consider:
1. A Tribe Called Red: http://atribecalledred.com
2. RookieMag: http://rookiemag.com
3. Bronies: http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=t2EOfhvvURY
4. Turng: http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=JQRRnAhmB58
5. Roller Derby: http://rivercityrollergirls.org
Politics: http://mashable.com/2011/11/17/ows-
tea-party/
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
The role of blogs and cultural-critical video in
intervening in public discourses (Ill Doctrine).
Watch at least 7 of the videos: http://
www.illdoctrine.com
Small Groupwork
KEYWORDS: subculture, digital culture, new media, culture, American Studies, interdisciplinarity,
cultural criticism
KEYWORDS: subculture, digital culture, new media, culture, American Studies, interdisciplinarity,
cultural criticism
KEYWORDS: subculture, digital culture, new media, culture, American Studies, interdisciplinarity,
cultural criticism
Unit One: Emerging Cultural Movements (and writing about them) Unit One: Emerging Cultural Movements (and writing about them) Unit One: Emerging Cultural Movements (and writing about them)
9/9-9/13 Emerging Cultural Movements in the Digital
Age: Hidden Practitioners
Read all of these for today:
2. Barry Shanks The Political Agency of
Musical Beauty (PDF on BBoard)
3. Dick Hebdige, Subculture: The Politics of
Style (PDF on BBoard)
4. Kyra Gaunt, all of Chapters 1, 5, and 7 from
The Games Black Girls Play: Learning the
Ropes from Double-Dutch to Hip-Hop
(available as an e-book through SWEM)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Greg Tate, Black Jazz in the Digital
Age: http://www.criticalimprov.com/article/
view/287/431
2. Selections from Danah Boyds Apophenia:
http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/
2009/08/16/twitter_pointle.html
http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/
2009/12/29/race_and_social.html
http://www.danah.org/papers/2009/
WhiteFlightDraft3.pdf
KEYWORDS: practitioner, emergence, style, politics, agency, practice, digital age, digital divide KEYWORDS: practitioner, emergence, style, politics, agency, practice, digital age, digital divide KEYWORDS: practitioner, emergence, style, politics, agency, practice, digital age, digital divide
Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground
500-600-word writing assignment due Tuesday, 9/10 (Assignment 1): Write about a digital subculture. 500-600-word writing assignment due Tuesday, 9/10 (Assignment 1): Write about a digital subculture. 500-600-word writing assignment due Tuesday, 9/10 (Assignment 1): Write about a digital subculture.
9/16-9/20 Locating and listening to undergrounds
Read all of these for today:
1 Kara Keeling, Josh Kun Introduction:
Listening to American Studies. American
Quarterly, Volume 63, Number 3, September
2011, pp. 445-459 (PDF on BBoard)
2 Fikentscher, The Underground as Cultural
Context (PDF on BBoard)
3 Victor Turner, Liminality and
Communitas (Scanned on BBoard)

Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Wired article on Anonymous: http://
www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/06/
anonymous-parmy-olson-review/all/
2. bell hooks: Cultural Criticism and
Transformation. Watch the entire 6-part
series available on youtube (60 minutes or
so) , starting with part 1: http://
www.youtube.com/watch?
v=zQUuHFKP-9s

KEYWORDS: liminality, marginalization, underground, subaltern, alternative, other, binary, inversion KEYWORDS: liminality, marginalization, underground, subaltern, alternative, other, binary, inversion KEYWORDS: liminality, marginalization, underground, subaltern, alternative, other, binary, inversion
9/23-9/27 The Others to Media Studies
Read all of these for today:
1. From Shobat and Stahm, Unthinking
Eurocentrism, Introduction and Chapter 9
(PDF on BBoard)
2. From Ginsburg, Abu-Lughod, Larkin: Media
Worlds, Selections (PDF on BBoard)
3. Selections from Marshall McLuhan TBA (PDF
on BBoard)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Yasmin Moll, Islamic Televangelism:
Religion, Media and Visuality in
Contemporary Egypt, Issue 10, Spring
2010http://www.arabmediasociety.com/
index.php?article=732&p=0
Library Research Day: Meet in Swem to work
with Reference Librarians

KEYWORDS: nation, di!erence, power, empowerment, disempowerment, race, eurocentrism,
modernity, resistance
KEYWORDS: nation, di!erence, power, empowerment, disempowerment, race, eurocentrism,
modernity, resistance
KEYWORDS: nation, di!erence, power, empowerment, disempowerment, race, eurocentrism,
modernity, resistance
1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 9/24 (Assignment 2): Critically unpack an sample of digital culture 1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 9/24 (Assignment 2): Critically unpack an sample of digital culture 1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 9/24 (Assignment 2): Critically unpack an sample of digital culture
9/30-10/4 Social di!erence and the idea of the
underground
Read all of these for today:
1. Stuart Hall, from Representations, Chapter 1:
The Work of Cultural Representation
2. Selections from Gelder and Thornton, The
Subcultures Reader (PDF on BBoard)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Carefully read this hypertext version of
Arjun Appadurais Disjuncture and
Di!erence in the Global Political Economy
and do searches on each of the key terms
within: http://www.intcul.tohoku.ac.jp/
~holden/MediatedSociety/Readings/
2003_04/Appadurai.html#
KEYWORDS: subculture, digital culture, new media, culture, American Studies, interdisciplinarity,
cultural criticism, representation, communication
KEYWORDS: subculture, digital culture, new media, culture, American Studies, interdisciplinarity,
cultural criticism, representation, communication
KEYWORDS: subculture, digital culture, new media, culture, American Studies, interdisciplinarity,
cultural criticism, representation, communication
Unit Two: Engagements with Digital Media (and building a critical argument) Unit Two: Engagements with Digital Media (and building a critical argument) Unit Two: Engagements with Digital Media (and building a critical argument)
Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground
10/7-10/1
1
How Americanness circulates globally via
digital media
Read all of these for today:
1. Michel Foucault, from Archaeology of
Knowledge
2. Daniel Sharp: Foucaults genealogical
method: http://philforum.berkeley.edu/blog/
2011/10/17/foucaults-genealogical-method/
3. Ted Friedman, Electric Dreams: Computers in
American Culture (New York: New York
University Press, 2005). Introduction,
selections (PDF on BBoard)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Ali Colleen Ne!, The New Masters of
Eloquence(PDF on Bboard)
2. Social Text Online article: http://
www.socialtextjournal.org/periscope/
2011/11/in-one-all-senegalese-women-
freestyle-artists-unify-the-global-
ghetto.php
3. Freestyle video: http://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=0qg05IBWKGM
Class visit from Toussa Senerap
KEYWORDS: circulation, history, genealogy, methodology, Americanness, postmodern, alternative
knowledges, discourse, communicative complexity, social capital, cultural capital, labor, consumption
KEYWORDS: circulation, history, genealogy, methodology, Americanness, postmodern, alternative
knowledges, discourse, communicative complexity, social capital, cultural capital, labor, consumption
KEYWORDS: circulation, history, genealogy, methodology, Americanness, postmodern, alternative
knowledges, discourse, communicative complexity, social capital, cultural capital, labor, consumption
500-600-word response due Tuesday, 10/7 (Assignment 3) 500-600-word response due Tuesday, 10/7 (Assignment 3) 500-600-word response due Tuesday, 10/7 (Assignment 3)
Fall Break 10/12-10/15 Fall Break 10/12-10/15 Fall Break 10/12-10/15
10/16-18 Youtube and the Immediacy of Web Video/The
Visual
Read all of these for today:
1. Nick Salvato Out of Hand: YouTube
Amateurs and Professionals, TDR: The
Drama Review, Volume 53, Number 3, Fall
2009 (T 203) , pp. 67-83 (PDF on Bboard))
2. Christine Bacareza Balance, How It Feels to
Be Viral Me: A!ective Labor and Asian
American YouTube Performance (PDF on
BBoard)
3. Maria A. Kopacz (bio) and Bessie Lee Lawton
Rating the YouTube Indian: Viewer Ratings of
Native American Portrayals on a Viral Video
Site (PDF on BBoard)
4. William Merrin , Still Fighting the
Beast:Guerrilla Television and the Limits of
YouTube (PDF on BBoard)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Instagram and the impact of immediate
visuality: http://www.pewresearch.org/
fact-tank/2013/06/20/instagram-vine-and-
the-evolution-of-social-media/
2. Moira Burke and Robert Kraut, Social
Capital on Facebook: Di!erentiating Uses
and Usershttp://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/
viewdoc/download?
doi=10.1.1.227.6644&rep=rep1&type=pdf
3. Jessica Winter, Instagram is even more
depressing than Facebook. Heres
why.http://www.slate.com/articles/
technology/technology/2013/07/
instagram_and_self_esteem_why_the_pho
to_sharing_network_is_even_more_depres
sing.html
KEYWORDS: visuality, moving image, immediacy, sensory communication, visual anthropology KEYWORDS: visuality, moving image, immediacy, sensory communication, visual anthropology KEYWORDS: visuality, moving image, immediacy, sensory communication, visual anthropology
10/21-25 Queering the Media, Digitally
Read all of these for today:
1. Esther Milne , FCJ-010 Email and Epistolary
technologies: Presence, Intimacy,
Disembodiment http://
two.breculturejournal.org/
2. Selections from: Kate O'Riordan and David J
Phillips, eds., Queer Online (PDF online)
3. Mary Gray, Out In The Country, Selections
(PDF Online)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. The Queer Zine Archive: http://qzap.org/
v5/index.php?
option=com_gallery2&Itemid=28
2. A Queer Social & Cultural Media Study:
http://qcsms.tumblr.com
3. Queerty: read at least ve blog entries
from this site: http://www.queerty.com/i
Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground
KEYWORDS: queer/queerness/queering, presence, intimacy, embodiment, disembodiment,
experimentation, coming out
KEYWORDS: queer/queerness/queering, presence, intimacy, embodiment, disembodiment,
experimentation, coming out
KEYWORDS: queer/queerness/queering, presence, intimacy, embodiment, disembodiment,
experimentation, coming out
1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 10/21 (Assignment 4) 1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 10/21 (Assignment 4) 1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 10/21 (Assignment 4)
10/28-11/
1
Digital Music Production
Read all of this for today:
1. Read all of Dave Thompkins, How to Wreck a
Nice Beach: The Vocoder from World War II to
Hip-Hop, The Machine Speaks (Available
through amazon.com)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Visit Dave Tompkins website at: http://
howtowreckanicebeach.com and read
over at least 5 blog entries
2. Read all of the Wayne and Wax blog
entries from may 10th to the present:
http://wayneandwax.com
KEYWORDS: medium, vocality, audibility, futurism, Afro-futurism, organic/inorganic, jazz,
experimentation
KEYWORDS: medium, vocality, audibility, futurism, Afro-futurism, organic/inorganic, jazz,
experimentation
KEYWORDS: medium, vocality, audibility, futurism, Afro-futurism, organic/inorganic, jazz,
experimentation
Unit Three: Global Networks (and the elements of critical style) Unit Three: Global Networks (and the elements of critical style) Unit Three: Global Networks (and the elements of critical style)
11/4-11/8 Digital Diasporas: What is digital
Americanness?
Read all of these for today:
1. Rivera, Marshall, and Hernandez, Reggaeton:
Introduction (PDF on BBoard)
2. R. Niezen, 2005, Digital Identity: The
Construction of Virtual Selfhood in the
Indigenous People's Movement, Comparative
Studies in Society and History 47.3, 532-551
(PDF on BBoard)
3. Lisa Nakamura and Peter A. Chow-White ,
eds., Race After the Internet (Selection) (PDF
on BBoard)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Beit Hatfutsot: The Museum of the Jewish
People http://www.bh.org.il
Additional Media TBA
KEYWORDS: globalization, diapsora, transatlantic, The Americas, Caribbean, KEYWORDS: globalization, diapsora, transatlantic, The Americas, Caribbean, KEYWORDS: globalization, diapsora, transatlantic, The Americas, Caribbean,
11/11-15 Utopia and the possibilities/limitations of new
media
Read all of these for today:
1. Article contextualizing digital utopia: http://
www.nytimes.com/2006/09/25/arts/
25conn.html?pagewanted=all
2. Selections from Fred Turner, From
Counterculture to Cyberculture : Stewart
Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the
Rise of Digital Utopianism. Chapters 1, 2, and
8. Available as an e-book through Swem
library.
3. Ulises A. Mejias, FCJ-147 Liberation
Technology and the Arab Spring: From Utopia
to Atopia and Beyondhttp://
twenty.breculturejournal.org
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
1. Visuality.com and the grassroots political
campaign: http://visuality.com/orida-
education-association
Additional Media TBA
KEYWORDS: utopia, access, cyberculture, counterculture, liberation KEYWORDS: utopia, access, cyberculture, counterculture, liberation KEYWORDS: utopia, access, cyberculture, counterculture, liberation
Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground Course Schedule: Digital Underground
11/18-22 Bringing it all back home
Read all of these for today:
1. Mark Katz, from Groove Music: Falling
Barriers (PDF on BBoard)
Read/engage all of these for today, and
revisit Mondays readings:
Multimedia TBA
KEYWORDS: TBA KEYWORDS: TBA KEYWORDS: TBA
Final Paper Draft Due Tuesday 11/17 (Assignment 5) Final Paper Draft Due Tuesday 11/17 (Assignment 5) Final Paper Draft Due Tuesday 11/17 (Assignment 5)
11/26 Screening Day--Thanksgiving Break 11/27-12/1 Screening Day--Thanksgiving Break 11/27-12/1
Revisit all of the week one readings during this screening and review timewe will loop back
to discuss them in class again as it comes to a close, and you are expected to know them
well for the nal. Also, be sure you have mastered the course keywords and concepts.
Revisit all of the week one readings during this screening and review timewe will loop back
to discuss them in class again as it comes to a close, and you are expected to know them
well for the nal. Also, be sure you have mastered the course keywords and concepts.
Review Review Review
12/2-12/6 Read all of these for today:
Revisit the rst full week of media studies
readings:
Minimal Review Materials T.B.A.
Final Exam: Monday, December 9
th
, 2-5 p.m. Final Exam: Monday, December 9
th
, 2-5 p.m. Final Exam: Monday, December 9
th
, 2-5 p.m.
Graded Item Number of points (of 100 total)
Assignment Sheets will be available for each assignment as it is presented in class
Graded Item Number of points (of 100 total)
Assignment Sheets will be available for each assignment as it is presented in class
500-600-word writing assignment due Tuesday, 9/10 (Assignment 1). This assignment
asks you to choose a text, website, multimedia sample, or other example of digital media
and discuss its relationship to a particular subculture. You will draw from your keywords
from the rst week of class in shaping an argument about this relationship that will
convince your classmates that this object represents a cultural group, idea or movement
that is an alternative to the mainstream, dominant, or hegemonic digital status quo.
5
1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 9/24 (Assignment 2). This is a keyword-centered essay
that asks you to analyze the ways in which a particular subculture with which you are
familiar (or will become familiar) uses multimedia in critical ways. Educate your peers
about how this group's engagement with digital media is distinctly its own.
15
500-600-word response due Tuesday, 10/7 (Assignment 3) You will respond critically to
one of your classmates' essays from 9/24 (I will distribute these blindly on 9/26) with a
critique suggesting that another interpretation of this subculture's engagement with
media is possible. Your work as a co-critic and peer is to challenge your partner to make
his or her analysis more complex, rather than to break down or destroy their work,
thereby strengthening the power of their analysis.
5
1,000-word essay due Tuesday, 10/21 (Assignment 4) 15
First Draft of nal paper due Tuesday, 11/19 (Assignment 5) 5
12/5 Final paper due (Assignment 6) This research project involves approximately 15
written pages and accompanying multimedia. You will receive an in-depth assignment
description by Tuesday, September 10th.
25
Final Exam: Thursday, December 12th, 9a.m.-12 p.m.: Short Answer 15
Course Participation 15