MW 3:30-5pm
Room: FBH 401
Prof. Peter Dechermey (decherne@upenn.edu)(FBH 211)
TAs: Anat Dan (anatdan@sas.upenn.edu)
ASSIGNMENTS
1) Class attendance (10 points) 3 unexcused absences will result in a reduction of your final grade.
2) Share a Phrase (10 points)
Before every class meeting, upload a phrase or sentence that you heard or read during the previous class session or that you read or heard in preparatory material on the syllabus. If you miss a class, you are still responsible for submitting a phrase from the reading. If you miss three of these submissions, you will be marked down a grade (for example A to A-).
3) 60-Second Assignments (there are two)
- a) In-Class Presentation (10 points)
Sign up for and do a 60-second in-class oral presentation. You will watch an episode of a 20th century TV show (i.e. made before 2000). In 60 seconds in-class, you will describe and analyze the episode. Using the material we’ve learned in class, what can you tell us about the context (production, cultural, format, etc.)?
- b) Video (to be screened in class)(10 points)
Make a 60-second video. The video may be a parody technology commercial or a video in one style of fan video work.
4) Collaborative Annotated Bibliography (20 points)(DUE NOVEMBER 14)
Choose a focused research question (foe example: How did networks use Neilson ratings in programming decisions in the 1950s and 1960s? How did Twitter impact the Arab Spring?). Then identify 5 GREAT sources (articles or book chapters) that help you answer your research question. Write 300-words on each source, describing (a) the conclusions of the source as well as (b) the methods of research that supports it. These entries will be collated in a permanent and public database. You may not include more than one chapter from an individual book. Readings assigned for class do not count. You may use no more than one newspaper or magazine article; the remainder of your sources must come from books and journals.
5) open book midterm (Oct 17) / final (date TBA) (20 points each)
There will be an in-class midterm and a final during the finals period. Please make appropriate travel plans. Booking an early flight is not an excuse for missing your final. The exams are not cumulative. The fist exam will cover the fist section on the course on the history of TV and related topics. The second exam will cover the development of the internet and related topics. Exams are open book, so you are encouraged to take good notes.
READING/VIEWING
All readings and videos will be made available through Canvas.
CLASS MEETINGS, READINGS, and VIEWING
August 31 – Death By Television
Sept 5 – Labor Day – no class
Sept 7 – Guest Speaker: Bill Guttentag
Sept 12 – Shaping the Public Sphere
Robert Darton, “An Early Information Society”
Debora Spar, from Ruling the Waves
Sept 14 – Inventing Television
Steven Johnson, “Error”
Malcolm Gladwell, “In the Air”
Sept 19 – Television Industries
Christopher Anderson, “Hollywood in the Home”
Decherney, “The New Hollywood”
Sept 21 – Television Programming
Decherney, “The Studio System”
Aniko Imre, “Socialist Comedy”
Watch: Exporting Raymond (2010)
Sept 26 – Rosh Hashanah – no class
Sept 28 – Deep Dive: Desilu
NPR Planet Money, “How Desi Invented Television” (audio)
Oct 3 – TV Advertising and News
Raymond Williams, “Advertising: The Magic System” and “Flow”
Oct 5 – Yom Kippur – no class
Oct 10 – Global TV Audiences
John Tomlinson, from Cultural Imperialism
Jo Ellen Fair on Television in Senegal
Oct 12 – Theme Parks and Exam Review
Jean Baudrillard, from Simulacra and Simulation
Oct 17 – In-class Midterm
Oct 19 – A Network of Networks
Manuel Castells, “Lessons from the History of the Internet”
Marta Figlerowicz, ”Counter-Histories of the Internet”
Oct 24 – Cyberutopianism
John Perry Barlow, “Declaration of Independence for Cyberspace”
dana boyd, “Hacking the Attention Economy”
Oct 26 – The Myth of the Global Internet
Claire Evans, from Broad Band
Goldsmith and Wu, “The God of the Internet”
Oct 31 – Free and Open Source Software (and Culture)
Lawrence Lessig, Remix, pp 23-57
Nov 2 – From Cyberspace to the Internet of Things
Vanevar Bush, “As We May Think”
William Gibson, “Academy Leader”
Decherney, “Smart is the New Locked”
Nov 7- Revolutionaries and Authoritarians
Hillary Clinton, speech on internet freedom
Kraidy, “The People Want”
Evgeni Morozov, from The Net Delusion
Nov 9 – Regulating Internet Speech
Watch: Laura Poitrus’s “Citizenfour” [documentary]
Nov 14 – Mobile Media
guest speaker: Steve Horowitz
Annotated Bibliographies Due
Nov 16 – Web 2.0: Convergence and Remix Culture
Henry Jenkins, “Quentin Tarantino’s Star Wars”
Francesca Coppa, from Vidding
Guest: Francesca Coppa
Nov 21 – Equity and Sustainability
Chris Ali, Senate Testimony
Nov 23 – no class
Nov 28 – Streamers
Guests: Alexandra Milchan and Scott Lambert
Nov 30 – The Metaverse
Ivan Sutherland, “The Ultimate Display”
Mark Zuckerberg on the metaverse
Dec 5 – Building Virtual Worlds with Agora 1
Dec 7 – Building Virtual Worlds with Agora 2
Dec 12 – Exam Review
TBD – Final exam