Course Description
In this course we will examine, as the title indicates, the impact of the Internet on U.S. cultures and communication. In just 15 years the Internet and especially the World Wide Web that it enables have become essential in the lives of many people in the U.S. (although not all). What would your life be like without email or texting? Without Facebook or MySpace? Without file-sharing? Without sites like Amazon or YouTube? Without massively multiplayer online games? From sports to shopping, politics to medicine, education to dating, all aspects of U.S. culture and communication have been affected by the Internet and more specifically the Web.
We will begin the course with a short unit reflecting on our own uses of the Internet and its impact on our lives. From this self-reflection we will then move to studying a variety of aspects of U.S. culture, examining how the technologies of the Internet have changed communication methods that have in turn changed (or perhaps not changed) people's interactions and perceptions. Some questions we will consider include who benefits and who doesn't from this new digital age, how 24/7 access to information affects what we know (or think we know), the relationship of virtual worlds to "real" worlds, and what it means to be a "friend" online. The final project, the Internet & Culture Team Project, will enable you to work collaboratively with others to investigate a particular question of interest in more depth, conducting both primary and secondary research. Infused throughout the units will be discussion of such issues as the impact of race, gender, class on online participation, the effect of corporate influence, and some global perspectives.
This writing-and reading-intensive seminar fulfills Miami Plan goals of (1) critical thinking, (2) understanding of contexts, (3) engaging with other learners, and (4) reflection leading to informed action. As a Writing & Cultures Core Course, this course also fulfills a number of the Honors & Scholars Program's writing and intercultural objectives (available in.doc).
We will engage in frequent face-to-face and online discussions, create avatars in a virtual world, read online articles and reports about the Internet, write multiple drafts of various writing assignments in a variety of genres, and in the final team project, produce a multimodal web site that will include text, digital images, audio, and video based on primary and secondary research.
In addition to class participation (both online and face-to-face) and numerous shorter written and oral assignments, the key assignments in this course are: a self-reflective essay on your own Internet use and experiences; a position paper evaluating Wikipedia; an interview-based report on the impact of the Internet on an academic or professional field (you will interview a professor or other professionals); a double-entry virtual world "diary" (written both as user and avatar), and the final course project, a collaborative group presentation and web site for the Internet & Culture Team Project. As a writing-intensive course, you will be frequently asked to read and respond to your classmates' writing and to share your writing with others.
This course will be held in a laptop classroom. You do *not* have to be a "computer whiz" to enroll in this class, but you do need to own a laptop computer that you will bring to class daily (either Mac or PC). We will have direct instruction in class on various technological aspects of the course, such as creating Web sites or using iMovie or MovieMaker to edit videos. All that each of you need to bring is a great deal of enthusiasm and curiosity for writing and for the study of how the Internet has impacted U.S. cultures and communication.