Digital Literature
Jessica Pressman
Yale University
Fall 2008
Wednesdays, 2:30-4:20
Room:
Email: Jessica.pressman@yale.edu
Office: LC 423
Office hours: Mondays 1-3 and by appointment
Office Phone: 432-2240
COURSE DESCRIPTION
What happens to literature and its study when text moves from page to screen? This course examines works of digital literature (literature created on the computer to be read on the computer) to understand how this emergent literary form affects the way we read, study, and understand literature. The course situates digital literature within literary history, examining connections to print hypertextual narrative, concrete poetry, OULIPO constraint-driven experiments, and other lineages. However, we also consider digital literature as a new form whose art “object” possesses computer-driven aesthetics— such as speed, animation, and multimodal semiotics— that produce decisively different literary effects and reading practices.
We will examine a varied collection of digital literature and genres including hypertext, interactive fiction, and kinetic poetry by such writers as Young-hae Chang Heavy Industries, Erik Loyer, Jason Nelson, and Judd Morrissey. Our study will be bolstered by readings in theory and criticism by Katherine Hayles, Janet Murray, Lev Manovich, and others. Moving between creative and critical works in print and digital formats, we will strive to understand the state of this new literary field and its relation to print literature and traditional methods of literary study.
COURSE OBJECTIVES
This is a literature course: it focuses on analyzing literary works. This is also a writing-intensive course. You will sharpen your critical thinking, reading, and writing skills by applying them to multimodal, multimedia literature. The result will, hopefully, be an expansion of these abilities as well as your appreciation of literature as an evolving, emergent cultural form.
Writing assignments focus on the practice of close reading with an awareness of media-specific analysis, wherein critical analysis examines not only the formal techniques but also the material format of a literary work. To this end, the course culminates in a final essay (10-12 pages) which will be presented as a website whose interface, aesthetic, and navigational elements support the intellectual claims of the argument.
COURSE TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGIES
Since this a course in digital literature wherein we will practice media-specific analysis, you will produce your critical responses in digital form. You will be given a blogspace in which to present your assignments, collect your notes, and use as an online portfolio/notebook for the course.
*No previous programming knowledge is required for the class. Technical instruction and assistance will be provided by the Instructional Technology Group. Visit their website for informative lessons in blogging (http://itgblog.commons.yale.edu) and other help-related pages (http://itg.yale.edu/help-pages).
REQUIREMENTS
4 Short Explication Essays, posted online (2 pages): (5% each): 20%
Presentation: 5%
1 Short Midterm Essay, presented online (5-7 pages): 25%
Participation: 5%
Web-based Essay Project (10-12 pages): 45%
4 Short Explication Essays: As this is a class on digital literature, we will employ the technology of the Web to stimulate and extend our in-class discussions. You will be required to post 4 thoughtful responses in the form of close-reading explications about the works we read to your blog. These responses must be posted on your blog 24 hours in advance of our meeting time. NO late postings will be graded; NO exceptions.
Midterm Essay: This essay is an opportunity to explore an in-depth analysis of a single work of digital literature and to practice the kind of multimodal explication that you will extend for your final essay. You may expand upon this ideas expressed in one of your short explication essays for this assignment.
This assignment will initiate your engagement with digital technologies because you will use your blog to present your essay. The essay will be presented online and must include certain elemental aspects of web-design (hyperlinks, images, mouse-over, pop-up, etc) that will be made explicit with the assignment details.
Presentation: During the semester, you will prepare a short (5 minute) presentation on 1 work of electronic literature that you have discovered and read that is not on the syllabus. You will introduce it to the class in a presentation that 1) presents and summarizes the work, 2) analyzes it in relation to the issues explored in class, and 3) provides a critical judgment on it as literature. The goal of this assignment is to practice your oral presentation skills while also providing an opportunity for you to explore the Web in search of new literature.
Final Web-based Essay Project: This 10-12 page paper will be an analytical essay on at least one work from the course presented, and it will be presented in the form of a website. You will propose your own essay topic and website in a formal proposal, meet with me to discuss the structure and presentation of the argument, and receive technical support from ITG to implement the digital aspects of this creative-critical analysis. You will receive the necessary instruction for building the site and including these required elements in it during an out-of-class session by ITG. This final assignment serves to implement the learned methodology of media-specific analysis and to exhibit an understanding of how the relationship between form and content, the foundation of traditional literary study, expands to address the role of technologies in presenting and accessing literature.
Participation: The success and productivity of the seminar depends upon the participation and preparation of each individual for each meeting. Together, we will collaboratively explore the subject of the class in depth, working together to pursue questions, analyze texts, and proffer critical connections and conclusions. In order to do so, you must come to class ready to participate. Some of these works do not have traditional endings, and you cannot simply rely on a page number as a sign of completed reading, while some are deceptively simple or short. You must allocate enough time to get a deep sense of the text, perhaps even engaging in multiple readings. Adequate preparation includes not only reading the work but also being prepared to discuss it. You are expected to both talk and listen during each session. As this is a small seminar, you must attend all class meetings.
Your participation grade also includes a mandatory conference. You are required to meet with me at least once during the quarter, particularly in preparation for your final web-essay. The purpose of this meeting is for us to get to know one another and to thoroughly address your questions about the course and topic. I encourage you to utilize my office hours or set up an appointment with me to discuss any ideas or concerns about the reading, the subject of the course, or even the very definition of literature!
REQUIRED WORKS
Shelley Jackson, Patchwork Girl (Eastgate Systems, CD-ROM)
READING SCHEDULE
In order to create a critical context for reading the literature, we will often pair works of electronic literature with critical essays (creative works are denoted by ~). The balance between critical and creative works varies by week.
Week 1, 9/3: What is Digital Literature?
Introduction to the subject of digital literature by way of a short Flash piece that contains no text to read, only a voice-over, and an essay that contextualizes new media reading practices within a history of literary forms.
~Ingrid Ankerson and Megan Sapnar, “While Chopping Red Peppers” (2000)
(http://www.poemsthatgo.com/gallery/spring2000/redpeppers/start.htm)
Jeffrey Masten, Peter Stallybrass, and Nancy Vickers, Language Machines (Routledge
1997): Introduction (1-6)
Week 2, 9/10: What is New about New Media? (Part I)
What exactly do we mean by “new media”? Manovich situates it within a cinematic genealogy as he tries to define the term. We read a work of digital poetry that is decisively cinematic and one that evolves from the tradition of visual experimental poetry.
~Ingrid Ankerson and Megan Sapnar “Cruising” (2001)
http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/ankerson_sapnar__cruising.html
~Brian Kim Stefans, “The Dreamlife of Letters” (2000)
http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/stefans__the_dreamlife_of_letters.html
Lev Manovich, The Language of New Media (MIT Press 2001): Chapter 1, “What is
New Media?” (27-48)
Week 3, 9/17: Hypertext
With evident continuities to print literature and lots of hype about reader-control, hypertext is an important genre and historical moment in digital literature. We consider one of the finest works in the genre and a work of literary criticism about it.
~ Shelley Jackson, Patchwork Girl (1995) [CD-ROM]
N. Katherine Hayles, “Flickering Connectivities in Shelley Jackson’s Patchwork Girl:
The Importance of Media-Specific Analysis” in My Mother Was a Computer
(U. Chicago Press, 2005)
Additional Reading:
Robert Coover, “The End of Books” (New York Times, 1992)
http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/09/27/specials/coover-end.html
Michael Joyce, Twelve Blue (1996)
http://www.eastgate.com/TwelveBlue/Twelve_Blue.html
Student Presentations begin
Week 4, 9/24: What is New about New Media? (Part II)
We continue to consider the theoretical implications for calling digital media “new” by way of Bolter and Grusin’s concept of “remediation.” We read two works that practice remediation as aesthetic strategies in very different ways.
~J.R. Carpenter, “Entre Ville” (2006)
http://luckysoap.com/entreville/index.html
Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin, Remediation (MIT Press 1999): Introduction
(3-15) and Chapter 1 (21-50)
Additional Reading:
~Judd Morrissey, The Jew’s Daughter (2000)
http://www.thejewsdaughter.com/
Week 5, 10/1: Interactive Fiction
The question of “interactivity” is central to claims and questions about what is new in new media. We read works of Interactive Fiction that push the limits of what constitutes the literary “text.”
~Andrew Plotkin, “Shade” (2000)
http://wurb.com/if/game/918
~Andrew Stern and Michael Mateas, Façade (2005)
http://www.interactivestory.net/
Nick Montfort, “Interactive Fiction” and response by Brenda Laurel in First
Person (MIT Press, 2004): http://www.electronicbookreview.com/thread/firstperson/fictive
Additional Reading:
Jeremy Douglass, “Enlightening Interactive Fiction: Andrew Plotkin’s Shade”
http://www.electronicbookreview.com/thread/firstperson/glassdark
Week 6, 10/8: Flash-ing Literature
With animation programs like Flash and Shockwave, words can be made to move and be heard as well as seen and read. What are the effects of these technologies on the way we read, analyze, and define “literature”? How do digital formats complicate distinctions between literature and film?
~William Poundstone, “Project for the Tachistoscope” (2005)
http://collection.eliterature.org/1/works/poundstone__project_for_tachistoscope_bottomless_pit.html
~Young-hae Chang Heavy Industries, Dakota (2002)
http://www.yhchang.com
Mid-term Essay Project Due
Week 7, 10/15: Artist Visit—Young-hae Chang Heavy Industries
We are privileged to welcome to our classroom the collaborative team responsible for some of the most innovative and respected works of electronic literature/new media art. Their work has been exhibited at the world’s top museums—both in the buildings and on their web-portals—including the Whitney, The Getty, and the Tate. YHCHI come to us from Seoul, Korea
~Readings from www.yhchang.com
Week 8, 10/22: Games and Play
The popularity of video games and the emergence of games as a critical field (ludology) prompts literary responses in creative that adapt game-play for critical purposes. How can the genre of game-play be used to promote reflective evaluation of the normative experience of gaming and the “reading” practices it promotes?
~Jason Nelson, “Game, Game, Game, and Again Game” (2008)
http://www.secrettechnology.com/gamegame/gamegamebegin.html
~Natalie Bookchin, “The Intruder” (1999)
http://www.poemsthatgo.com/gallery/fall2003/intruder/index.html
First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game (2004), Selections from
“Ludology” and “Game Theories” (35-55)
Additional Reading:
~Jason Rohrer, “Passage” (2007)
http://hcsoftware.sourceforge.net/passage
Week 9, 10/29: Code and Codeworks
What is the relationship between the onscreen text and computational code? How do these layers of text inform our practice as critical readers? We read a work from the genre known as “codework” and a critical work discussing the issues this genre raises.
~Talan Memmott, “Lexia to Perplexia” (2000)
http://tracearchive.ntu.ac.uk/newmedia/lexia
John Cayley, “The Code is not the Text (Unless it is the Text)” (2002)
http://www.electronicbookreview.com/thread/electropoetics/literal
Proposals for Final Projects due
Week 10, 11/5: Generative and Database Narrative
Digital literature is a processural performance of textual translation within the machine that produces the onscreen “object” we read. This week we read works of generative literature that display the role of the database in digital literature and prompt our inquiry into how writers use the database as an aesthetic tool for producing literature.
~Geniwate, “Concatenation” (2004)
http://www.idaspoetics.com.au/generative/generative.html
~Braxton Soderman, “mémoire involontaire no. 1” (2007)
http://thefollowingphrases.com/memory/memory.html
Lev Manovich, The Language of New Media (MIT Press 2001): from Chapter 5,
“Database as a Symbolic Form” (218-229)
Additional Reading:
~Talan Memmott, “Self Portrait(s) [as Other(s)]” (2006)
http://www.uiowa.edu/~iareview/tirweb/feature/memmott/spo_Memmott/index.html
Out-of-class ITG instructional meetings
Week 11, 11/12: Identity and/on the Internet
Cyberspace is a not only a cultural product but also a literary creation, and this week’s readings explore the influence of the Internet on the construction of identity, race and gender in particular, and identity politics.
~Erik Loyer, Chroma (2000)
http://www.marrowmonkey.com
Wendy Chun, Control and Freedom (MIT Press, 2006): Chapter 1, “Why Cyberspace”
(37 -76)
Sherry Turkle, Life on Screen (Touchstone Press, 1985): ‘Introduction: Identity in the
Age of the Internet” (9-26)
Additional Reading:
Deena Larsen, Disappearing Rain (2000)
http://www.deenalarsen.net/rain/
Out-of-class ITG instructional meetings (TBA)
Week 12, 11/19: VR and 3D Literature
What might future formats for reading literature look like as digital technologies become even more sophisticated and omnipresent? We consider 3D literature enabled by VR technology and contemplate how such innovations affect the stories we tell and the ways we read them.
~Noah Wardrip-Fruin, et. al., Artists’ Summary of VR Installation “Screen” (2003) and Quicktime movie of installation
http://www.noahwf.com/screen/index.html
Interview with Noah Wardrip-Fruin, The Iowa Review Web (online)
http://www.uiowa.edu/~iareview/tirweb/feature/cave/#
~Daniel Howe and Aya Karpinska, “Open Ended” (2005)
http://mrl.nyu.edu/~dhowe/open/open.html
Additional Reading:
The Iowa Review Web 3D issue (2006), edited by Rita Raley
http://www.uiowa.edu/~iareview/mainpages/new/september06/sept06_txt.html
Possible class visit to Brown University’s VR space, the CAVE
THANKSGIVING BREAK
Week 13, 12/3: Presentation of Final Web-based Essays
We conclude with a class dedicated to sharing students’ media-specific analysis: final essays presented in website form.
Week 15, 12/17: Final Web-Essays Due—online @ 2:30 pm