This writing course - an investigation into how information has shaped and been shaped by human society - will operate on two levels. First, the students will analyse and recreate the research process that lies at the heart of academic inquiry. From the collection, organization, and annotation of original data, students will design original research projects. More broadly, this course will test the hypothesis that human society - from its basic infrastructures to the highest levels of power - is inseparable from the processes that manage information and oversee its circulation.
A number of general questions will guide our thinking: social questions like communities of information, the construction of memory and attention in media-rich environments, and issues of trust and credibility in a world of information enclaves. We'll analyze institutional issues like open access to scholarly research, data collection and preservation, and information architectures such as archives, libraries, and museums. And, as a writing course, we will be interested in composition questions that touch on format, genre, and media as well as information and digital literacy.
Throughout, we'll be adopting the perspective of self-ethnographers as we track the strange creature that we've always been but perhaps never so clearly as today, namely, the inforg - the informationally embodied organism - whose conciousness and desire are inseparable from the circuits of information through which we connect to others and the world at large.