Announcements (recent first)

** We'll start using the blogs on our third meeting.

** The class member blogs are now online.

** The syllabus is now online!

** This syllablus last changed on Saturday 7 Nov.

About This Class

Essentials
Class Meetings: 224 Lincoln Hall, Mondays, 3-5:50 p.m.

Instructor: Professor Christian Sandvig
Office: 133 Lincoln Hall
Office Hours: 3-4 Wednesdays and by appointment
Office Telephone: 333-0141 (use only during office hours)
Messages: 333-2683 (department office)
Mailbox: 244 Lincoln Hall
E-mail: csandvig@uiuc.edu

Course Description
This seminar addresses accounts and theorists of communication technologies as systems. Its focus is on influential books investigating entire systems of communication from competing theoretical perspectives. Its purpose is to develop an understanding of how the social sciences reason about systems of communication technology and humanity.

The authors covered here address a wide range of concerns, including: How is the Internet situated in the normal experiences of users? How does digital convergence complicate national sovereignty? How did the telephone alter the conditions of modernity? However, in addition to these questions, our broader aim is to compare and contrast the construction of scholarly arguments incorporating technological systems, with an emphasis on the development of these systems.

Organization
The seminar covers a range of intellectual traditions and disciplines, with some emphasis on science and technology studies and the history of technology. Other perspectives and approaches include ethnography, "new" institutionalism, political economy, and cultural studies. This seminar is intended to be useful for students interested in the study of media and communication generally or of technology generally.

The seminar is organized around competing theoretical concerns, assumptions, and approaches. Work by the authors covered includes four accounts of particular technologies: radio, television, the telephone, and the Internet. It also includes four accounts that make arguments across communication technologies and/or across history, often dealing with digital convergence and the Internet.

Requirements
Students will be responsible for a seminar paper of about 25 pages, and a paper proposal (or short paper) of 5 pages. In addition, there will be very short "weekly questions." No incompletes.

Required Texts

• Claude Fischer, America Calling: A Social History of the Telephone to 1940. University of California Press, 1994 (reprint edition). (read more about this...)
• Carolyn Marvin, When Old Technologies Were New: Thinking About Electric Communication in the Late Nineteenth Century. Oxford University Press, 1988. (read more about this...)
• Raymond Williams, Television. Routledge, 2003. (read more about this...)
• Susan J. Douglas, Inventing American Broadcasting. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987. (read more about this...)
• Harold A. Innis, The Bias of Communication. University of Toronto Press, 1991. (read more about this...)
• Daniel Miller and Don Slater, The Internet: An Ethnographic Approach. Berg Publishers, 2001. (read more about this...)
• Monroe E. Price, Media and Sovereignty: The Global Information Revolution and its Challenge to State Power. MIT Press, 2002. (read more about this...)
• Ithiel de Sola Pool, Technologies of Freedom. Harvard University Press (also under imprint "Belknap Press"), 1984 reprint edition (or any edition OK). This book is out of print -- but strangely it is in the bookstore anyway. You can also use the library's copy or buy used online (try alibris or amazon). (read more about this...)

Optional Texts

• William Strunk, Jr. & E. B. White, The Elements of Style. (4th edition.) Longman, 2000.
• Howard S. Becker, Writing for Social Scientists: How to Start and Finish Your Thesis, Book, or Article. University of Chicago Press, 1986.

Schedule

Wed 08/24:	welcome -- no readings
Mon 08/29:	read ALL of Williams Today's question: Many consider Williams's Television to be the definitive book on television in modern society. However, in a negative review of Television written for the American Journal of Sociology in the late 1970s, W. Russell Neuman wrote that "scholars...will be forced to continue their search for a definite review of...television in modern society" because Williams's "critique lacks the sophistication and focus necessary to have a constructive influence on the design and execution of research on television." Neuman attributes this to, "Williams's uneasiness with...the whole notion of gathering data to test ideas." What is your opinion of this critique? Explain.
Mon 09/05:	LABOR DAY -- NO CLASS
Mon 09/12:	read ALL of Douglas Today's question: Douglas has written an explanation of the social construction of radio in order to avoid technological determinism. The "constructors" proposed in this book are inventors, the press, amateur operators, the military, the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) and others. One sure way to avoid "determinism" is to advance a narrative that contains more than one possible outcome. Can you use the materials in this book to propose a plausible alternative way that radio might have developed in the U.S.? If yes, explain the alternative. If not, explain what information you would need in order to propose an alternative (that is, information that you don't have in this book).
Mon 09/19:	read Marvin: intro, ch. 1-3 Today's question: Expertise and "new technology" are two concepts that are often inextricably linked in writing about technological change. Comment on some significant use of the concept of "expertise" in When Old Technologies Were New. For example: You might elaborate on Marvin's definition of "expertise" and analyze why she defines it this way. You might explain how expertise functions in Marvin's understanding of the social construction of new technologies. Or, you might differentiate Marvin's concept of expertise from Douglas's discussions of engineers (or other readings or popular ideas).
Mon 09/26:	read Marvin: ch. 4-5, epilogue Today's question: Marvin has been both praised and criticized for the unusual methods in this book. "Methods" should be understood broadly: for example, it could mean her choice of sources, the application of her chosen theoretical framework, the structure of her argument, her deployment and analysis of historical data, or her close reading and analysis of texts. Now that you have read the entire book, in this blog post, please characterize her methods in some way and offer an assessment of them. For example, you could (1) relate her methods to her stated goals. Or, you could (2) compare her methods to others you have read (for this course or outside it). Or you could do something else that offers a characterization and assessment.
Mon 10/03:	read Fischer: ch. 1-4 Today's Question: When scholars write about communication technologies, they often focus on successful technologies. Successful technologies, in turn, are usually described as ever-expanding or "diffusing" throughout society until they are widespread. In this context, Fischer's analysis of the decline in rural telephony in Chapter 4 is remarkable and unusual. Please evaluate this argument in chapter 4. You might comment on his evidence for the decline, his analysis, or his explanation of it. Is the explanation convincing? You might compare it to discussions of other technologies we have read. Does this analysis demonstrate a strength or weakness in his method? (Or, Why did he find this decline when other scholars rarely if ever highlight any declines?) In-class handout: Seminar Papers and Proposals (PDF, 1 page)
Mon 10/10:	read Fischer: ch. 5-9 No question today. PAPER PROPOSAL DUE (post it to your blog)
Mon 10/17:	read Miller & Slater: ch. 1-4 and: read all other class member paper proposals (from the blogs) Today's Question: Miller & Slater have elaborated four cross-cutting, non-exhaustive "dimensions" or "dynamics" that mark the Trinidadian Internet, and perhaps the Internet everywhere. Choose one of the four dynamics introduced in chapter 1 (Objectification, Mediation, Normative Freedom, Positioning) or a sub-concept within one of the dynamics (expansive realization, expansive potential). Analyze how the dynamic manifests in the ethnographic material presented in chapter 3 (Relationships) or chapter 4 (Being Trini). You might consider: What does the dynamic mean? How is the dynamic analytically useful? How is it applied? How is its use related to the method employed here, or the assumptions?
Mon 10/24:	read Miller & Slater: ch. 5-7 Today's Question: For this answer, try to highlight a conclusion that Miller & Slater make that differs from what we know about an older technology. That is, Miller & Slater cover themes that are very familiar from our earlier readings -- such as businesspeople and consumers trying to come to terms with a new communication technology -- but they occasionally come to strikingly different conclusions. Consider Chapter 6, "Doing Business Online," which chronicles several instances where Trinis try to employ new communication technologies (Web site design businesses, textiles catalogs, Miss Universe, etc.). Compare one of these instances and any conclusions that Miller & Slater draw from this material (e.g., about decommodification, virtual vs. real, the dynamics from ch. 1) to an analogous instance with an older technology covered by another author in this course (Douglas, Marvin, Fischer, Williams). How do you explain this difference in conclusions? e.g., Is the difference the result of technology (the Internet?), the method, the theoretical approach, assumptions, Trini culture, etc.?
Mon 10/31:	read Innis: introduction-p. 91 Today's Question: The Bias of Communication is known as a "classic" in the study of communication technology, but it is also described as "difficult," "nonlineal," "puzzling," and "a struggle" -- probably chiefly because the book does not build to a sustained or coherent argument. Choose one of the three essays assigned for today and read them in the manner suggested by the introduction -- as an "idea file." Identify some important concept, theory, or insight in the essay you chose and describe its importance. Please describe the idea critically as appropriate -- list drawbacks as well as praise. It may be helpful to reference earlier class readings as a point of comparison to show what is different about Innis' ideas or his disciplinary approach (economic history). In-class discussion: Pedagogy. In-class handout: Bloom's Taxonomy of Learning Objectives (PDF, 1 page)
Mon 11/07:	read Innis: pp. 92-198 Also read: Designing Teaching / Lesson Plans (PDF, 3 pages) Speaking of Teaching 13(2). "Designing Courses." Winter, 2004. Download file (PDF, 5 pages) Today's Question: What would Innis make of the Internet? Write a brief analytical comment about the relation of the Internet to society that you can defend as consistent with Innis's ideas in some way. For example, you might employ one of his concepts (information monopoly, time-biased, space-biased) or borrow one of his analyses from an earlier technology (cuneiform's effects on the invention of abstraction in math) and apply it to the Internet.
Mon 11/14:	read de Sola Pool: ch. 1-5 Today's Question: Ithiel de Sola Pool's discussion of the "convergence of modes" (see esp. ch. 3 but also throughout) is now over twenty years old. Assess and discuss the degree to which some feature of this concept is still useful today. For example, you might consider: Did some of Pool's predictions come to pass? Do Pool's predictions still seem immanent? Is the historical foundation of the concept defensible? Are similar predictions made by scholars (or their sources) in our other readings or in the popular press today? Is there a "rhetoric of convergence" that spans multiple communication technologies and/or time periods? Are the political or structural concerns reflected in Pool's discussion of convergence (e.g., cross-ownership, the First Amendment) still provocative? Does the Internet show this discussion to be outdated, or is the Internet the expression and triumph of this concept? Etc.
Mon 11/21:	THANKSGIVING-- NO CLASS
Mon 11/28:	read de Sola Pool: ch 6-9 AND Price: part I Also read: Example Syllabus Outlines (PDF, 3 pages) from the U of M Wireless Communication Workshop TEACHING ASSIGNMENT DUE (post it to your blog) Today's Question: How are relevant ideas from de Sola Pool's work affirmed, expanded, updated, or refuted in Part I of Price's book? Don't simply point out the explicit connections that Price makes (see p. 28). Instead, you might consider the way that one or more central concepts from Technologies of Freedom (e.g., convergence, cross-ownership, common carriage, new technology) are still of concern in Price's work, twenty years later. Note that the concepts may go by different names in Price.
Mon 12/05:	read Price: part II and III And: read all other class member teaching assignments (from the blogs). In-class discussion: Teaching Exercise Today's Question: Prepare a constructive discussion question to ask Monroe Price about his book in case we can get him on the phone. Don't worry about the word minimum for this post (that is, it can be short). Also, please prepare contructive comments about the teaching assignments to share in class. (You do not need to post these to your blog.)
Wed 12/14:	PAPER DUE -- NO CLASS

 Image Credits

About the images on this page, from top: (1) The statue "The Spirit of Communications," by sculptor Evelyn Beatrice Longman (originally named "The Genius of Electricity"). From: Boettinger, H. M. (1977). The Telephone Book: Bell, Watson, Vail and American Life. Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y.: Riverwood Publishers. Original image reproduced by The Bell System Memorial. (2) Box of Network Cable, San Diego County. Original photograph by Hope Hall. (3) Computer Graveyard, Detroit. Original photograph by Hope Hall.