An overview of media technologies, including early writing and the printing press, the rise of mass culture, and the digital revolution.
Wednesdays, 6:30 – 9:20 PM
Keily Hall, Rm 264
Juan Monroy
G Building, Room 102-D
By appointment only
The following textbooks are available through online retailers, and on reserve at Rosenthal Library.
Crowley, D. J, and Paul Heyer, eds. Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society. 6th ed. Boston: Allyn & Bacon/Pearson, 2011.
You may also consider buying the 5th edition.
Fang, Irving E. Alphabet to Internet: Media in Our Lives. St. Paul, Minnesota: Rada Press, 2012.
Wu, Tim. The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires. New York: Alfred A. Knoppf, 2010.
Use your Queens College email account (@qc.cuny.edu) to activate a free, fifty-two–week digital subscription to the New York Times.
http://library.qc.cuny.edu/research/NYTimes-Academic-Pass-Instructions-and-FAQ.pdf
Required course readings not found in the textbook are available electronically from the course website. When prompted, enter the username and password provided at our first class meeting.
After each class, I will post an outline and a PDF copy of the slides, available under the “Review” section of each class on the course schedule. The outlines are not detailed summaries of each class. Each is an outline of my lecture and the topics we covered in the class that day. The slides are available by logging in with the same username and password provided at our first class meeting.
If you don’t use it already, I highly recommend using Dropbox to exchange files with me. You can sign up for free and receive two (2) gigabytes of cloud based storage. This is an invaluable tool for accessing all of your files anywhere without having to carry a USB flash drive. I hate those things.
We will not be using Blackboard for this course.
This class consists of four components. You cannot satisfactorily complete this course without all four of these.
Each lecture will form the basis of the material I expect you to know for the exams. I will present on the historical and cultural context relevant to the media technology covered that particular week. I will post outlines and slides from each lecture, but believe me, those serve as poor substitutes for attending each week’s lecture.
Please read the assigned course material prior to each week’s class. Consult the Course Schedule (below) for the required reading assignments.
All assignments must be completed on time in order to receive full credit. Late assignments will be penalized by a 10% reduction for each 24-hour period it is late. After seven calendar days, the assignment will not be accepted and you will likely fail this class.
Exams comprise 40% of your course grade and are designed to reward regular attendance and diligent studying. Exams will be administered in class and must be taken at the specified date and time.
Please respect the classroom environment. You should pay attention to the lecture, take notes, and avoid distractions, such as web surfing and using your mobile phone. Studies have consistently shown that students using laptops and mobile phones perform about 11% worse than students who are not distracted by these devices. On a personal note, it’s very difficult to stay motivated as a teacher if I see students seemingly disinterested in their own education. If I find you engaging in disruptive behavior, such as watching online videos, passing notes, instant messaging, chatting, or texting, I will remove you from the classroom and have you withdraw from the class.
Please submit your work on time. Late work will be penalized by a 10% reduction for each 24-hour period it is late. After one calendar week, the assignment will not be accepted and you will likely fail this class.
There will be no incomplete grades for this class except in the case of a documented emergency in the final weeks of the semester. If you experience such an emergency, please contact me immediately, and we will work out a schedule for you to complete the outstanding work before the beginning of the following semester.
But aside from these circumstances, no late work will be accepted and no “incomplete” grades will be granted. If you have difficulty keeping up with coursework, consider giving yourself extra time to complete assignments, reducing your overall course load, and/or taking this class at a later semester.
Academic dishonesty is prohibited in The City University of New York. Penalties for academic dishonesty include academic sanctions, such as failing or otherwise reduced grades, and/or disciplinary sanctions, including suspension or expulsion. Examples of Academic Dishonesty include cheating, plagiarism, obtaining an unfair advantage, and falsification of records and official documents.
Cheating is the unauthorized use or attempted use of material, information, notes, study aids, devices or communication during an academic exercise. Plagiarism is the act of presenting another person’s ideas, research or writings as your own. Obtaining Unfair Advantage is any action taken by a student that gives that student an unfair advantage in his/her academic work over another student, or an action taken by a student through which a student attempts to gain an unfair advantage in his or her academic work over another student.
For tips and information on how to maintain academic integrity, consult Writing at Queens document, “What is Plagiarism?”.
Please silence or turn off the radio in your mobile phone (power down the phone or set to “Airplane” mode). Not only do ringing phones disrupt class, most phones will also interfere with the media equipment in the room.
Students must surrender mobile phones, tablets, and computers on exam days.
Please check your QC email account (student@qc.cuny.edu) on a daily basis, if not more frequently. I will broadcast announcements and send point-to-point communiques using your official email address.
Please note that I am not allowed to discuss your grade from an account that is not your official email account.
Queens College has a history of commitment to the enhancement of education of students with disabilities. The Office of Special Services for Students with Disabilities was established in 1974 to provide equal opportunities for a college education to academically qualified students with physical disabilities. The office offers comprehensive support services to students with various disabilities. Queens College prohibits discrimination against students with disabilities and it ensures full access and equal opportunity to qualified students with disabilities to all academic programs and social activities on campus.
To receive these services, a student must first register with the office in Kiely 171. To do so, you must bring proper documentation pertaining to the nature of your disability from a qualified professional. To learn more about CUNY Assistive Technology Services and the office located at Queens College, call (718) 997–3775 or visit Kiely Hall 173. For more information, visit The Office of Special Services.
The following three assignments require that you read two books on your own schedule. This is in addition to the required readings listed on the Course Schedule (below).
In a widely used textbook, Irving Fang outlines a series of “information revolutions” in human history that are both products and factors of deep social changes. Read the chapters on the first two information revolutions he survets—the writing revolution and the printing revolution.
In his recent book, The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires, Tim Wu outlines how virtually every media technology introduced since industrialization has followed a “cycle.” Using one of the media technologies he discussed, evaluate his argument that this media followed this rise-and-fall pattern.
There are two parts to this assignment.
The midterm exam is an in-class exam, consisting true-false, multiple-choice, identification and short essay questions. The exam will cover the course material from the first half of the course.
The final exam is an in-class exam consisting of true-false, multiple-choice, identification and short essay questions. The exam will cover the course material from the entire course.
Please review the list of Testable Terms in advance of the final exam.
| Assignment | Weight | Due Date |
|---|---|---|
| Two Information Revolutions | 15% | October 8 |
| Midterm Exam | 20% | October 22 |
| The Cycle: Draft and Outline | 10% | November 19 |
| The Cycle: Final Paper | 30% | December 10 |
| Final Exam | 25% | December 17 |
As you await the arrival of your textbook, you can download the required readings for this week. Fang (2012) is available as a separate download.
There is no class today in observance of Rosh Hashana.
The assignment Two Information Revolutions is due today in class.
We will take our midterm exam in class today.
The Draft and Outline of your Media Technologies and the Cycle assignment is due today in class.
No class tonight. Go to bed early and run a turkey trot or something in the morning.
Watch Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio (Ken Burns, 1992). It is available on:
You can take a extra-credit quiz in class when we return on December 3.
The evaluations for this course is available at http://www.qc.cuny.edu/evaluate.
The Final Paper of your Media Technologies and the Cycle assignment is due today in class.
We will take our final exam in class on Wednesday, December 17, beginning at 6:15 PM. Please review the list of Testable Terms in advance of the final exam.