Here are the booklists for the two classes I’m taking this fall. I
ordered many of them the other day (had several from the second list already on
the office shelf). The second class (690) is an independent study, so I was thinking that it might be worthwhile to (semi)formalize a reading schedule, post it here, and invite read-alongs. By this I mean that anyone interested (or already intent on reading anything listed in the months ahead) could coordinate readings mixed with a few carnivalous interchanges, conversation and so on.
And yet I understand how things go, how in-semester workloads swell beyond our earlier anticipations of them. No problem if that happens (if, down the
line, you’re too busy). As one of the agreed-to aspects of the study, I’ll
be registering notes, lines of inquiry and other connectables throughout the
fall, blogging it either way, I mean. Feel free to express interest,
whatever comes of it.
As I’ve just added the starred items to the 690 list, it’s starting to look
more and more ambitious, so I’ll probably be swift with some, more careful with
others. In addition to the list of books, we have a packet of 8-10
articles in 691–the final core course in my current program of study.
Along with teaching 307, this constitutes my fall:
CCR691: Comparative Processes and Premises of Research: Crafting Researchable
Questions
“We Are Coming”: The Persuasive Discourse of Nineteenth-Century Black Women by
Shirley Wilson Logan (ISBN 0-8093-2193-9)
What Writing Does and How It Does It: An Introduction to Analyzing Texts and
Textual Practices edited by Charles Bazerman and Paul Prior (ISBN 0-8058-3806-6)
Sidewalk by Mitchell Duneier (ISBN 0-374-52725-3)
Collision Course: Conflict, Negotiation, and Learning in College Composition by Russel K. Durst (ISBN 0-8141-0742-7)
Rhythm Science by Paul Miller aka DJ Spooky That Subliminal Kid (ISBN
0-262-63287-X)
Self-Development and College Writing by Nick Tingle (ISBN 0-8093-2580-2)
Strange Encounters: Embodied Others in Post-Coloniality by Sara Ahmed (ISBN
0-415-20185-3)
CCR690: Visualization and New Media
Barthes, Roland. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. Trans. Richard
Howard. New York: Hill and Wang, 1981.
Baudrillard, Jean. Simulacra and Simulation. Trans. Sheila Faria Glaser. Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1994. (selections)
Benjamin, Walter. Illuminations. Ed. Hannah Arendt. New York: Schocken, 1978.
(selections)
Bolter, Jay David and Richard Grusin. Remediation: Understanding New Media.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999.
*Fuller, Matthew. Media Ecologies. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press,
2005.(selections)
Hansen, Mark. New Philosophy for a New Media. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004.
*Hayles, Katherine. Writing Machines. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002.
Hocks, Mary and Michelle Kendrick, eds. Eloquent Images. Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press, 2003.
iPod (aural digression). Apple. 20GB. W/ iTalk for podcasting.
Johnson-Eilola, Johndan. Datacloud: Toward a New Theory of Online Work. New
Dimensions in Computers and Composition Ser. Cresskill, NJ:
Hampton Press, 2005.
Kittler, Friedrich. Discourse Networks, 1800/1900. Trans. Michael Metteer. Palo
Alto, CA: Stanford UP, 1990.
Liestol, Gunnar, Andrew Morrison and Terje Rasmussen, eds. Digital Media
Revisited: Theoretical and Conceptual Innovations in Digital Domains. Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press, 2004.
Lanham, Richard. The Electronic Word: Democracy, Technology, and the Arts.
Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1995.
Manovich, Lev. The Language of New Media. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002.
Mitchell, W.J.T. Picture Theory: Essays on Verbal and Visual Representation.
Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1995.
*—. What Do Pictures Want? : The Lives and Loves of Images.
Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 2005.
Norman, Donald. The Invisible Computer: Why Good Products Can Fail, the Personal
Computer Is So Complex, and Information Appliances Are the Solution. Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press, 1999.
Taylor, Mark and Esa Saarinen. Imagologies: Media Philosophy. New York: Routledge, 1994.
Tufte, Edward. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. 2nd Ed.
Cheshire, CT: Graphics Press, 2001.
I don’t know who the heck your 690 instructor thinks s/he is, making you read all of that in a semester! When does s/he expect you to sleep?
Just two classes (and teaching one), so I’ll have time for mid-morning and mid-afternoon naps all semester (except for Wednesday mornings). And with just five classes left (ever?), I’d rather think of it as a bonus load (for which I should be grateful): Free, 50% more at the same low price.
“Sidewalk by Mitchell Duneier”
Huh. I taught this a few years ago for an upper division undergrad writing course. Nice little book. It does offer (more implict than explicit) instructions for ethnography/interview-based research.
Nice 690 list. I don’t know that adding to it would accomplish much, you have much ground already covered. If anything, I’d drop Illuminations, and replace it w/Arcades b/c the second is more visual in attitude.
I’ve been meaning to get a copy of Arcades, so I’ll probably try to do that and fit something from it into the current list (’round the same time as Illuminations, even if only a quick read-through of bits and pieces from it.
Are you supposed to READ this stuff in one semester? EeeGads. Wish some of your profs were being coached by me: I recommend short reading lists with lots of checking to make students are keeping up with the reading.
Well, uh, I just don’t know how coachable they are, to be honest. But their email addresses are full-well available online. You should probably know that I’m primarily responsible for devising and proposing the 690 reading list, compiling it largely out of my own sense of what I want/need to read (with proper credit to the professor for suggestions, bits of guidance and so on). One problem with a short reading list is that it’s, well, short. And, quite frankly, with just one year of coursework remaining, I’m much better off reading as much as possible. Figure it’ll make the projects later on more manageable.
I think lots of reading is pretty common for rhetoric & composition Ph.D. programs. I’ve seen online syllabi for courses at other schools (i.e., not SU) that had pretty long reading lists (a book per week, for instance). I’d be curious to hear what some of your readers from other schools would have to say about Academic Coach’s comment. What’s a typical length for a reading list in their rhet/comp courses?
By the way, I’m interested in the Ahmed book, Derek, and took it out of our library. Don’t know if I’ll get to reading it (got that dissertation hanging over my head and all…), but I’ll be looking forward to seeing your posts about it…
By “our library” I mean Tunghai’s, of course. (Must be my “Chinese” tendency to speak of “we” rather than “I”… 😉 )
Thanks for letting me know about your interest in Ahmed, Jon. I will try to post a few thoughts when we get to it. I think the first chapter of Strange Encounters is in the recent collection of readings used for WRT105, Critical Encounters with Texts.
As for readings lists, I can only say that a book per week is just about right, and maybe just a bit less than that (8-10 books plus articles, let’s say) is average in the courses I’ve had at SU. There’ve been exceptions, but those courses generally ask for a different kind of reading.