This outline is pretty rough. The exact topics covered will depend
on student interest.
| Week | Topics and Themes |
| 1 | Introduction: Discussion of class goals and
expectations. Initial internet explorations and meanderings.
Preliminary discussion of online "communities". |
| 2 | Background -- History: "History" of information technology. Printing press, radio, telephone, tv, etc. |
| 3 | Background -- History and Sociology of Technology: Different ways of thinking about technology. Technological determinism vs. social construction vs. ??? . |
| 4 | Background -- Political Economy: Who owns the media, and why is this an important question? History of public broadcasting in the U.S. |
| 5 -- 7 | Internet Culture: Online identity. Gender online. Class and the internet. |
| 8 -- 9 | Intellectual Property and the Open Source Movement. |
| 10 | Conclusion: ??? |
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