Digital Technology and Culture

A blog for students and friends of Washington State University Vancouver's Digital Technology and Culture Program

Philosophy underlying the DTC

Those of you taking my DTC 375 "Language, Texts, and Technology" course this semester have already seen this. But others in the DTC Program have not. But posted below are seven points that make up the philosophy underlying the DTC Program––and, I would add, most digital media programs that focus on the production of media objects. I have put this list together from various readings in the field. So, each point is linked to a specific source.

What has drawn me to this exploration was the need to understand how the DTC Program was different from other disciplines, particularly those in the Humanities. As some of you know, I spent 12 years on faculty at a university in Texas, working in an English department and teaching a few courses for the Women's Studies Program (feminist cyberculture, feminist theories). I was struck by the differences in approach toward and views of technology and wondered what was driving these differences. Two years in a post doc program in the media arts helped me understand more deeply the basic tenets of digital media. Synthesizing this information, I came to these points:

1. A computer is not a tool or prosthesis that helps us to accomplish something; rather, it is the medium in which we work. (Oliver Grau, MediaArtHistories, 2007 )

2. The medium affects the message. (Marshall McLuhan, The Medium Is the Massage, 1967)

3. Text is any form of information by which we communicate an idea, feeling, or concept. (Mats Dahlstrom, “When Is a Text Text?,” 2002 )

4. Digital media are material texts. (N. Katherine Hayles, Writing Machines, 2002)

5. Criticism of digital media should be specific to digital media and relies on the sensory modalities of the body for that critique rather than abstract ideas or theories. (N. Katherine Hayles, Writing Machines, 2002)

6. The artifact of new media is just as important as the process it took to produce it. (Jan Van Looy & Jan Baetens, Close Reading New Media, 2003)

7. New media involves an interdisciplinary/transdisciplinary study of art, science, and technology (Edward Shanken, "Introduction to Telematic Embrace", 2003 )––and, I would add here, the Humanities.



In devising this list, I am not saying that others are wrong in their approach to their field. Rather, I am simply trying to make sense of the differences. As students an interdisciplinary program like the DTC, it is important for you guys to understand that each discipline, each program, has its own way of seeing the world, of doing things, like criticism and research. And in knowing these differences you can get a better sense of how you fit into the academic environment you find yourselves currently in as well as will fit into your own field one day.

posted by: grigar at 16:24 | link | comments |

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