Being the English-Studies type of guy that I am, I've always got my radar on looking for examples of cultural discourse about All Things Book, especially stuff about books as material objects or artifacts (cuz, you know, that's kind of my thing). So imagine my delight when I caught these back-to-back stories on NPR's All Things Considered:
>>: A Prayer Book's Secret: Archimedes Lies Beneath. A harrowing tale of the Archimedes Palimpsest, an ancient codex of the famous Greek mathemetician hiding underneath a 13th century prayer book, uncovered with the help of a particle accelerator.
>>: Kerouac's 'On the Road' Manuscript Unfurled. The original typescript of Kerouac's masterwork is being published for the first time, and it's a good bit different, textually speaking, from the edited editions modern-day beatniks have come to know and love. I'm a little disappointed, however, that it'll be in a boring old book format and not an homage to the original typescript: a 120-foot scroll of taped-together typing paper.
So here's my belated DMAC post, a little over a month after its conclusion. First off, a mini-blogroll from participants that kept a decent public record of the goings-on:
>>: m2h blogging (shouts to Mary)
>>: KSU TechBlog (shouts to Laura)
I was pleased with my panel's presentation on the whole--we gave participants different perspectives on how to incorporate rhetorical theory/analytics in a digital media curriculum more effectively. Lisa Ann Robertson discussed how she applies classical rhetorical theory (mainly the appeals) as a reading lens for new media texts; Susan Delagrange brought a feminist rhetorical lens to bear on Google Maps (questioning the power relations engendered in the representations of different socio-politico-geographical areas--i.e., the map bears the ideological stamp of its creators); Patricia Sullivan began to outline a new rhetorical taxonomy for digital media composing; I asked the somewhat glib question: "What can that Luddite Kenneth Burke bring to digital media studies?"--I'm still trying to answer that question myself (more on that in a later post)...
After the dust settled, I realized that some fundamental questions still persist in this field of new media/digital media/multi-modal/word+sound+image studies, not the least of which is what to call the blasted thing. Having agreed on a term, the next step, and a step that has already consumed many hours of intellectual kerosene, is to actually define the thing and be done with it (a task easier said than done, of course, given the ever-changing status of new media textuality). Otherwise, I predict that at some point, scholars in the field will begin collapsing from a condition I'd like to call "So-What-Is-New-Media-Anyway? Fatigue Syndrome." Finally, a recent conversation with a nameless colleague brought to light a very important political point: those of us in the field can be a tad, shall we say, insular, which results in a kind of groupthink wherein we take as a first principle that our existence has already been justified to the discipline at large (it hasn't)? Those fundamental questions that many of us feel have already been settled and internalized--Why teach multi-modal composing in an English class? What does any of this have to do with writing?--are not self-evident to those outside of the Reality Distortion Field. I say this is a healthy skepticism that needs to be engaged--we should be doing a better job of making our case.
My suspicion is that in a lot of institutions currently, our presence is welcome because we bring technology monies into the department and give it the luster of innovation; surely in order to genuinely thrive as a field we should shore up our bona fides. Fo' real.
But enough of that. If you'll excuse me, I'm off to the Columbus Jazz 'N' Ribs Fest to catch the Mingus Big Band.
For those of you wondering, "Just what in tarnation is this 'Net Neutrality' thingamabob?":
