Course Readings & Registration Deadlines
MCS 164 B01 * UC Riverside * Summer 2017
Weekly Breakdown of Course Readings and Themes
July 31 — Introductory concepts and key words: What is social about social media? Internet; big data; Web 2.0; Web 3.0; social facts; social action; social relations; community
Read in class: Selections from FUCHS: Social Media: A Critical Introduction, Chp 1- What is a Critical Introduction to Social Media? What are Social Media and Big Data?
SCREENING, Digital Nation: Life in the Virtual Frontier (2010) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/digitalnation/view/
Aug 2 — The Constructions of the Everyday and Questioning the Concept of Technology
FUCHS: Social Media: A Critical Introduction, Chp 2 — What are Social Media and Big Data? and Chp 3 –Social Media as Participatory Culture
SCREENING: Terms and Conditions May Apply (2014)
AUG 4 — FINAL DAY TO DROP on GROWL with 100% refund and NO GRADE
Aug 7 — Political Economies of Sociotechnical Infrastructures
FUCHS: Social Media: A Critical Introduction, Chp 4 — Social Media and Communication Power and Chp 5 — The Power and Political Economy of Social Media
SCREENING: Foxconn documentary (CBS Morning News) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKnx2JWfNSM (10 min) and Blood Coltan https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=in0A8SFL3XM (55 min) or Blood in the Mobile (2013)
AUG 8: FINAL DAY TO WITHDRAW with ENROLLMENT ADJUSTMENT FORM with “W” grade, no refund, no filing fee.
AUG 8: FINAL DAY TO CHANGE GRADING BASIS with ENROLLMENT ADJUSTMENT FORM and no filling fee.
Aug 9 — Foundational Asymmetries of Sociotechnical Infrastructures
McPherson, Tara. “Why Are the Digital Humanities So White? or Thinking the Histories of Race and Computation.” Debates in the Digital Humanities (2012): 139–60.
Winner, Langdon. “Do Artifacts Have Politics?.” Daedalus (1980): 121–136.
SCREENING: #chicagogirl (2015)
Aug 14 –
Haraway, Donna. “A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late 20th Century.” In The Cybercultures Reader. David Bell and Barbara M Kennedy, eds. London: Routledge, 2000. pp. 291–324.
Nakamura, Lisa http://culturedigitally.org/2013/12/glitch-racism-networks-as-actors-within-vernacular-internet-theory/
Thurlow, Crispin, and Kristine Mroczek. “Introduction: Fresh Perspectives on New Media Sociolinguistics,” Digital discourse: Language in the new media. London: Oxford University Press, 2011. Pp. xix-xliv.
SCREENING: CodeGirl (2015)
Aug 16 –
FUCHS: Social Media: A Critical Introduction,
Chp 8 — Twitter and Democracy: A New Public Sphere?
AUG 18 — FINAL DAY TO WITHDRAW with ENROLLMENT ADJUSTMENT FORM, “W” grade, no refund, $4 filing fee.
Aug 21 — Sociotechnical Intimacies: (Same-sex) Desiring on digital platforms
Castañeda, Jan Gabriel Melendrez. “Grindring the Self: Young Filipino Gay Men’s Exploration of Sexual Identity Through a Geo-Social Networking Application.” Philippine Journal of Psychology. 48, no. 1 (2015): 29–58.
Gershon, Ilana. “Breaking-Up is Hard To Do: Media Switching and Media Ideologies,” Journal of Linguistic Anthropology. Vol 20, №2: 389–405.
Ong, Jonathan Corpus. “Typhoon Grindr: Love, Liberation, and Post-disaster Sex in the Philippines.” IRIN Asia. 8 September 2015. http://www.irinnews.org/report/101968/typhoon-grindr-love-liberation-and-post-disaster-sex-in-the-philippines.
Raj. Senthorun, “Grindring Bodies: Racial and Affective Economies of Online Queer Desire”. In: Critical Race and Whiteness Studies. Volume 7.2, 2011: 1–12.
SCREENING: The Secret World of Tinder (2015) https://vimeo.com/128158320
Aug 23 –
FUCHS: Social Media: A Critical Introduction, Chp 10 — Airbnb and Uber: The Political Economy of Online Sharing Platforms
AUG 25 — FINAL DAY TO CHANGE GRADING BASIS with ENROLLMENT ADJUSTMENT FORM and $4 filing fee.
Aug 28 — [UPDATED 20 Aug 2017] Fake News and Post Facts: Terms for Problematic Information.
Reminder: COMPLETE YOUR iEVAL at http:/ieval.ucr.edu
READ: Data & Society Report on Propaganda, Misinformation, and Disinformation.
Aug 30 –Sociotechnical Horizons
FUCHS: Social Media: A Critical Introduction, Chp 12-Conclusion Pp. 339–356.
Tsing, Anna Lowenhaupt. “Arts of Noticing,” The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins. Princeton University Press, 2015. Pp. 17–25.
