Overview
Over the semester, as you read, prepare for class and ‘consume’ media in your lives, you will develop a critical and/or creative project that engages with the issues in this class, as well as your own research and professional interests. In terms of the actual format, this should be digital, public, and interactive (within limits!). Here, a blog or a journal is the most basic format that you can start with as it implies a constant engagement with your topic, but we can come up with more interesting and experimental formats. The purpose of this assignment is twofold: first, it demands that you keep a constant level of engagement with the spirit and materials of the class through writing or producing in a critical or creative, although not necessarily academic, fashion; and, second, it encourages you, as the semester progresses to have these ideas coalesce into a more streamlined product that allows you to pursue an interest in a sustained and inventive manner. This need not be an essay, but it should be a piece of work that you would include in a ‘professional portfolio’. In terms of objects to analyze, this could include: the films from the various online film festivals that will be online this fall as well as film series at the Walker Art Center; the new 4 line-up of fall television shows that are on offer; or, the videogame industry’s advertising campaigns as they build up to the holiday season.