Technology, Literacy, and Citizenship

Fall 2002

JOUR 4871and GEOG 4702

ECON 117

Instructors

Andrew Calabrese	Lynn Staeheli
School of Journalism & Mass Communication and IBS	Department of Geography and IBS
Office: Armory 103A	Office: Guggenheim 201f
Campus Box 478	Campus Box 260
Tel: 492-5374	Tel: 492-4695
andrew.calabrese@colorado.edu	lynn.staeheli@colorado.edu
http://spot.colorado.edu/~calabres Office hours: Th. 11:15 – 1:30, or by appt.	Office hours: T, Th. 11-12, and Wed. 9:30 – 11:30.

Course Requirements: This course involves lecture and discussion sessions, critical analysis of contemporary writing on the topic, writing assignments, and a final research project. Grades will be based on the following criteria:

Four writing assignments (40%)

Final paper (45%)

Participation (15%)

Papers are due in class on the day we discuss the topic. No late papers will be accepted.

Class attendance is required.

Writing Assignments: These papers will be 3-4 double-spaced pages that use the readings and your thoughts about them to develop a position with respect to a set of issues that we identify. For example, we might ask you to compare briefly the views of two authors with respect to what literacy means. Then we might ask you to explain why you agree with one compared with the other. The papers will be graded on your use of the readings, by the quality of the argument you develop, and the quality of the writing.

You are asked to complete 4 of these writing assignments. You will see, however, that there are seven opportunities to write an essay. You are only responsible for 4 of them, but you may write 5. In the event that you write on 5 topics, we will select the 4 highest grades.

Papers are due in class the day we discuss the topic. No late papers will be accepted, and papers will not be accepted if you are not in class. The due dates for the writing assignments are:

1) Media literacy

2) Speech versus conduct

3) Intellectual property and access to information

4) Citizens versus consumers

5) Global civil society

Final Paper: The final paper will be a longer essay in which you develop an argument with respect to one element of the connections between technology, literacy, and citizenship. We will provide more information about the project later in the semester.

Readings:

Kevin Hill & John E. Hughes, Cyberpolitics: Citizen Activism in the Age of the Internet (Rowman & Littlefield, 1998).

Craig Warkentin, Reshaping World Politics: NGOs, the Internet, and Global Civil Society (Rowman & Littlefield, 2001).

Cass Sunstein, Republic.com (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002).

Additional readings will be available on the web and on reserve.

Course Description: This course addresses issues related to information and communication technologies and literacy as they affect citizenship and opportunities for participation in political and community activities. Debates over the roles that citizens can and should play in public deliberation are long-standing and of central importance to the development and maintenance of democratic institutions. This debate concerns “civic competence,” that is, the ability to participate effectively as a listener and speaker in public discourse and political practice. Drawing from research and theory about citizenship in the modern world, this course will emphasize the kinds of interventions that will enhance civic competence, focusing particularly on the increasingly important relationships between “digital literacy” and citizenship. In the context of the networked information age, it is important to investigate media and educational policies that shape civic competence, as well as the uses to which new technologies are used in political activism and practice.

This course will offer an opportunity for students to systematically examine the historical relationship between literacy and citizenship. Various accounts of how past technological changes in the means of communication have contributed to the expansion of literacy – from the introduction of writing in ancient Greece, to the codification of the Roman alphabet, to the diffusion of Gutenberg’s moveable type printing press and the rapid expansion of book publishing in the Western world – set the background for understanding an important set of contemporary debates about new forms of literacy today. “Technological literacy,” “information literacy,” “computer literacy,” “media literacy,” “visual literacy,” and “digital literacy” are a few representative terms used in today’s discussions about the reinvention of the meaning of literacy in the modern world. Whether and how such new concepts of literacy are being promoted to enhance civic competence is a matter of great concern today, not only among activists and policy makers who wish to close the “digital divide,” but also among those who share basic concerns about how new uses of communication and information technologies contributing to significant revisions in the meaning of citizenship. Students taking this course will have the chance to become engrossed in carefully examining what is at stake in these changes.

Disabilities: If you qualify for accommodations because of a disability, please submit to me a letter from Disability Services (DS) early in the semester so that your needs may be addressed. DS determines accommodations based on documented disabilities (303-492-8671, Willard 322)

Religious observance: If you have a religious obligation that conflicts with a particular date of classroom attendance, or with meeting an assignment deadline, please notify us two weeks prior to the date so that we may consider possible solutions to the conflict.

Classroom behavior: As a result of extensive discussions with and recommendations from faculty and students, a new classroom behavior policy and associated new procedures have been adopted. Please consult the policy at: (http://www.colorado.edu/policies/index.html)

Honor code: According to the university’s honor code, students must neither give nor receive unauthorized assistance on the work they do. You are responsible for knowing and adhering to this code. The honor code is available at: (http://www.colorado.edu/academics/honorcode/). Please pay particular attention to the definitions of various forms of academic dishonesty, so that you may be certain that you are not in violation of the code.

The following is a list of topics that will be covered in the course:

Literacy in Historical Perspective - Literacy and national identity - Literacy and political participation - Literacy, cultural hegemony and social control The Idea of Media Literacy - Critical consumers - Digital literacy - Critical media literacy - Critiques of the digital literacy movement The Digital Divide - NTIA Reports - UNDP Report - Analyses and commentaries - Policy interventions USA: E-rate Internationally

Citizenship and the Means of Communication - Social citizenship - Cultural citizenship - Community: Local and translocal Globalization and Media - New forms of civic engagement - The idea of a global civil society - NGOs and the Internet

Wk 1	27 Aug	Introduction
	29 Aug	Discuss Map Exercise	Map
Wk 2	3 Sept	The Idea of Electronic Democracy	Sunstein, 1-2
	5 Sept	History of Media Literacy	Graff, Part One of Legacies of Literacy, “Setting the Stage” (pp. 2-31)
Wk 3	10 Sept	Idea of Media Literacy	Lippmann, Ch. 1&2 of The Phantom Public
	12 Sept	Idea of Media Literacy	Dewey, The Public and Its Problems (excerpt)
Wk 4	17 Sept		Hobbs, “Seven Debates on Media Literacy”
	19 Sept	Paper #1	Oppenheimer, “The Computer Delusion,” The Atlantic Monthly.
Wk 5	24 Sept	Brief History of Internet	Video on history of the Internet
	26 Sept	Brief History of Internet	McChesney, “The Internet and U.S. Communication Policy-Making”
Wk 6	1 Oct	Digital Divide	NTIA, “Falling Through the Net: Toward Digital Inclusion” (summary)
	3 Oct	Digital Divide	Wilhelm, “They threw me a computer…”
Wk 7	8 Oct	Community	Galston, “(How) does the Internet affect community?” Putnam, “Strange Disappearance of Civic America”
	10 Oct	FALL BREAK
Wk 8	15 Oct	Speech v. Conduct	Video: Hate.com; Gina Smith, “Freedom of Hate Speech”
	17 Oct	Paper #2	Julian Dibbell, “A Rape in Cyberspace”
Wk 9	22 Oct	Citizenship & participation	Hill & Hughes
	24 Oct	Citizenship & participation	Hill & Hughes
Wk 10	29 Oct	Social fragmentation	Sunstein, 3
	31 Oct	Paper #3	Sunstein, 4-5
Wk 11	5 Nov	Citizenship & government	Sunstein, 6-7
	7 Nov	Paper #4	Sunstein, 8-9
Wk 12	12 Nov	Global civil society	Warkentin, 1
	14 Nov	Global civil society	Benjamin Barber, “Globalizing Democracy;” Susan George, “Democracy at the Barricades” ; see also “Genoa Photo Gallery”;
Wk 13	19 Nov	Paper #5	Warkentin, 2; Jonah Paretti, “My Nike Media Adventure”; see also: “Paretti-Nike Correspondence”
	21 Nov	Global civil society	Warkentin, 3
Wk 14	26 Nov	Global civil society	Warkentin, 4-5
	28 Nov	THANKSGIVING
Wk 15	3 Dec	Hacking	Video on hacking
	5 Dec	Hacktivism	Stephan Wray, “Virtual Luddites;” Naomi Klein, “My Mafiaboy”
Wk 16	10 Dec
	12 Dec	LAST DAY OF CLASSES