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	Technology Zones Film Studies 190DT Fall 2003 Professor Lisa Parks Office: 1806 Ellison Hall Phone: 893-5547 Office Hours: R 12-1 & 4-5 & by appointment Course Meets: TR 1-3:50 pm Ellison 1714 Download Printable Syllabus Course Description This interdisciplinary course combines approaches from global studies, cultural geography, media studies, and science and technology studies to consider the historical emergence of computer and satellite industries in California, and to establish their relation to the global economy, screen studies and cultures of everyday life. The seminar focuses on specific technology zones including the Silicon Valley, the US/Mexico border and the Satellite Coast and considers their economic, cultural, and spatial organization and their relevance to concepts such as global security, nationalism, information, cyberspace, militarization, territorialization, espionage, freedom, and privacy. We will also view fictional and documentary films and other media that relate to our study of these technology zones. Course Requirements Term Paper (35%) A 8-10 page critical analysis paper will be due on Tues Dec 2. You will be asked to analyze the representation of technology in a film, television program or website of your choice. I encourage you to consult with me as you develop ideas for your papers. The paper will be due on Tues Dec 2. Participation (20%) Since this is a seminar, your contributions to our class discussions are essential. Your participation will impact directly what you and other students gain from this course. You are expected to engage closely with course readings and screenings, and you should take detailed notes on both. Each student will be responsible for helping to lead class discussion at least once. When you come to class, be prepared to participate actively in discussion. Attendance is mandatory and unexcused absences will adversely affect your participation grade. You will need to turn in a 1-2 page reading report each Thursday. Midterm Exam (25%) There will be a take home midterm exam due on Thursday Nov 6th based on readings, screenings and discussion. Group Project (20%) You will work with other students on a project that involves making an onsite visit to a technology zone in California. This will be a place of your choice. You should discuss the appropriate site with others in your group and be sure that each member of your group can visit the site. On Tues Nov 22 the members of your group must deliver an audiovisual presentation of your visit that can include photographs, maps, video footage, drawings, written descriptions, and/or websites. Screenings You are required to attend and take notes during all screenings. Lab Fee There is a required $16 lab fee to take this course. It is paid at the beginning of the quarter and covers all film course you take this quarter. Fee cards will be handed out the first week of classes. If you were not present when the cards were handed out, pick one up in the Film Studies office, Ellison 1720. Instructions for paying the fee at the Cashier’s Office are printed on the card. Please pay as soon as possible. If the fee is not paid by the drop deadline you will be subject to multiple fee charges. Required Texts Kotkin, Joel. The New Geography: How the Digital Revolution is Reshaping the American Landscape. New York: Random House, 2001. Available at the University bookstore. Course Reader available at Grafikarts in Isla VistaCourse Schedule R = Reader Part I Conceptual Zones -- Social and Cultural Approaches to the Study of Technology Week 1 T 9/23 Course Introduction R 9/25 Cold War Archaeology Dr. Strangelove R: Vanderbilt Week 2 Computers, Satellites and Security T 9/30 Spy Watch R 10/2 R: Menser & Aronowitz; Castells; Berland; Parks1 Week 3 Places, Interfaces & Information T 10/7 Websurfing Assignment R 10/9 Kotkin Book; R: Johnson; Brown & Duguid Week 4 Technology, Culture and Globalization T 10/14 Tribulation 99; Perfumed Nightmare R 10/16 R: Appadurai; Sassen; Lovink; Sandoval Part II Geographic/Ethnographic Zones Week 5 US Mexico Border T 10/21 Maquila: A Tale of Two Mexicos; Performing the Border R 10/23 Paredes; Gomez-Pena Week 6 Silicon Valley T 10/28 Secrets of Silicon Valley R 10/30 English-Lueck; Nakumura; Sandoval; Ross Week 7 Satellite Coast T 11/4 Visit to Vandenberg Air Force Base R 11/6 Redfield; Lykke & Bryld; Dean; Virilio Take Home Midterm Due Week 8 T 11/11 Holiday R 11/13 Group Project Meetings Week 9 Electronics/Computer Salvage Yards T 11/18 Exporting Harm; Junkyard Wars R 11/20 R: Parks2; Baudrillard & TBA Week 10 T 11/25 Group Presentations R 11/27 Thanksgiving Holiday Week 11 T 12/2 Term Paper Due Sample Sites for Group Project Lockheed Martin Center for Land Use and Interpretation Museum of Jurassic Technology Electronics or Computer Salvage Yards Mobile Homes on the Rincon Coast w/ Satellite Dishes Tomorrowland at Disneyland Studio of Artists who work with Technology LO/TEK Exhibition at UCSB Raytheon Corp Hewlett Packard LAX Airport Edwards Air Force Base Jet Propulsion Lab, NASA Ames Research Center, NASA Course Reader Appadurai, Arjun. “Grassroots Globalization and the Research Imagination.” In Globalization, Appadurai, ed. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001, pp. 1-21. Baudrillard, Jean. “Astral America.” In America, London: Verso, 1988, pp. 27-73. Berland, Jody. “Mapping Space: Imaging Technologies and the Planetary Body.” In Technoscience and Cyberculture, Stanley Aronowitz, et al, eds. New York: Routledge, 1996, pp. 123-137. Bryld, Mette and Nina Lykke. “The Big Mission.” In Cosmodolphins, London: Zed Books, 2000, pp. 72-91. Castells, Manuel. “The Network is the Message” and “Lessons From the History of the Internet. In The Internet Galaxy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. 1-35. Dean, Jodi. “Space Programs.” In Aliens in America. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998, pp. 62-97. English-Lueck. “A Technological Place: Culture Version I.X.” In cultures@siliconvalley, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002, pp. 1-44. Gomez-Pena, Guillermo. “The Virtual Barrio @ The Other Frontier.” In Electronic Media and Technoculture, John Caldwell, ed. New Brunswick: Rutgers, 2000, pp. 295-308. Johnson, Steven. “Electric Speed” and “Bitmapping.” In Interface Culture. New York: Basic Books, 1997, pp. 1-41. Lovink, Geert, “Net.Times, Not Swatch Time” and “Fragments of Network Criticism.” In Dark Fiber: Tracking Critical Internet Culture, Cambridge: MIT Press. 2002, pp. 142-175. Menser, Michael and Stanley Aronowitz. “On Cultural Studies, Science and Technology.” In Technoscience and Cyberculture, Stanley Aronowitz, et al, eds. New York: Routledge, 1996, pp. 7-28. Nakamura, Lisa, “Where Do You Want to Go Today? Cybernetic Tourism, the Internet and Transnationality.” In Cybertypes: Race, Ethnicity and Identity on the Internet. New York & London: Routledge, 2002, pp. 87-99. Paredes, Mari Castaneda. “Television Set Production at the US-Mexico Border.” In Critical Cultural Policy Studies. Justin Lewis and Toby Miller, eds, Blackwell, 2002, pp. 272-281. Parks, Lisa. “Satellite and Cyber Visualities: Analyzing ‘Digital Earth.’” In The Visual Culture Reader, 2.0, Nicholas Mirzoeff, ed. London: Routledge, 2002, pp. 279-292. _____. “Kinetic Screens: Epistemologies of Movement at the Interface.” In Media/Space, Nick Couldry and Anna McCarthy, eds. London: Routledge, 2003, pp. 37-57. Redfield, Peter. “Modern Sky” and “A Gate to the Heavens.” In Space in the Tropics. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000, pp. 111-148. Ross, Andrew. “Hacking Away at the Counterculture.” In Technoculture, Ross and Penley, eds. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1991, pp. 107-134. Sandoval, Chela. “Cyborg Feminism and the Methodology of the Oppressed.” In The Cyborg Handbook, Chris Hables Gray, ed. New York: Routledge, 1995, pp. 407-420. Sassen, Saskia. “Spatialities and Temporalities of the Global.” In Globalization, Appadurai, ed. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001, pp. 260-278. Seely, Brown John and Paul Duguid. “Limits to Information.” In The Social Life of Information. Boston: Harvard Business School Press, pp. 11-33, 2002. Vanderbilt, Tom. “Looking for Dr. Strangelove” and “Dead City.” In Survival City: Adventures Among the Ruins of Atomic America. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2002, pp. 7-67. Virilio, Paul. “Desert Screen.” In The Virilio Reader, James Der Derrian, ed. Malden: Blackwell, 1998, 166-182.