Schedule stuff

[skygiants]

So currently the plan is to take three five-unit courses next quarter. This gives me fifteen units - the average number per quarter required to get you to graduation; minimum per quarter is 12, max 20 - and very busy Monday-Wednesdays, but absolutely no classes on Tuesday and Thursday and only one class on Friday. Tuesday and Thursday afternoons I work.

It's a perfectly reasonable and productive schedule; I'm taking one class for my major, one for my minor and one for my own purposes, and fifteen is, as said above, the average number of units people take, but I'm used to taking at least four classes per quarter and feeling a little guiltily idle. Especially considering the two-days-a-week-off thing.

This morning, I got an e-mail about this class:

New Media Writing: Storytelling by Any Means Necessary
Instructors: Tom Kealey and Adam Johnson
English 96, Winter Quarter, Tuesdays 6:15-9:05

This class is a hands-on exploration of how the Internet is impacting creative writers. Students will actively post to the New Media Wiki and Blog and will explore their own interests and present to the class. The class will focus on Oral History, Hypertext, The Graphic Novel, Gaming as Literature, and Fan Fiction.

It's five units (which brings me up to the max of 20), it fits beautifully into my schedule without depriving me of my lovely lazy Tuesday-Thursday mornings, and it sounds like a lot of fun. However, I've heard dubious things about classes at other schools that study internet writing and fanfiction - namely, that they tend to take a very patronizing tone, which would be a little awkward to sit through, considering. If anybody has information on this kind of class, I'd appreciate it.

Comments

[darthrami.livejournal.com]

Gaming as literature? Hello. I don't know, it's possible it would suck, but that would definitely intrigue me.

[skygiants]

Oh, I'm definitely intrigued. At the very least I'm going to the first section to see what it's all about. :D

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

Here's the thing, as I see it:

Pop culture studies, as they stand today, are often patronizing, oversimplified, or overly self-justifying. The only real way to fix those problems, though, is for people who care about the intellectual viability of pop culture studies to jump in and take or teach these courses. I'd think that you, as a new media writer (by that definition, we all are new media writers!) concerned with literature as a field of study, really ought to take that class and fight for intellectual rigor. Go for it.

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

Also, I was curious and googling. You might be interested in this (http://www.thepublishingspot.com/2006/04/five_easy_questions_tom_kealey_1.html).

[skygiants]

*reads*


Oooh. That is interesting, and making me feel more confident about the class.

I'd think that you, as a new media writer (by that definition, we all are new media writers!) concerned with literature as a field of study, really ought to take that class and fight for intellectual rigor.

*giggles* This makes me feel positively noble about taking it. But you're right, definitely; even if the viewpoint of the professor doesn't turn out to be one that I agree with, it's important to have an opposing viewpoint in the class.

[sdelmonte]

I am not a new media writer! I do all my Milliways stuff using quills and ink! :)

[skygiants]

I use a typewriter and then magic to make it appear on the screen, myself. >.>

[shati.livejournal.com]

It sounds nifty, though!

*is a jealous giant snake*

[skygiants]

It does! I am getting more excited the more I hear about it.

*placates you with seam ripping*

[schiarire.livejournal.com]

From now on, that's how I'm going to think of myself -- not as an Internet addict, but as a new media writer. *adopts lofty tone*

[skygiants]

It's like referring to sci-fi/fantasy as "speculative fiction!"

[shati.livejournal.com]

I'm a new media speculative fiction writer. *rips seams*

[vivien]

WOW, what a cool class. They didn't have cool classes like that in my day. *grumbles*

[skygiants]

*giggles* We also have a two-unit Harry Potter class, but it's not very well-organized - they give you a form to fill out to enter, and then do not tell you who to give it to!