Electronic Literature (DTC 338, Special Topics)

Electronic Literature is an emergent form of born-digital, experimental writing as well as an academic field with a global community of scholars and artists that support, promote, preserve and write critically about creative works. This course is a survey of the field’s evolution from floppy disks to VR and is broken into thematic modules – such as “hypertext”, “interactive games” and “recombinant poetics” – that frame certain practices of computer-writing. For each module, students will read relevant essays and creative works, as well as explore tools and practices for creative expression.

The course is designed for students to find thematic threads that excite them to creative scholarly responses. While this is not a “production” course, it is important for students to understand certain ideas through hands-on making. Students will receive training in the close-reading and analysis of works of electronic literature, as well as technical training in digital writing tools. Students will practice different forms of digital writing – blogging, experimental and collaborative fiction, multimodal and hypertext essays – that will develop critical thinking, reading, and writing skills. Shorts assignments will lead to a final digital writing project and oral presentation that explores works and/or themes in the course.