During our unit on software, we will be reading about different approaches to analyzing new media objects at the level of code and computation. In groups, you will testing out these approaches and analyzing computational objects. The objects we will be analyzing are:
Reagan Library, a work of electronic literature by Stuart Moulthrop
Taroko Gorge, a poetry generator by Nick Montfort
ELIZA, a version of the famous ELIZA chatbot created by Michael Wallace
Each of these objects is written in Javascript, but you do not need to be an expert in Javascript to conduct an analysis of them. As you examine the code, you might find the W3Schools documentation on Javascript useful. Each group will be assigned one of these objects and will be tasked with doing three things:
1) Providing a detailed explanation of how the program works. This explanation should be accessible to non-programmers, but it can and should contain snippets of code along with explanations of that code. The key here is to provide a detailed account of how the software is doing what it is doing.
2) Providing an interpretation of the object's use of computational processes using some of the theories and approaches we are examining in class (including, but not limited to, concepts such as expressive processing, procedural rhetoric, invisible code, etc.)
3) Create a "remix" of your assigned work.
The first two tasks will be completed as part of a collaboratively authored paper, but the third will most likely take the form of a web page. In class, we will discuss some ways of approaching the remix portion of the assignment.
You will share your papers with me and classmates using Dropbox, but you can use Google Documents to collaboratively author those papers. In addition, you will have the opportunity to present your work in class. This presentation will be a somewhat informal one, in which you will walk us through how your object works and how you've chosen to remix it.
When responding to these projects, here are the questions I'll be asking:
- Have you provided an accessible and accurate account of how this object works
- Does your interpretation of the work link computational mechanism to surface effects, explaining how computation is being used as an express and/or rhetorical medium?
- Does your remix transform the work, taking the existing data and processes in a new direction to make new arguments and express new ideas?
- Is your paper clearly written and generally free of grammatical errors?
- Does the project show evidence that the group has effectively collaborated on both the paper and the remix?
