Digital Media Culture

(3 Credit Hours) · Undergraduate

RE - Rome: This course provides students with a number of theoretical approaches to critically assess how digital media function and their expanding and expansive role in contemporary culture. The course further investigates digital media convergence in order to develop a critical lexicon that can both chart its development and engage in intellectual interventions in its use within the transformations occurring in more traditional cultural forms such as television, film, popular music, print, and radio. Special emphasis will be placed on the specific cultural, political, economic, and social issues raised by digital media forms. IR / UCD: Dublin, Ireland: Digital media cultures wield an enormous influence on 21st-century life. This module equips students with the theoretical means to evaluate the role of digital media within contemporary culture and understand its history. Students will engage with a variety of perspectives on digital media. They will look beyond pervasive discursive constructions of digital utopianism and critique the infrastructures and institutions that shape the use and creation of digital media content. The module will adopt a non-Eurocentric approach to addressing some critical debates in contemporary lives, including access and representation, inequalities, and transnational communities and diasporas. Students will engage with the main discussions around the role and impact of global media players, including the tech companies, on digital economies and futures. Throughout, students will investigate and critically reflect on how class, race, place, and gender shape contemporary digital culture.