Big data and digital methods, such as changes in social media privacy laws and advances in mapping and network analysis, are changing financial markets, political campaigning, and higher education while becoming commonplace in our lives. Our daily existence is increasingly structured by code and data, from the algorithms that time our traffic lights to those that filter our search criteria and record our thoughts and ideas. This course explores the possibilities, limitations, and implications of using digital tools and methods to understand the issues that affect our everyday lives. We will critically collect, analyze, portray, and use data, in order to answer the following questions: What does big data reveal to us about the world? What does it hide? How do American policies and values influence the global production of the Internet, social media, algorithms, and data? Students will learn a range of data visualization tools to apply a critical lens for understanding and evaluating what technology can and cannot bring to the study of American life, and will share that knowledge publicly as a project of public humanities. Topics such as gender, race, sexuality, class, privacy, war, and governance will be highlighted through in-class conversations and research projects.
TEXTS REQUIRED:
- Yau, Nathan. 2013. Data Points: Visualization That Means Something. Hoboken: Wiley.
- All other readings will be provided in the course packet or as handouts (Seabury T-403).
TEXTS OPTIONAL:
- Brunton, Finn, and Helen Nissenbaum. 2015. Obfuscation: A User’s Guide for Privacy and Protest. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
- Hu, Tung-Hui. 2015. A Prehistory of the Cloud. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
TENTATIVE COURSE SCHEDULE
I :: Critical Data Studies through the Social Data Sciences and Digital Humanities
Mon. 1/23 Introduction to the course
☐ neveragain. 2016. “neveragain.tech.” neveragain.tech. December. http://neveragain.tech/.
☐ boyd, danah. 2017. “Hacking the Attention Economy.” Data & Society: Points. January 5. https://points.datasociety.net/hacking-the-attention-economy-9fa1daca7a37#.5d2jgczd1.
Wed. 1/25 Readings:
☐ Pentland, Alex. 2013. “The Data-Driven Society.” Scientific American 309 (4) (Oct 1): 78–83.
☐ McPherson, Tara. 2009. “Introduction: Media Studies and the Digital Humanities.” Cinema Journal 48 (2): 119–23.
☐ Johnson, Jeffrey Alan. 2014. “From Open Data to Information Justice.” Ethics and Information Technology 16 (4): 263–74.
Mon. 1/30 Readings:
Conversation with reference librarian Erin Valentino and archivist Rick Ring.
☐ Klein, Lauren F. 2013. “The Image of Absence: Archival Silence, Data Visualization, and James Hemings.” American Literature 85 (4): 661–88.
☐ Greene, Daniel. 2016. “Discovering the Divide: Technology and Poverty in the New Economy.” International Journal of Communication 10 (0): 20.
☐ Yau, Nathan. 2013. “Understanding Data.” In Data Points: Visualization That Means Something, 1–42. Hoboken: Wiley.
Wed. 2/1 Lab & Readings :: Data Scraping
☐ Appadurai, Arjun. 2006. Excerpt from “The Right to Research.” Globalisation, Societies and Education 4 (2): 167-168.
☐ Marres, Noortje, and Esther Weltevrede. 2013. “Scraping the Social?” Journal of Cultural Economy 6 (3): 313–35.
☐ < ONLINE > Holmes, Harlo. 2014. Harlo Holmes: Deep Lab Lecture Series. Deep Lab Lecture Series. New York, NY: Eyebeam. https://vimeo.com/114175594.
II :: Big Data Meets Code/Space
Mon. 2/6 Readings:
☐ boyd, danah, and Kate Crawford. 2012. “Critical Questions for Big Data.” Information, Communication & Society 15 (5): 662–79.
☐ Crawford, Kate. 2013. “Think Again: Big Data.” Foreign Policy, May 9.
☐ Corsín Jiménez, Alberto. 2014. “The Right to Infrastructure: A Prototype for Open Source Urbanism.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 32 (2): 342–62.
Wed. 2/8 Readings:
☐ Gieseking, Jen Jack. 2017 (forthcoming). “Size Matters to Lesbians Too: Queer Feminist Inerventions into the Scale of Big Data.” Professional Geographer.
☐ McGlotten, Shaka. 2016. “Black Data.” In No Tea, No Shade: New Queer of Color Critique, ed. E.P. Johnson, 262-286. Durham: Duke University Press.
☐ Ashcoff, Nicole M. 2015. “The Smartphone Society.” Jacobin. March.
Mon. 2/13 Readings:
☐ Graham, Stephen D. N. 2005. “Software-Sorted Geographies.” In The People, Place and Space Reader, eds. Gieseking, Mangold, Katz, Low, Saegert, 133-138. New York: Routledge.
☐ Kurgan, Laura. 2013. “Representation and the Necessity of Interpretation,” and “Million-Dollar Blocks.” In Close Up at a Distance: Mapping, Technology, and Politics, 19–38, 186-204.
☐ Bridle, James. 2016. “Algorithmic Citizenship, Digital Statelessness.” GeoHumanities 2 (2): 377–81.
Wed. 2/15 Lab & Readings :: Graphing
☐ Yau, Nathan. 2013. “Visualization: The Medium.” In Data Points: Visualization That Means Something, 43–90. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley.
☐ Gieseking, Jen Jack. 2013. “Opaque Is Being Polite: On Algorithms, Violence, & Awesomeness in Data Visualization.” jgieseking.org. October 13.
☐ Kirk, Andy. 2012. “10 Things You Can Learn From the New York Times’ Data Visualizations.” ScribbleLive. April 2. http://www.scribblelive.com/blog/2012/04/02/10-things-you-can-learn-from-the-new-york-times-data-visualizations/.
III :: Privacy, Surveillance, & Code
Wed. 2/22 Readings:
☐ Cheney-Lippold, John. 2011. “A New Algorithmic Identity: Soft Biopolitics and the Modulation of Control.” Theory, Culture & Society 28 (6): 164–81.
☐ McPherson, Tara. 2012. “Why Are the Digital Humanities So White? Or Thinking the Histories of Race and Computation.” In Debates in the Digital Humanities, edited by Matthew K. Gold, 139–60. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
☐ Rosenblat, Alex. 2015. “Uber’s Phantom Cabs.” Motherboard. July 27. http://motherboard.vice.com/read/ubers-phantom-cabs.
Mon. 2/27 Readings:
☐ Community Informatics Community. 2013. “An Internet for the Common Good: Engagement, Empowerment, & Justice for All.” Journal of Community Informatics 9 (4).
☐ Boyle, James. 1997. “A Politics of Intellectual Property: Environmentalism for the Net?” Duke Law Journal 47: 87–116.
☐ Gehl, Robert W. 2014. “Power/Freedom on the Dark Web: A Digital Ethnography of the Dark Web Social Network.” New Media & Society, October, 1–17.
Wed. 3/1 Lab & Readings :: Mapping
☐ Tufte, Edward R. 2011. “Visual & Statistical Thinking: Displays of Evidence for Making Decisions.” In Envisioning Information, 27–54. Cheshire, CT.: Graphics Press.
☐ Yau, Nathan. 2013. “Representing Data.” In Data Points, 91–134. Hoboken: Wiley.
IV :: Design
Mon. 3/6 Mid-Term Exam
Wed. 3/8 Readings:
☐ Berners-Lee, Tim, Robert Calliau, Ari Loutonen, Henrik Frystk Nielsen, and Arthur Secret. 1994. “The World Wide Web.” Communications of the ACM 37 (8): 76–82.
☐ < ONLINE > Johnson, Steven A. 1997. “Bitmapping: An introduction.” In Interface culture: How new technology transforms the way we create and communicate. HarperOne. 11-41. http://www.units.miamioh.edu/technologyandhumanities/johnson.htm.
☐ World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). 2015. “HTML & CSS Guide.” W3C.
☐ World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). 2015. “Accessibility Guide.” W3C.
☐ < ONLINE > Code Studio. 2014. “Code with Anna and Elsa.” Code.org. https://studio.code.org/s/frozen/stage/1/puzzle/1.
Mon. 3/13 – Fr. 3/17 Spring Break: No Classes, No Readings, No Labs
Mon. 3/20 Readings:
☐ Pariser, Eli. 2012. “Introduction.” In The Filter Bubble: How the Web Is Changing What We Read & How We Think, 1–20. New York: Penguin.
☐ Nakamura, Lisa. 2011. “Race and Identity in Digital Media.” In Mass Media and Society, ed. James Curran, 5th ed., 336–47. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.
☐ Lingel, Jessa, and Adam Golub. 2015. “In Face on Facebook: Brooklyn’s Drag Community and Sociotechnical Practices of Online Communication,” Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 20 (5): 536–553.
Wed. 3/22 Readings:
☐ Gillespie, Tarleton. 2012. “Can an Algorithm Be Wrong?” Limn (2).
☐ Chess, Shira, and Adrienne Shaw. 2015. “A Conspiracy of Fishes, Or, How We Learned to Stop Worrying About #GamerGate and Embrace Hegemonic Masculinity.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 59 (1): 208–20.
☐ Gray, Mary L., and Siddharth Suri. 2017. “The Humans Working Behind the AI Curtain.” Harvard Business Review. January 9. https://hbr.org/2017/01/the-humans-working-behind-the-ai-curtain.
Fri. 3/24 Required lecture:
Melissa Wright – Jan Cohn lecture (Smith Room at 12pm)
Mon. 3/27 Lab & Readings :: Social Network Analysis
☐ Hu, Tung-Hui. 2015. “The Shape of the Network.” A Prehistory of the Cloud. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, pp. 1-36.
☐ Yau, Nathan. 2013. “Exploring Data Visually.” In Data Points, 135–200. Hoboken: Wiley.
V :: Cyborgs
Wed. 3/29 Readings:
☐ Fawcett, John. 2013. Episodes 1 – 10. Orphan Black: Season 1. TV Show. UK: BBC Home Entertainment.
Mon. 4/3 Readings:
☐ Stone, Allucquére Rosanne. 1991. “Will the Real Body Please Stand Up?” In Cyberspace: First Steps, 81–118. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
☐ Shaw, Adrienne. 2015 “The Tyranny of Realism: Historical Accuracy and Politics of Representation in Assassin’s Creed III.” Journal of Canadian Game Studies 9 (14): 4–24.
☐ Neff, Gina. 2013. “Why Big Data Won’t Cure Us.” Big Data 1 (3) (September): 117–123.
NOTE: SYLLABUS UPDATED ON 4/5
Mon. 4/10 Readings:
☐ Nakamura, Lisa. 2014. “Indigenous Circuits: Navajo Women and the Racialization of Early Electronic Manufacture.” American Quarterly 66 (4): 919–41.
☐ Gray, Mary L. 2007. “From Websites to Wal-Mart: Youth, Identity Work, and the Queering of Boundary Publics in Small Town, USA.” American Studies 48 (2): 49–59.
☐ Bivens, Rena, and Oliver L. Haimson. 2016. “Baking Gender Into Social Media Design: How Platforms Shape Categories for Users and Advertisers.” Social Media + Society 2 (4): 1-12.
Wed. 4/12 Lab & Readings :: Text Analysis
☐ Aiden, Erez, and Jean-Baptiste Michel. 2013. “Through the Looking Glass.” In Uncharted: Big Data as a Lens on Human Culture, 1–25. New York: Riverhead Books.
☐ Yau, Nathan. 2013. “Visualizing with Clarity.” In Data Points: Visualization That Means Something, 201–240. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley.
Mon. 4/17 Readings:
☐ Thakor, Mitali. 2015. “Problematising the Dominant Discourse around Children, Youth and the Internet.” Global Information Society Watch 2015: Sexual Rights and the Internet. Association for Progressive Communications: GISWatch.
☐ Wortham, Jenna. 2012. “Homeless as Wi-Fi Transmitters Creates a Stir in Austin.” The New York Times, March 12.
☐ Sterne, Jonathan. 2006. “The MP3 as Cultural Artifact.” New Media & Society 8 (5) (October 1): 825–842.
☐ <READ THIS AND CLICKTHROUGH AND READ ONE THING FROM> Johnson, Jessica Marie. 2016. “#Lemonade: A Black Feminist Resource List.” African American Intellectual Historical Society. May 12. http://www.aaihs.org/lemonade-a-black-feminist-resource-list/.
VI :: Networked
Wed. 4/19 Readings:
☐ Hu, Tung-Hui. 2015. “Introduction” and “Data Centers and Data Bunkers.” A Prehistory of the Cloud. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, pp. ix-xxix, 79-110.
☐ Mowlabocus, Sharif. 2016. “‘Y’all Need to Hide Your Kids, Hide Your Wife’: Mobile Applications, Risk and Sex Offender Databases.” New Media & Society 18 (11): 2469–84.
☐ Yu, Charles. 2010. “Standard Loneliness Package.” Lightspeed Magazine, November. http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/standard-loneliness-package/.
Mon. 4/24 Readings:
☐ Coleman, Gabriella. 2012. “Am I Anonymous?” Limn (2).
☐ Brunton, Finn, and Helen Nissenbaum. 2015. “Political & Ethical Perspectives on Data Obfuscation.” In Privacy, Due Process and the Computational Turn, eds. Hildebrandt and Vries, 164–88. New York: Routledge.
☐ Tiidenberg, Katrin, and Nancy K. Baym. 2017. “Learn It, Buy It, Work It: Intensive Pregnancy on Instagram.” Social Media + Society 3 (1): 2056305116685108.
Wed. 4/26 Lab & Readings :: Graphing the Second Dataset
☐ Yau, Nathan. 2013. “Designing for an Audience.” In Data Points: Visualization That Means Something, 241–276. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley.
☐ Jabbour, Eddie, and Julie Steele. 2010. “Mapping Information: Redesigning the New York City Subway Map.” In Beautiful Visualization, edited by J. Steele and N. Illinsky, 69–90. Beijing, China: O’Reilly.
Mon. 5/1 In-class lab & presentation prep-time
Wed. 5/2 In-class presentations
** :: CODA
Mon. 5/4 In-class lab & presentation prep-time
Wed. 5/5 In-class presentations
Tues. 5/9 Final Exam @ Noon