COML 4861 - [Genres, Platforms, Media]

(crosslisted) PMA 4861
(CA-AS, GLC-AS)

Spring. Not offered: 2021-2022. Next offered: 2022-2023. 3 credits. Student option grading.

Co-meets with COML 6861/PMA 6461.

J. Monroe.

How do questions of genre persist and evolve in the digital age? To what extent do we choose our genres, and in what ways do they choose us? How do genres, platforms, and media intersect and inform one another? What hierarchies do they establish, and to what purposes? What are the implications of such questions for what Jacques Ranciere has called the “distribution of the sensible,” for democratic consensus and dissensus? Moving among websites, social media, and streaming services, from Poetry Foundation and PennSound to podcasts and serial TV, from FaceBook and Twitter to Instagram and YouTube, from Netflix and Amazon to Roku and Hulu, this course will explore the accelerating interplay of genres, platforms, and media and their impact in contemporary culture and politics.