Academic Catalog

HUMN 8: EX MACHINA: THE PARADOX OF BEING HUMAN IN THE DIGITAL AGE

Foothill College Course Outline of Record

Foothill College Course Outline of Record
Heading Value
Effective Term: Summer 2024
Units: 4
Hours: 4 lecture per week (48 total per quarter)
Advisory: Demonstrated proficiency in English by placement via multiple measures OR through an equivalent placement process OR completion of ESLL 125 & ESLL 249; not open to students with credit in HUMN 58.
Degree & Credit Status: Degree-Applicable Credit Course
Foothill GE: Area I: Humanities
Transferable: CSU/UC
Grade Type: Letter Grade (Request for Pass/No Pass)
Repeatability: Not Repeatable

Student Learning Outcomes

  • Synthesize critical thinking, imaginative, cooperative and empathetic abilities as whole persons in order to contextualize knowledge and make meaning.
  • Students will be able to critically analyze the impact of digital technologies through cultural, artistic, and sociological lenses on the human condition.
  • Students will comprehend and be able to explain the intersection of technology and humanities.

Description

An inquiry into reality and human culture as a co-construct between technology and art. Through the study of film, video games, and other cultural products, the course traces how social media and artificial intelligence challenge our understanding of what it means to be human and how social engagement in the digital age is altered by the acceleration of time and the collapse of space.

Course Objectives

The student will be able to:

  1. Engage critically with key concepts and issues in digital humanities
  2. Apply critical approaches to the analysis of the impact of digital technologies from cultural, artistic, and social perspectives
  3. Discover the intersections of humanities, arts, cultural production, and digital technologies
  4. Explain the convergence of technology and humanities
  5. Analyze critically the relationship between humanities and new digital technologies
  6. Analyze critically the trends in socio-cultural communication and society
  7. Develop the habit of learning and responding to new ideas and challenges in the digital age
  8. Evaluate the benefits and potential loss to humanity due to emerging digital technologies
  9. Enhance critical and creative thinking, oral and written communication through critical engagement

Course Content

  1. The impact of digital technologies on humanity
    1. Digital technologies and time-space continuum
    2. Digital technologies and privacy
    3. Digital technologies and ethics
    4. Digital technologies and social engagement
  2. Arts and culture in the digital age
    1. Cinema
    2. Digital arts
    3. Videogaming
    4. Advertising
    5. Social media
  3. Social, political, and ethical conditions in the digital age
    1. Cyber activism (social media)
    2. Education
    3. Morality and ethics
    4. Humanistic communications
    5. Civil (human) rights
    6. Women
    7. Sexuality
    8. Globalization
    9. Socio-economic systems

Lab Content

Not applicable.

Special Facilities and/or Equipment

When taught as an online distance learning section, students and faculty need ongoing and continuous internet and email access.

Method(s) of Evaluation

Methods of Evaluation may include but are not limited to the following:

Essay midterm and final
Evaluation of contributions to class discussions
Presentations
Formal essay

Method(s) of Instruction

Methods of Instruction may include but are not limited to the following:

Lecture
Discussion
Oral presentations
Extensive writing and analysis

Representative Text(s) and Other Materials

Gold, Matthew K., and Lauren F. Klein (eds.). Debates in the Digital Humanities. 2023.

Feenberg, Andrew. Technosystem: The Social Life of Reason. 2017.

Gardiner, Eileen, and Ronald Musto. The Digital Humanities: A Primer for Students and Scholars. 2015.

Turkle, Sherry. Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other. 2017.

Wu, Tim. The Attention Merchants: The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads. 2017.

Types and/or Examples of Required Reading, Writing, and Outside of Class Assignments

  1. Weekly assigned readings from 5-50 pages drawn from both primary and secondary sources
  2. Brief philosophical and literary critical readings designed to familiarize students with ongoing debates in the field of digital humanities
  3. Bi-weekly one- to two-page essays requiring summary, interpretation, analysis, and synthesis of both original art works and secondary texts

Discipline(s)

Humanities