Materialities of Literature II

Recommended Prerequisites

Proficiency in English.

Teaching Methods

Oral presentations, lectures, analysis of experimental works (in both codex and digital media), discussions, group work, and blog and wiki writing. Regular use of digital platforms and other online resources devoted to experimental literary practices, including the directories, repositories and archives ELMCIP, ELD, NT2, UbuWeb, PennSound, NetPoetic, Po-Ex e DigLitWeb.

 This methodology may be subject to minor changes depending on the instructor and number of students registered.

Learning Outcomes

Students should be able to

a) Describe the graphic and embodied dynamics of textuality by looking at graphic surfaces and book structures;
b) Describe the signifying strategies of intermedia and kinetic texts in various genres of experimental poetry and fiction;
c) Understand permutational and generative texts as forms of algorithmic literature;
d) Understand processes of intermediation in both print-digital and human-computer interactions;
e) Describe the electronic and graphic materiality of writing in digital media, and understand the rhetoric of computational literary forms;
f) Conceive a literary work for print and/or digital media and/or performance.

Work Placement(s)

No

Syllabus

This seminar examines various materialities of literature, focusing on visuality, bookness, intermediality, kineticism, hypertextuality, and digitality. Particular attention is given to the relational dynamics of material forms and to the embodied and performative nature of reading acts.
1. Constellated texts and randomized paths in poetry and narrative.
2. Algorithmic literature and texts in motion: from OuLiPo to electronic literature.
3. Cybertext poetics and the grammatology of the computer: Hayles, Bootz, Wardrip-Fruin, Aarseth, Eskelinen, and Kirschenbaum.
4. The performative nature of reading: meaning as an emergent phenomenon.
5. Literacy in action: the social and discursive nature of writing and reading.

 

N.B. The syllabus may change in different editions of the course.

Head Lecturer(s)

Professor a Definir - Faculdade de Letras

Assessment Methods

Assessment
Oral presentation about a theoretical text: 30.0%
Research work: 35.0%
Project: 35.0%

Bibliography

Borras, Laura et al. eds. (2010). Electronic Literature Collection (volume 2). Available online at http://collection.eliterature.org/2/
Drucker, Johanna (2014). Graphesis: Visual Forms of Knowledge Production. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP.
Eskelinen, Markku (2012). Cybertext Poetics. London: Continuum.
Hayles, N. Katherine (2008). Electronic Literature: New Horizons for the Literary. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame.
Hayles, N. Katherine et. al. eds. (2006). Electronic Literature Collection (volume 1). Available online at http://collection.eliterature.org/1/
Kirschenbaum, Matthew G. (2015). Track Changes: A Literary History of Word Processing. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP.
Portela, Manuel (2013). Scripting Reading Motions: The Codex and the Computer as Self-Reflexive Machines. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Rettberg, Scott and Sandy Baldwin, eds. (2014). ELMCIP. Morgantown, WV: West Virginia UP.
Torres, Rui and Sandy Baldwin, eds. (2014). PO.EX. Morgantown, WV: West Virginia UP.