History of Media and Technology

Readings

Ses #	Topics	readings
Lec 1	Introduction	Talbot, David. “How Tech Failed in Iraq.” MIT Technology Review.
Lab 1	Doctor Strangelove	Screening: Kubrick, Stanley. Doctor Strangelove.
Lec 2	Fictions of War, Philosophy of War, History of War	Orwell, George. 1984. Book One. New York, NY: Signet Classic, pp. 1-104. ISBN: 9780451524935. (Required Book) Tzu, Sun. Art of War. Translated by Lionel Giles. Sections I-VIII, The Internet Classics Archive. Thucydides. “Outbreak of War.” In History of the Peloponnesian War. Penguin Classics. Book II, pp. 124-193. Van Creveld, Martin. Technology and War: From 2000 B.C. to the Present. New York, NY: Free Press, 1989, Chapters 1-3 (pp. 9-50), chapter 5 (pp. 67-78). ISBN: 9780029331514.
Lab 2	Ran Air Force	Screening: Kurosawa. Ran. 1985. Hawks. Air Force. 1943.
Lec 3	WWII: Code Wars	Stephenson, Neal. Cryptonomicon. New York, NY: Avon, 2002, pp. 77-92, 143-183, 215-294, 315-364. ISBN: 9780060512804. Singh, Simon. The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography. New York, NY: Doubleday, 1999, Chapters 3-6 (pp. 101-292). ISBN: 9780385495318. Van Creveld, Martin. Technology and War: From 2000 B.C. to the Present. New York, NY: Free Press, 1989, Chapters 16-18 (pp. 235-283).. ISBN: 9780029331514. Hardt, Michael, and Antonio Negri. Multitude. New York, NY: The Penguin Press, pp. 12-62, notes: pp. 361-369.
Lab 3	Akira	Screening: Katsuhiro ’tomo. _Akira. _ Arquilla, John, and David Ronfeldt. “Cyberwar is Coming!” pp. 24-50. Weiguang, Shen. “Information War - A New Challenge.” pp. 84-95. Kittler, Friedrich. “On the History of the Theory of Information Warfare.” pp. 266-272. From: Infowar, Ars Electronica Center (Springer Wien/New York).
Lab 4	Rumsfeld’s War	Screening: Frontline: Rumsfeld’s War. PBS, 2004.
Lec 5	The New War Machines Guest Speaker: Owen Cote, Associate Director of Security Studies at MIT	Cote, Owen. “The New War Machines.” MIT Technology Review (March 21, 2003).
Lab 5	Eternal War Research Topics: Discussion of Final Papers and Projects Control Room	Screening: Noujaim, Jehane. Control Room. 2004.
Lec 6	History of War Technologies/War Games	DeLanda, Manuel. War in the Age of Intelligent Machines. New York, NY: Zone Books. ISBN: 9780942299755. (Required Book) Van Creveld, Martin. Technology and War: From 2000 B.C. to the Present. New York, NY: Free Press, 1989, Chapters 1-3 (pp. 9-50), chapter 5 (pp. 67-78), chapters 12-13 (pp. 167-199). ISBN: 9780029331514.
Lab 6	War Games	Screening: Badham, John. War Games. Secrets of War: Spy Games of World War II. 1998. America’s Army (Web Game) Patriot Act (Web) War Against Terror (Web) “Author Dilip Hiro On Operation Iraqi Freedom and the Collapse of American Power in the Middle East.” Democracy Now. Thursday, February 12, 2004.
Lec 7	First-Person Shooters	Haldeman, Joe. The Forever War. Eos. Herr, Michael. “Hell Sucks.” In Dispatches. Reprint edition. New York, NY: Avon, 1978, pp. 70-85. ISBN: 9780380019762. Tesanovic, Jasmina. The Diary of a Political Idiot: Normal Life in Belgrade. San Francisco, CA: Cleis Press, 2000, pp. 71-112. ISBN: 9781573441148. Wright, Evan. Generation Kill: Devil Dogs, Iceman, Captain America, and the New Face of American War. New York, NY: Putnam, 2004, Chapters 7-11, pp. 71-123. ISBN: 9780399151934.
Lab 7	The Fog of War	Screening: Morris, Erol. The Fog of War.
Lec 8	Virtuous War Guest Speaker: James der Derian	der Derian, James. Virtuous War: Mapping the Military-Industiral-Media-Entertainment Network. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2001, pp. 22-249. ISBN: 9780813397948. Silberman, Steve. “The War Room.” Wired (September 2004): 150-155, 171-173. Virilio, Paul, and Sylvere Lotringer. Pure War. Semiotext(e) Foreign Agent Series. Chapters 1-3, pp. 9-36.
Lab 8	Virtual War After 9/11 Wag the Dog	Levinson, Barry. Wag the Dog. Screening: der Derian. After 9/11.
Lec 9	Man Machines: Race and War Guest Speakers: Director Reggie Hudlin and Comic Artist Kyle Baker, Birth of a Nation Comic Book Project	Truth Series. Marvel Comics. Adas, Michael. Machines as the Measure of Men. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, pp. 343-401. Diamond, Jared. Guns, Germs, and Steel. New York, NY: Norton, 1999, chapter 13, pp. 239-264. ISBN: 9780393317558.
Lab 9	Birth of a Nation and Hearts of the World	Screening: Griffith, D. W. Birth of a Nation and Hearts of the World. 1918.
Lec 10	21 Century War: The War in Iraq and the Branding of Terrorism	Sante, Luc. “Tourists and Torturers.” New York Times, May 11, 2004. Hiro, Dilip. War Without End: The Rise of Islamist Terrorism and the Global Response. New York, NY: Routledge. “The Rise of Islam,” pp. 3-24. “Islamist Terrorism and Global Response.” pp. 267-434. Agamben, Giorgio. “We Refugees.” Black, Edwin. Banking on Baghdad: Inside Iraq’s 7,000-Year History of War, Profit, and Conflict. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, 2004, chapters 13-17, pp. 211-352. ISBN: 9780471671862. Van Creveld, Martin. Technology and War: From 2000 B.C. to the Present. Chapters 19-Conclusion, pp. 285-320. Michael, John. “Beyond Us and Them: Identity and Terror from an Arab American’s Perspective.” The South Atlantic Quarterly 102, no. 4 (Fall 2003): 701-728.
Lab 10	Battle of Algiers	Screening: Battle of Algiers.
Lec 11	Project Presentations
Lab 11	Project Presentations (cont.)
Lec 12	Project Presentations (cont.)
Lab 12	Project Presentations (cont.)