CMN 696: Theorizing YouTube: How many YouTube videos have you watched today? How about videos on Instagram or TikTok? What about live streams on platforms like Twitch or Facebook? Digital video, much of it amateur or semi-professional, has come to dominate social media and the internet—accounting for everything from entertainment to political activism. YouTube, founded in 2005, began the transformation of the primarily text and image-based internet to a more video-heavy experience. This class is designed around studying the history and cultural impact of YouTube, as well as social media-based video more generally. We’ll study the history of YouTube, and immerse ourselves the present culture, forms, and genres of YouTube. We’ll look at the phenomenon of ‘YouTube stars’ and the emergence of influencer culture on the platform. We’ll study the growing body of scholarship and popular commentary and criticism of YouTube and related platforms. We’ll look at the debates around free speech and concerns over political extremism and conspiracy theories. YouTube will be our focal point through which we will examine
many of the larger topics related to video-based social media platforms: entertainment, identity, journalism, education, cultural production, fandom, politics, community, marketing, and public discourse. In addition to the expected components of a writing intensive class, students will also have the opportunity to use the modality of video to enhance their scholarship: curating, remixing, and even creating original critical video pieces. 

JN

Course Description - Images of death are ubiquitous in our society, yet death continues to be taboo and grief has become a "silent epidemic," especially among young adults. This course examines end of life (EoL) communication in a variety of contexts. We will take a close look at how people communicate about death and dying, how people communicate with the dying and the bereaved, and the rituals and practices through which we create meaning out of loss. Throughout the semester, we will attend to the social construction of death in our culture and other cultures, and interrogate why some deaths are afforded dignity and respect, while others are relegated to the margins. Death imbues communication with profound significance. It is my hope that students will develop a dialogic relationship with death, and in turn, gain a deeper appreciation of life.

In this class, we will explore the enormous rhetorical powers of photographic images - whether combined with photographic images - whether combined with text or not - to inform, educate, delight, and, of course, persuade viewers. We will learn how to consider the rhetorical function of photographs that were taken with the intent to record as well as those that were taken with the intent to persuade; “disposable” photographs as well as famous “classics”; single, unique photographs as well as those commonly embedded in social movements and photo-essays; contemporary photographs “in the prime of” their original rhetorical function as well as some that have outlasted their original message to take on new rhetorical functions. In addition to thinking about particular photographs, we will also consider the ethos of photography itself as a scientific imaging technology. We will supplement our viewing by reading what some of the theorists have had to say about photographs and other kinds of pictures. And, finally, we will sample some of the work rhetorical critics have produced as the discipline has expanded to acknowledge the importance of visual as well as verbal rhetorical artifacts.  Non-majors: please contact the professor regarding registering for this class.