HCCK03161U Computer technologies and mediated interaction

It has become a truism that in modern day society, computers are found everywhere and used all the time for everything. This course allows students to unpack how this actually unfolds with a particular focus on everyday instances of mediated social interaction: how people use computer technologies to communicate with each other. The course is thematically based around conceptualizations of the various communicative uses computers are being put to in today’s media landscape, and each session of the course is structured around one or more key concepts which will be discussed in some depth. One key concept is that of interactivity, and the first couple of sessions introduce and discuss this concept and its historical ties to the computer and related media technologies referred to as “new media”. The course then introduces Nancy Baym’s seven properties of new media to be used as sensitizing concepts throughout the course. Then, it progresses thematically by devoting individual sessions to the introduction and discussion of concepts such as media affordances, interpersonal communication, social networks, community, mobility, virtuality, and privacy, among others.

The overall aim of the course is to enable students to analyse specific and bounded instances of computer-related interaction processes and patterns. Students should apply one or more of the above mentioned concepts and related theoretical frameworks to a case of their own choice. It is not mandatory that students perform an empirical study as part of their exam, but the course lends itself well to small scale empirical studies and/or clarifications of the connections between concepts and empirical reality. In the case of students doing an empirical project, it is assumed that students have prior experience with empirical studies, since the course does not have a methodological component per se. However, individual and group supervision will be available with regards to the implementation of both quantitative and qualitative research designs and students are encouraged to share ideas about implementing different designs. The course includes two exam-oriented workshops.

EXAMS: Media studies (2008) curriculum: Audience and user studies; Users and digital communication; Computer media, genres and digital aesthetics

Film and Media Studies (2013) curriculum: Audience and user studies

Cognition & Communication curriculum: Cognition and computer interaction