STS 4618

Data Corruption's Deep History

Course Description

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2017-2018.

How can studying the deep past of information storage and transmission help us understand our current engagements with information and contemplate its future? In this course we will we will explore the materiality of information-bearing artifacts over the long history of semantic inscription. From cuneiform tablets to digital media (whose veneer of immateriality disguises the complexities of the material mechanisms of storage and transmission), we will study the shifting materialities of the matrices through which information is stored, transformed, shared, and obliterated: compilations and remixes, piracies and hacks, inscribed objects and their digital "surrogates."

When Offered Fall.

Permission Note Enrollment limited to: 15 students. Intended for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.

View Enrollment Information