Seminar in digital communication Seminar in Digital Communication: COMM 648syllabus | schedule of events | notes on ourTwitter useFall term 2011, Queens University of CharlotteDr. John A. McArthurSyllabus ³COMM 648: Students will explore the communicative aspects of digital technology as they relate to and intertwine with oral, aural, and visual communication. Special emphasis will be placed on theories of information and experience design and the implications of these theories for effective practice in strategic communication.´ ObjectivesThis seminar¶s aims include: 1.equipping students toward a lifelong practice of ³absorbing a vir tual firehose of streaming information´ (Solis, 2009, p.29).; 2.engaging student-professio nals and academicians as creator-consumers of digital information; 3.developing practices ofadaptation, creativity, and innovation in a changing strategic communication landscape; and, 4.framing our study in the context of academic writing/composing/curat ing for contribution to the study and profession of communication. As part of the strategic communication emphasis in the Master of Arts in Organizational and Strategic Communication, this seminar will focus on the consideration of the interactions between media, technology, and society. Specifically, our work will be grounded in theories of information design and user-experience design to allow us to consider the means whereby digital media creates opportunities for conversation, engagement, and experimentation. AssignmentsDigital Media Consumption & CreationSeminar participants should be active consumers ofdigital media. In this seminar, this means finding, reading, and participating in timely conversations. Each participant will establish and maintain a Twitter page that creates opportunities for contribution to ongoing discussions as a digital thinker rather than as an idle consumer (Why Twitter?). Participant pages should be focused on strategic communication, organizatio nal communication, or another area of the field of particularinterest to the participant. Deliverables: Twitter page. Digital Media ExperimentationSeminar participants will engage oral, aural, visual, and digital media to experiment with multiple modalities of in formation design. Three presentations ofthis work will occur at intervals throughout the seminar. Deliverables: Digital Events I, II, III Contribution to the fieldEach seminar participant will devise a book chapter written in APA format as a contribution to an e-book titled, ³Community 2.0: At the Intersection of Digital Media and Information Design.´ Deliverables: Book chapter. Ideas for potential chapters might include things that connect a particular information design issue to a community¶s ability/opportunity to be informed and engaged: Wayfinding displays as markers of informed communities
