| title | subtitle | chapter | URL | author | editor | publisher | type | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Digital Pedagogy in the Humanities |
Concepts, Models, and Experiments |
Video |
keywords/video.md |
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Modern Language Association |
book |
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
It seems counter intuitive---given the expectations for using cameras, working with sound, and learning editors---but digital video production provides one of the smoothest paths for integrating digital composing into a class. Traditionally, high-quality film and video production required both costly equipment and relatively high levels of technical competency. In the last fifteen years, however, the technological barriers to video production have decreased dramatically.
JENTERY: Mind providing a citation for this decrease? Not that I doubt you, but some evidence wouldn't hurt the argument.
In fact, creating digital videos presents no more (and sometimes fewer) problems than developing websites, composing podcasts, or designing visuals with image editors. At the same time, the increased ubiquity of video only intensifies questions of what competencies and literacies one requires in order to participate as a producer in a culture saturated with digital moving images.
One response to the need to develop these competencies has been to find a resonance between video production and composing in general. From this perspective the process(es) of video production and the process(es) of writing largely remediate and support each other. Here we see an embrace of both the traditional documentary form and its related genres such as the cinematic essay.
JENTERY: Perhaps some classic examples here, of cinematic essays and documentaries? I'm thinking of material instructors might want to include in their syllabi.
We might loosely call this the “audio-visual writing” perspective. Within this perspective, rhetoric comes to the fore. On one level, this presence smoothes the paths for digital composing through concepts like audience, purpose, genre, and medium---broad concerns that can drive the creation of assignments and the development of projects. On another level, this compositional approach translates into a focus on properties of filmmaking, photography, text, and sound, casting video-making as series of rhetorical choices instantiated in the specifics of multimodal forms.
JENTERY: Would you be willing to revise these two levels with more of an emphasis on pedagogy, or on teaching and learning? What teaching and learning challenges correspond with these two levels, e.g.? How do these levels manifest in the classroom or in syllabi? How are they embodied?
Another response to the increasing ease of creating and ubiquity of video has been to focus experimental attention on the effects of digitization on the moving image, and subsequently on the channels for communication opened by these possibilities. From this perspective, digtial video is not limited to new instantiations of familiar forms. Instead, we see an embrace of alternative modes of messaging or the influences of algorithmic processes on composing. We might loosely call this perspective on video “post-cinematic.”
JENTERY: Point to or cite examples of the post-cinematic here?
If what we’ve tentatively tagged as the audio-visual writing perspective holds to a rhetorically grounded view of the relatively stable communicative and representative potential of video, then the post-cinematic perspective orients itself more to possibilities of working beyond the symbolic and even beyond the capacities for human perception.
JENTERY: Nice distinction. I can see how physical computing enters into the picture here.
It would of course be a mistake to reduce our keyword “video” to either of these two perspectives. The goal, however, in identifying these general perspectives is to offer some sense of the scope by which we might approach our pedagogy with digital video.
JENTERY: At this point in this section, I'm wondering if, generally speaking, you could revise this curatorial statement with pedagogy in the foreground. Right now, it's kind of lurking in the margins. Know what I mean? Any way to further ground this statement in concrete acts of teaching and learning?
Given these familiar and experimental possibilities combined with the increasing ease of creating video projects, it’s somewhat surprising that there isn’t more widespread adoption of video assignments as part of digital pedagogy.
JENTERY: Agreed! Especially in fields such as digital humanities, which is largely text-based.
In some ways, this can be explained by technical affordances and the expectations for production values associated with digital video. If we conceive of digital video assignments in terms of film production, we’re confronted with the need for cameras, microphones, lighting, and a good deal of time learning the nuances of film editing. Similarly, if we ignore the concerns of production, we may find ourselves confronted with digital video projects with poor image quality, unusable sound, and clunky editing. A more productive approach for digital pedagogy broadly is to work somewhere between these two extremes.
JENTERY: I like how you've framed this position, but I'm also wondering where an emphasis on, say, argument, perspective, or narrative comes into play. Thoughts?
By lowering the entry-difficulties to creating video projects but maintaining reasonable expectations for production quality (something that is easily accomplished with prosumer technologies and basic instruction), we can create more opportunities to deploy digital video in the classroom.
JENTERY: Is "deploy" a strong word here?
These opportunities are important as working with video yields a number of important payoffs. Students deal directly with concerns of intellectual property. They experiment with a range of literacies and composing strategies that include alphabetic, sonic, visual, and motion. And they find high levels of engagement and motivation in activities as they rise to new intellectual challenges and work in modes that resonate with their daily lives.
JENTERY: It would be great if the interests expressed here could be elaborated throughout the statement. Is that possible? Here is where the statement seems most expressly about digital pedagogy.
- Source URL: http://lessonplans.dwrl.utexas.edu/pedagogical-goals-digital-literacy/video
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creators: Cate Blouke, Lisa Gulesserian, Jenny Howell, Rachel Mazique, Scott Nelson, Sarah Riddick, Michael Roberts, Laura Thain, and Beck Wise (University of Texas at Austin)
This resource presents a collection of lesson plans filed under “video” in the lesson plan archive of UT-Austin’s Digital Writing and Research Lab. The lessons range from doing rhetorical analysis of short videos to disputing YouTube content takedowns to using juxtapositions in video mash-ups. Lessons offer clearly articulated pedagogical goals in a variety of categories including rhetoric, literature, and digital literacy. In addition, the lessons articulate technological requirements, suggestions for evaluation, and even “timeline for optimal use” within a curriculum. The strength of these lesson plans is that they are pitched for both instructors and students who are novice readers and makers of video. For more experienced instructors and students, these lessons provide a nice starting point for the remixing of goals and technologies based on more recent phenomena in video-making and culture. Beyond the “video” tag, the DWRL’s Lesson Plan archive contains a wealth of starting point lessons related to many other themes relevant to the reception and making of video and moving images.
JENTERY: Thanks for this! Would you be willing to point to one or two lesson plans that you think are especially informative or useful? Or maybe speak to how you use one or two of these lesson plans in your own courses? Just trying to narrow this resource down a bit.
- Source URL: http://jump.dwrl.utexas.edu
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creators: Justin Hodgson and The JUMP Collective (Indiana University and The University of Texas at Austin)
Jump provides a venue for video projects and a space for reflecting on the pedagogical dimensions of those projects. Geared toward student multimedia, Jump is great resources for instructors interested in pursuing undergraduate research. Each published project is accompanied by an author’s statement that includes details on the technologies used to create projects and reflections on the composing process and decisions. Publications also include a good deal of the pedagogical materials that support the student projects---assignments, details about the course, etc. And each project is accompanied by an instructor reflection, offering more details about the pedagogical dimensions of the projects. This resource can be used as a venue that might provide an end-goal for video assignments. It also provides a wealth of student examples and sample instructional materials.
JENTERY: Ditto here. Are you willing to point to more specific materials (e.g., assignments) available via site, if only to narrow the focus or point our audiences to some of the particulars? Thanks!
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Source URL: http://www.unc.edu/~twtaylor/318/
- Creator: Todd Taylor (The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
Todd Taylor’s ENGL 318 course site features materials and products related to the production of student documentaries during the Fall 2014 iteration of the course. Taylor’s work with video focuses primarily on the documentary form. Like the work of Bump Halbritter (see “Big Questions, Small Works, Lots of Layers” below), the strength of Taylor’s pedagogy is that it successfully situates the students within a generative sweet spot of aiming for high-production values, but with an equal emphasis ease of entry into unfamiliar technological territory. The work that emerges from Taylor’s class provides a real sense of what’s possible for undergraduate video makers with reasonable access to prosumer technologies and a developing sense rhetorical purpose.
JENTERY: Thanks again. Do you happen to know if the actual syllabus is available online? Or available at all? Or am I missing it? Also, it would be great if you'd be willing to point to exactly what you like about that syllabus, especially if you'd be willing to stress how the learning expectations are articulated here. Finally, I'm not sure the URL for the image is correct. It doesn't seem to work, even if I change the format to JPEG or PNG. Thoughts?
- Source URL: http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/anthropology/21a-550j-dv-lab-documenting-science-through-video-and-new-media-fall-2012/index.htm
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creators: Christine Waley and Chris Boebel (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
An entry to the archive of course materials made available through MIT’s Open Courseware, “DV Lab: Documenting Science Through Video and New Media” outlines an undergraduate level course that offers a way into thinking about the intersections of science and technology studies and documentary film practice. This course might be of particular interest to those wishing to integrate video-making and analysis into a curriculum oriented toward knowledge making within the disciplines. Included in this resource is a collection of both lecture and media lab videos. Lectures cover such topics as “Documentary and Ways of Seeing” while lab videos address topics such as “Introduction to the Camera” and “Interviewing Techniques.” Additionally, this course also contains materials that deal with the ethics and legality of documentary film work including items on “best practices in fair use” and piece titled “The Photographer’s Right.” The site also provides easy navigation to other film and video related courses in the MIT archive via a helpful “Related Content” tab on course home page.
JENTERY: If only in a sentence or two, would you be willing to speak to how you've used this resource in your own teaching? What's worked? And why?
- Source URL: http://teachmix.com/mediacomp/
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creators: Daniel Anderson and students (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
A website for a course focused on new media composing. Of particular interest are experiments with short videos using Vine and Instagram and an emphasis on using screen recording to create videos. In addition to short, social media videos, students created film mashups and video essays. The site also collects a number of video reflections where students use screen capture to discuss their composing processes. (More of these kinds of video reflections are captured in the essay “This is What We Did in Our Class,” listed in the additional resource section below.)
JENTERY: Here, would you be willing to develop the learning outcomes related to "short videos" and "screen recording"? How are these taught in this course, and to what effects? In other words, why teach them? Or more generally (if you prefer), why teach video essays? (Three to four sentences would probably be fine.)
- Source URL: http://scalar.usc.edu/anvc/kuhn/index
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creator: Virginia Kuhn (University of Southern California)
This online text captures and reports on the work of a class: IML340: The Praxis of New Media. The focus is on the intellectual components of digital video, especially the argumentative and rhetorical affordances of video modes and their connections to digital literacy. The entire collection of materials is helpful, but of particular interest is the strand on digital pedagogy. From underlying course philosophies to technical concerns of processing and hosting videos to issues of intellectual property, the piece takes up pedagogical components of working with video in both practical and conceptual ways. In addition, Kuhn’s use of the Scalar platform for publication of the work---while itself not taking full advantage of many of the notational features of the Scalar system---does invite speculation towards the role that such platforms might play in video work both in terms of delivery and analysis. This resource might be used while planning and reflecting on the intellectual benefits and challenges of doing work with video.
JENTERY: Great to see this piece included in your resources. Mind elaborating a bit on what audiences might draw from the strand/path on digital pedagogy? Maybe link to a particular page or two and explain?
- Source URL: http://cargo.jenniferproctor.com/Teaching-Resources
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creator: Jennifer Proctor (University of Michigan, Dearborn)
Jennifer Proctor’s “Teaching Resources” page offers a range of materials capturing a variety of moments in video-making and culture. Assignments move from more traditional forms of audio-visual work such as storyboarding to more contemporary genres such as vlogs and mash-ups toward still in-process materials related to emerging web-based video applications such as Vine and Zeega. Proctor’s pedagogy operates at the generative intersection of audio-visual writing and the post-cinematic. The value of Proctor’s site lies both in its offering of the raw materials of her digital pedagogy, but also in that her pedagogy very much looks ahead to web-based, networked video-making. For example, included here are a “Loop Assignment” using GIFs and Vines and an “Augmented Reality Assignment” using the Aurasma platform. Additionally, Proctor has done extensive work with Mozilla’s Popcorn Maker and you can find an extended piece reflecting on teaching with it here. It provides a nice companion piece to her classroom materials.
JENTERY: Have you used any of these materials in your own courses? If so, then what worked? If not, then would you be willing to do into depth about either of the two assignments ("Loop Assignment" and "AR Assignment") you reference?
- Source URL: http://vogmae.net.au/piv/
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creator: Adrian Miles (RMIT University, Melbourne)
With this site Adrian Miles presents his curriculum for “post-industrial video.” In the broadest sense, post-industrial video designates a video production practice enabled by the digitization of and increased access to the means of audio-visual production. For Miles, however, the notion of post-industrial video also designates an even more profound shift from hardcopy paradigms of media production to what he terms softcopy forms, or those enabled by the development of digital networks. At the heart of this curriculum is Miles’s pedagogical experiment(s) with the interactive video system Korsakow; however, given that the site both makes available Miles’s teaching philosophy and outlines the specific tasks and forms of assessment for the post-industrial video classroom, this site could prove valuable in developing curricular experiments with any of the emerging the web-specific video applications such as Zeega, Storyplanet, Kylnt, 3W Doc, et al. Site also includes an archive of student Korsakow projects generated via the curriculum.
JENTERY: Would you be willing to elaborate here, if only in a sentence? "this site could prove valuable in developing curricular experiments with any of the emerging the web-specific video applications" Why should instructors or students consider these experiments? What types of learning do they afford?
- Source URL: http://fall2014beginningnewgenres.tumblr.com/
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creator: Justin Lincoln (Whitman College)
This resource and the pedagogy it represents fall squarely on the post-cinematic side of our digital video resources. Assignments range from glitching images to processing-based animations to remix video responses. The materials provide an invitation to experiment with the dynamics of signal and noise, using videos to explore the role of machinic processing and social media in composing. By using sites like Tumblr as collecting engines for video materials and teaching students non-traditional methods of composing, Lincoln’s pedagogy enacts a video paradigm built around the shifting relationships between humans and technology. While instructors might cull assignments or examples from the Tumblr, the site (and Lincoln’s Notational Tumblr, might best be used as illustrative examples/enactments of how video pedagogy and new aesthetics can come together.
JENTERY: At the end of this annotation, would you be willing to add a sentence on the learning outcomes related to blending video pedagogoy with new aesthetics?
- Source URL: http://siteslab.org/resources/RIEDER_ENG583-798_FALL2011.pdf
- Copy of Artifact: forthcoming
- Creator: David M. Rieder (North Carolina State University)
If Adrian Miles’s curriculum for post-industrial video and Justin Lincoln’s new genres course Tumblr offer a glimpse towards the future of video under the influence of software and digital networks, then David Reider’s course syllabus for “Introduction to Humanities Physical Computing w/Arduino and Processing” presents an introductory curriculum to the emerging disciplinary orientations from which new processes and conceptions for video might emerge. Reider’s course does not specifically take up video; however, it does offer a map for both a theoretical and hands-on introduction to “the computational and physical/material bases of electronic media.” We’ve included it here as a provocation of sorts. A provocation to continue to orient our work with video to more thoroughly post-cinematic futures. Reider has also taught an undergraduate variation of this course.
JENTERY: Great to see this in the list, too! Would you be willing to point to a specific moment in the syllabus that you think warrants instructor attention? What's provocative about it, exactly, and how might instructors respond (or why might they consider post-cinematic work in the classroom)?
Daniel Anderson, Adrian Miles, Alexander Reid, et al., “Issues of New Media,” http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/8.1/binder2.html?coverweb/anderson/index.html
Daniel Anderson, Jackclyn Ngo, Sydney Stegall, Kyle Stevens, “This is What We did in Our Class,” https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/8552537/ccconline/issue1-1/Anderson/index.html
Judith Aston and Sandra Guadenzi, et al., http://i-docs.org
Geoffrey V. Carter and Sarah J. Arroyo Eds., “Video and Participatory Cultures,” http://enculturation.net/8
Bump Halbritter, “Big Questions, Small Works, Lots of Layers: Documentary Video Production and the Teaching of Academic Research and Writing,” http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/16.1/praxis/halbritter/index.php
JENTERY: Mind putting this list in MLA?
JENTERY: Just send this along when it's ready. (Apologies if I missed it!) Thanks!