Contemporary Media and Fiction

tl;dr Version of the Course Outline
Contemporary Media and Fiction
English 230 at UVic
lək̓ʷəŋən and WSÁNEĆ Territories
Taught by Jentery Sayers (he / him)
With Babak Ashrafkhani, teaching assistant
View this document in PDF.

The point of this course is for you to gain media literacy skills pertinent to fiction and storytelling. You will have the opportunity to integrate audio, images, quotations, and even video into your writing about comics, animations, short fiction, dramatic podcasts, and games.

You need to purchase only one book for this course: Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home. It’s at the UVic Bookstore. Everything else is available online or in Brightspace.

We’re asking you to complete only four writing assignments this term, each 25% of your final mark. You can revise one of your first three assignments to improve your grade, and you’ll submit all work via Brightspace. There are no research papers, presentations, or discussion forums in this course. There are no exams, either.

• Week 1 (Sept 7, 9): Review the syllabus. Purchase Fun Home.
• Week 2 (Sept 13, 14, 16): Watch THE M00D 0F THE M0MENT. Review Prompt 1. Play Secrets Agent. No class on the 14th.
• Week 3 (Sept 20, 21, 23): Watch Biidaaban. Read “Message in a Bottle.”
• Week 4 (Sept 27, 28, 30): Respond to Prompt 1 by the 27th. Learn more about a game or fiction mentioned during class. No class on the 30th.
• Week 5 (Oct 4, 5, 7): Listen to Within the Wires. Review Prompt 2.
• Week 6 (Oct 11, 12, 14): Play or watch Gone Home. Learn more about a game or fiction mentioned during class.
• Week 7 (Oct 18, 19, 21): Respond to Prompt 2 by the 18th. Read “Translated, From the Japanese.”
• Week 8 (Oct 25, 26, 28): Read Fun Home. Review Prompt 3. Note that Monday, October 31st is the last day to withdraw from first term courses without penalty of failure.
• Week 9 (Nov 1, 2, 4): Respond to Prompt 3 by the 4th. Play or watch Undertale.
• Week 10 (Nov 8, 9, 11): No class this week.
• Week 11 (Nov 15, 16, 18): Check out 50 Years of Text Games. Read / play With Those We Love Alive. Review the prompt for revisions.
• Week 12 (Nov 22, 23, 25): Play or watch Celeste. Review Prompt 4.
• Week 13 (Nov 29, 30; Dec 2): Share a game or fiction with the class. Complete course experience surveys. Optional: submit a revised response to Prompt 1, 2, or 3 by the 2nd.
• Exam Period (Dec 13): Respond to Prompt 4 by the 13th.

Read the complete prompts in Brightspace and be sure to review the detailed schedule and the policies at some point, too.

We suggest dedicating to this course 3 to 5 hours of study each week, plus 3 hours for weekly meetings (TWF). With your permission, we may record audio of our sessions and circulate it via Brightspace. You’ll have the option to limit personal information shared in the recording. We will also provide you with detailed lecture notes in the form of an online Word doc available in Microsoft Office 365 care of UVic.

The best way to communicate with me (Jentery) is by email (jentery@uvic.ca) or during office hours, which are Wednesday, 12-1pm, and Thursday, 12:30 - 1:30pm. I respond to email between 9am and 5pm, Monday through Friday, excluding holidays.

This tl;dr is not intended to replace the actual syllabus, which you should also read.