Reading moving letters : digital literature in research and teaching : a handbook

Increasingly, as cinema once did, digital media are finding their way into the research of the humanities and by now a number of books on digital literature and art in general have been published. While some current collections of es- says discuss how new media shape human relations and generate new genres of art (Landow; Lunenfeld; Hayles, Writing Machines), others discuss in detail the new forms of literature (Bolter; Aarseth; Douglas; Ryan; Simanowski; Hei- bach; Block, Heibach and Wenz; Gendolla and Schäfer; Funkhouser; Hayles, Electronic Literature). Although these books include discussions regarding termi- nological and aesthetic questions, they do not offer much information about the educational and pedagogical impact of digital literature and the institutional aspects of its incorporation into existing curricula. Neither do studies dedi- cated to specific questions of digital technology and digital literacy, since they are mostly focused on general discussions (such as programming skills, hy- bridity, authorship, virtuality, ephemerality, copyright, digital divide, surveil- lance) rather than on the close reading of a specific work of digital literature, or its teaching practice (Tuman; Barrett; Boschmann; Landow; Schäfer and Schu- bert). In addition, some of these and the aforementioned books contain as- sumptions (i.e., about the role of the author and the reader as well as the value of interaction), which in more recent discussions have been criticized, rejected, or at least put into a contemporary perspective. Although some studies (Doug- las; Ryan; Simanowski) do present chapters on close readings as do some more recent publications (Hayles; Looy and Baetens; Ricardo), they do not discuss how a more thorough engagement with the aesthetic specifics of examples of digitale literature helps to introduce the subject into the classroom. Part Two, Teaching Digital Literature, asks how and why we should teach digital literature and conduct close readings in the classroom. Central to this chapter are respective institutional considerations necessary to take into account when implementing digital literature into curricula. Expanded by additional contributions, this book is based on the lecture series Digital Literature in Research and Teaching organized by Roberto Sima- nowski at Brown University in fall 2004 and spring 2005. This lecture series was part of a Transatlantic Cooperation initiated in 2004 between Roberto Si- manowski from the German Studies Department at Brown and Peter Gen- dolla and Jörgen Schäfer from the research group "Literature on the Net/Net Literature" at the University of Siegen (Germany). This book benefited from the work of many people. Our special thanks go to Brigitte Pichon and Dorian Rudnytsky for translating some of the texts into English and for checking the others for their linguistic correctness. Patricia Tomaszek provided invaluable assistance in unifying quotations and biblio- graphic information. We are also indebted to her for proof-reading the manu- script and for her assistance in finalizing the typesetting of this book. We are also grateful to Georg Rademacher for his support. Noah Wardrip-Fruin was an important interlocutor in the initial phase of the book’s conceptualization. While we have a number of impressive theoretical texts about digital literature, we as of yet have little in the way of resources for discussing the down-to-earth practices of research, teaching, and curriculum necessary for this work to ma- ture. Reading Moving Letters addresses this need on an up-to-date basis and pro- vides examinations in an international comparative perspective: terminological considerations, close readings, institutional aspects, pedagogical concerns, ex- periences, and solutions shared by authors from different academic back- grounds. This book brings together contributions by nine scholars and teach- ers who illustrate their approaches to the study and teaching of digital litera- ture. Grounded in substantial methodological questions that are examined thoroughly in this book the specific interest of this publication lies in the dis- cussion of the definitions and methods available to approach digital literature and art. Additionally, the collection of essays presents the lessons learnt from conceivable obstacles that have to be taken into account for curricular plan- ning and prepares teachers with valuable insights in international syllabi. The contributions are divided into two sections: Part One, Reading Digital Literature, provides definitions of digital literature as a discipline of scholarly treatment in the humanities and presents the contributors’ main focus in the field of digital literature.