Engl/Comm 180 serves as an introduction to the rhetorical and technical challenges posed by new digital media forums, exemplified by the World Wide Web. By the end of the course, students should have accomplished several overlapping goals:

• Each student should develop a facility with the representative tools and technologies used in the course. These include programs such as Dreamweaver, languages like HTML, and protocols such as FTP and SSH. In other words, by the end of the class, each student should be a "power user" of the college's computer resources.
• Equally important is that each student develop a strong conceptual understanding of the technical, philosophical, ethical, and even legal challenges posed by new media and emerging technologies. Many of these issues will be covered in class readings and discussions; others will come to light through group projects and individual research.
• Finally, the course aims to situate these technological and rhetorical issues within a larger cultural and historical context. Students should leave the class with an understanding of the relationship between what might be termed "electronic literacy" and the technologies of speech and writing that precede and inform it.

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Last modified 17-Aug-2002