Tactical Media @ ITP - NYU
Professor: Marisa Olson

In this class, we'll be reading a variety of theoretical texts, organized around weekly themes. Additional reading suggestions (non-required reading) will be presented in class. We will also look closely at art projects that relate to these themes and URLs / documentation of these works will be distributed in advance of class discussion.

This schedule is subject to change, and all updates will be posted here and announced in class.

Jan 19: Class introduction
What is tactical media? Discuss excerpts from Geert Lovink, Critical Art Ensemble, and Mackenzie Wark

Jan 26: Media Change and Theories of Value
Read "The Medium is the Message," from Understanding Media, by Marshall McLuhan; "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," from Illuminations, by Walter Benjamin

Feb 2: Intro to Critical Art Ensemble
Read Electronic Civil Disobedience, the first chapter of Critical Art Ensemble's book of the same name. (PDF) Review CAE's art projects, at http://www.critical-art.net

Feb 9: Surveillance
Read Panopticism, Chapter 3 of Michael Foucault's Discipline & Punish; read Streets into Stages: an interview with Surveillance Camera Players' Bill Brown, by Erich W. Schienke

Class visit by Bill Brown of SCP.

Feb 16 Class visits by Ryan Griffis and Trevor Paglen

Feb 23: Archives/ Data Visualization/ Mapping
Read The Work of Artists in a Databased Society: net.art as on-line activism, by Ricardo Miranda Zuniga; Jean Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulations.

Class visit from members of Not An Alternative; 6pm general ITP lecture by Hasan Elahi

March 2: Parody & Parasitic Media
Read "Nonrational Strategies, from CAE's Electronic Civil Disobedience and PARASITIC MEDIA: Invisibility & other forms of Tactical Augmentation, by Nathan Martin

Also recommended: The Financial Advantages of Anti-copyright from Digital Resistance;

Class visit by Michael Mandiberg

March 9: Fear/ Terrorism
Read The Spirit of Terrorism, by Jean Baudrillard; excerpts from CAE's Molecular Invasion

March 16: Spring Break

March 23: Science
Read continued excerpts from CAE's Digital Resistance and Molecular Invasion; and additional selections from subRosa and Eugene Thacker

Class visits by Brooke Singer and Ricardo Miranda Zuniga

March 30: Media as Medium/ Broadcast/ Transmission
Read excerpts from Postmodernism, by Fredric Jameson

Class visit: Tianna Kennedy

April 6: Hacktivism
Read excerpts from Protocol, by Alexander Galloway

Class visit: Finishing School

April 13: Gaming & Play
Read: Countdown to Collective Insurgence: Cyberfeminism and Hacker Strategies, by Anne-Marie Schleiner; Excerpts from The Practice of Everyday Life, Michel de Certeau

April 20 - Student Mini-Conference
April 27 - Student Mini-Conference