Final Paper: Age and Technology
age-and-technology-title-page2
About Age and Technology
“‘All right, father’—this with a grotesque simulation of filial respect—‘you’ve lived longer; you know best. Just as you say.’” (Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. New York: The Penguin Group, 1998, 324).
“He brought home lead soldiers, he brought toy trains, he brought large pleasant animals made of cotton, and, to perfect the illusion which he was creating—for himself at least—he passionately demanded of the clerk in the toy-store whether ‘the paint would come off the pink duck if the baby put it in his mouth.’” (Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. New York: The Penguin Group, 1998, 325).
The course will focus on modern technology’s relationship to age. It will discuss how technology divides age and how we divide technology by age. We will be looking at age and technology through educational, visual art, science, and social science perspectives. We will be exploring how age is viewed particularly in the U.S. but we will also read about a few other countries’ point-of-views. The course will be asking whether age is a state-of-mind or a biological factor of life. We will touch on technologies of death, but will concentrate on anti-aging technologies and the obsession with staying young. We will be comparing children, teenagers, young adults, and older adults’ relationships with technology. What does scholarship say about each of these groups in relation to technology? The class will be mainly discussion, but students might be asked to bring in newspaper clippings, images, and music that represent what they see as a combination of age and technology. This course also aims to see how age and technology are represented in our everyday lives.
The course requirements are to write 8 posts on an online blog throughout the 14 weeks of the semester. The posts must be longer than a paragraph, but do not need to be over 2 pages. This will be to help keep the discussion going outside of the classroom. Also, there will be two multimedia assignments and one 5-7 page paper. Each of these should focus on a certain section of the course. They should reflect the theories we have read and further the discourse on the subject. For example, a student may choose to focus on adult technologies being turned into toys for children for one of the assignments. The final project can either be a paper (8-10 pages) or a multimedia presentation (5-10 min). The student can choose the topic, but should present a proposal of their idea before the last class.
Age and Technology Syllabus
By Cat Bloxsom
“The dominant media image of the cyborg is the male, youthful game player, computer user, or action figure, but the cyborg in other everyday practices often includes old people relying on a range of medical therapies and devices to negotiate daily life.” (Calasanti, Toni M. and Kathleen F. Slevin Age Matters New York: Routledge, 2006: 115).
Questions to consider: How do Age and Technology intersect? How are they related? What technologies do we use to prevent aging? Why? Are class and culture factors in the relationship? If so, how? Are certain technologies generational or does age not matter when it comes to technology? Why in the elderly is technology usually connected with health, while in young adults it is attached to sex?
I. The relationship between Age and Technology. Aging; Birthing Technologies How do we define age? What is our relationship to age and what technologies are age-specific?
“Computer technology holds the promise of improve the quality of life for older adults and their families.” (Johnson, Malcom L., ed. The Cambridge Handbook of Age and Aging. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005: 668)
Monday January 26th:
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. New York: The Penguin Group, 1998.
And
Watch the film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. DVD. Directed by David Fincher. 2006;USA: Paramount Pictures, 2008
What are people’s reactions to someone aging backwards? What would it be like to age backwards? What do you think about age and our relationship to it? What interested you most about the book or the movie? How does age relate to our identities? Come to class on Wednesday ready to answer these questions in a discussion.
Wednesday January 28th:
And
Johnson, Malcom L., ed. The Cambridge Handbook of Age and Aging. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Ch. 4.8 Ageism by Bill Bytheway pages 338-343
Ch. 4.10 Images of Ageing: Cultural Representations of Later Life by Mike Featherstone and Mike Hepworth pages 354-360
Ch. 7.13 Adaptation to New Technologies by Neil Charness and Sara J. Czaja pages 662-669
Monday February 2nd:
Woodward, Kathleen, ed., Figuring Age. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999.
Incubabies and Rejuvenates: The Traffic between Technologies of Reproduction and Age-Extension by Susan Squier pages 88-111
And
http://www.cioinsight.com/c/a/Past-Opinions/Age-Determines-Technologys-Value/
Wednesday February 4th:
Buckingham, David Beyond Technology. Cambridge UK: Polity Press, 2007.
Chapter 3 Techno-Topias pages 31-50
Chapter 5 Digital Childhoods? pages 75-98
And
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/09/youth_age/
Multimedia Project due Friday February 6th!!
II. Childhood, Education and Technology. Can Computers Substitute for Teachers?
Monday February 9th:
Buckingham, David Beyond Technology. Cambridge UK: Polity Press, 2007.
Chapter 6: Playing to Learn? pages 99-118
Chapter 7: That’s Edutainment pages 124-142
Chapter 9: School’s Out? pages 176-183
Wednesday February 11th:
Denning, Peter J., and Robert M. Metcalfe. Beyond Calculation. New York: Copernicus, 1997.
Part II Computers and Human Identity page 87-92
Ch. 7: Growing Up in the Culture of Simulation by Sherry Turkle page 93-104
Monday February 16th:
Denning, Peter J., and Robert M. Metcalfe. Beyond Calculation. New York: Copernicus, 1997.
Ch. 8 Why It’s Good That Computers Don’t Work Like the Brain pages 105-116
and
O’Neil, Harold F. Jr, and Ray S. Perez eds., Technology Applications in Educating London: Lawrence Eribaum Associates, 2003.
Ch. 1: The Landscape and Future of the Use of Technology in K-12 Education by Marshall S. Smith and Michael Broom pages 3-30
Wednesday February 18th:
O’Neil, Harold F. Jr, and Ray S. Perez eds., Technology Applications in Educating London: Lawrence Eribaum Associates, 2003.
Ch 2: Gazing Yet Again Into the Silicon Chip: The Future of Computers in Education by Susan F. Chipman pages 31-54
Ch.3: Future Vision of Learning and Technology for Continuous Personal Development by Thomas P. Hill pages 55-78
Monday February 23rd:
O’Neil, Harold F. Jr, and Ray S. Perez eds., Technology Applications in Educating London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003.
Ch. 4: Evidence for Learning From Technology-Assisted Instruction by J.D. Fletcher pages 79-99
Ch. 13: Using Technology to Assess Students’ Web Expertise by Davina C.D. Klein, Louise Yarnall, and Christina Glaubke pages 305-320.
Wednesday February 25th:
Trend, David. Welcome to Cyberschool. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2001.
Ch.2: Utopian Promise and the Digital Divide pages 17-44
Ch.4: Welcome to Cyberschool pages 65-84
2nd Multimedia Project due Monday March 2nd !!!!!
III. Age specific Technologies. Younger generations relationship with Technology, specifically teenagers. How technology can define our age or vice versa? Who relies on what technologies? Does technology enhance our lives? How it used for different age groups? How does it differentiate between age groups?
“TRL is not a real community. However, it is not unreal because it is virtual or mediated; indeed, Fernback has noted that cyberspace has become a repository for cultural memory and a new arena for participatioin in public life.” (Davis, Glyn, and Kay Dickinson, eds., Teen TV. London: British Film Institute, 2004:122)
Monday March 2nd:
Kusahara, Machiko. “The Art of Creating Subjective Reality: An Analysis of Japanese Digital Pets.” Leonardo 34, no. 4 (2001): 299-302. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1577151
And
Caron, André H., and Letizia Caronia Moving Cultures. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2007.
Ch. 2: Speaking Objects, Acting Words: New Communication Practices pages 32-54
Talk Young, Talk Ads page 88
Ch. 5: Language, Interaction, and Mobile Culture: Field Research among Teenagers pages 102-118.
Ch 6: Displaying Identities in Urban Space: How Do Young People Talk on Mobile Phones? Pages 122-140.
Wednesday March 4th:
Caron, André H., and Letizia Caronia Moving Cultures. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2007.
Ch. 7: Mobile Culture in Everyday Life: Teenagers Talking on Their Mobiles pages 142-175
Ch. 8 SMS in Everyday Life: Ethnography of a Secret Language pages 178-196
Ch. 9: Intergenerational Communication: Changes, Constants, and New Models pages 198-215.
And
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/gentech/main500695.shtml
Spring Break!
Monday March 16th:
Davis, Glyn, and Kay Dickinson, eds., Teen TV. London: British Film Institute, 2004.
Ch. 5: ‘So Who’s Got Time for Adults!’: Feminity, Consumption and the Development of Teen TV—from Gidget to Buffy by Bill Osgerby pages 71-86
Ch. 6: Selling Teen Culture: How American Multimedia Conglomeration Reshaped Teen Television in the 1990s by Valerie Wee pages 87-98
Ch. 7: ‘My Generation’: Popular Music, Age and Influence in Teen Drama of the 1990s by Kay Dickinson pages 99-111.
Ch. 8: Total Request Live and the Creation of Virtual Community by Richard K. Olsen pages 112-124.
And
http://www.theantidrug.com/advice/teens-today/teens-and-technology/default.aspx
Wednesday March 18th:
Cole, Michael, Martin Engel, and Tony Scott. “Computers and Education: A Cultural Constructivist Perspective.” Review of Research in Education, 18, (1992): 191-251, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1167300
Read Sections:
“Computer Literacy and Computer Competence”
“Computering Across the Curriculum”
“Modes of Computer Use”
“Preparation of Teachers to Use Computers”
“Gender”
“Ethnicity”
Monday March 23rd:
Jennings, Nancy and Ellen A. Wartella. “Children and Computers: New Technology. Old Concerns.” The Future of Children 10, no. 2 (2000): 31-43.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1602688
And
Dresang, Eliza T. and Kathryn McClelland “Radical Change: Digital Age Literature and Learning” Theory into Practice 38, no. 3 (1999): 160- 167. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1477307
And
Calvert, Sandra L. “Children as Consumers: Advertising and Marketing.” The Future of Children 18, no. 1 (2008): 205-234. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20053125
And
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/WorldNews/story?id=6456834
Wednesday March 25th:
Montgomery, Kathryn C. Generation Digital: Politics, Commerce, and Childhood in the Age of the Internet Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2007. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/brynmawr/docDetail.action?docID=10190452
Ch.1: At the Center of a Cultural Storm pages 18-27
Ch 2: Digital Kids 28-51
Paper (5-7pages) due Friday March 27th!!!
Monday March 30th:
Montgomery, Kathryn C. Generation Digital: Politics, Commerce, and Childhood in the Age of the Internet Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2007. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/brynmawr/docDetail.action?docID=10190452
Ch. 5: Born to be Wired pages 124-157
Ch 6: Social Marketing in the New Millennium pages 158-195
Ch. 8: The Legacy of the Digital Generation pages 226-243
Explore this website:
IV. Anti-aging Technologies: Cryogenics, Transhumanism. Older Adults and Technology How do we stop aging? How is old age viewed by society?
“Older consumers tend to be more reluctant to use emerging technologies than their younger counterparts. This tendency is somewhat confounded with gender effects, because men across age groups feel more comfortable with most technologies than do women,” (O’Neil, Harold F. Jr, and Ray S. Perez eds., Technology Applications in Educating London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003: 54)
Wednesday April 1st:
Binstock, Robert H. and Linda K. George, eds., “Fifteen—Technological Change and Aging” Handbook of Aging and the Social Sciences 6th ed. Amsterdam: Academic Press, an imprint of Elsevier, 2006. http://www.credoreference.com/entry.do?id=7895977
Also read Twenty-four—Anti-Aging Medicine and Science Social Implications
Twenty-five—Aging and Justice
Monday April 6th:
Coles, L. Stephen, Richard G. Cutler, Michael Fossel, Leonid Gavrilov, Aubrey D.N. J. de Grey, S. Mitchell Harman, and S. Jay Olshansky “Anti-aging Technology and Pseudoscience” Science 296, no. 5568 (2002): 656. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3076556
And
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=no-truth-to-the-fountain-of-youth
And
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/gaming/2006-04-18-brain-age_x.htm
And
Roberts, Leslie “Questions Raised about Anti-Wrinkle Cream” Science 239, no. 4840 (1988): 564. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1700174
Wednesday April 8th:
Woodward, Kathleen, ed., Figuring Age. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999.
Scary Women: Cinema, Surgery, and Special Effects by Vivian Sobchack
And
Binstock, Robert H. and Stephen G. Post, eds. The Fountain of Youth Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Ch.3: Decelerated Aging: Should I Drink from a Fountain of Youth? By Stephen G. Post pages 72-93
Ch. 11: An Engineer’s Approach to Developing Real Anti-Aging Medicine by Aubrey D.N.J. de Grey pages 249-270
Ch. 12: An Unnatural Process: Why It Is Not Inherently Wrong to Seek a Cure for Aging by Arthur L. Caplan pages 271-285
Ch. 15: Anti-Aging Research and the Limits of Medicine by Eric T. Juengst pages 321-339.
Monday April 13th:
Calasanti, Toni M. and Kathleen F. Slevin Age Matters New York: Routledge, 2006.
Ch. 5: Graying the Cyborg by Kelly Joyce and Laura Mamo pages 99-121.
And
Gullette, Margaret Morganroth Aged by Culture Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004.
Ch.1: Trapped in the New Time Machines pages 3-20
Ch.2: True Secrets of Being Aged by Culture pages 21-41
Wednesday April 15th:
Brown, Nik and Andrew Webster New Medical Technologies and Society Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2004.
Ch.3 Reproducing Medical Technology pages 53-79
Ch. 4: Maintaining the Body pages 80-104
Ch. 6: Technologies of Death and Dying pages 124-160.
Monday April 20th:
Al-Deen, Hana S. Noor, ed. Cross Cultural Communication and Aging in the United States New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1997.
Ch. 3: Aging and Infotainment Technologies: Cross-Cultural Perspectives by Norbert Mundorf, Jennings Bryant, and Winifred Brownell pages 43-62
Ch. 13: The Image of Aging in Television Commercials: An Update for the 1990s by Wendy J. Hajjar pages 231-244.
Wednesday April 22nd:
Watch Movie Cocoon in Class
Barr, Robin A. and Sara J. Czaja “Technology and the Everyday Life of Older Adults” Annals of the American Academy of Policial and Social Science 503, 1989: 127-137. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1047222
And
Binstock, Robert H., Eric T. Juengst, Maxwell Mehlman, Stephen G. Post, and Peter Whitehouse “Biogerontology, ‘Anti-Aging Medicine,’ and the Challenges of Human Enhancement. The Hastings Center Report 33, no. 4, 2003: 21-30. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3528377
Monday April 27th:
Karlsson, Jens O.M., “Cryopreservation: Freezing and Vitrification” Science 296, no. 5568, 2002: 655-656. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3076555
And
Fukuyama, Francis “Transhumanism” Foreign Policy, no.144, 2004: 42-43. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4152980
Wednesday April 29th:
Discuss final projects. Last Day of Class!
Final: You can choose to either write a 8-10 page paper or do a Multimedia Project that is 5-10 minutes in length.
