Literature and Media

For this assignment, you will create an essay related to the film and book versions of No Country for Old Men. The essay should feature clips from the film and can also use materials on the Web. 

The challenge here is to transcend the print essay mode. The genre is Web essay, meaning you can weave links and media into the text. But replicating paper makes no sense. How can you give an essay its own rhythm and vibe through sound, or image, moving and still? How can you mix words with media elements to bring out your ideas and make sense of stories?

Thought this piece from the Washington Post might resonate with some of the thinking offered by Shirky. 

Cruel Mistress" by flogging molly

Clay Shirky discusses "lolcats" in Chapter 1, and even nominates the process of making a lolcat as the "stupedist possible creative act."  I'm not a fan, but I thought that those unfamiliar with lolcats might appreciate an example.

The crux of of Shirky's argument seems to be that people today are spending so much time watching television because we have too much free time on our hands.  As Shirky explains, television has absorbed the lion's share of our unoccupied time as the population is "living longer and working less."  

But where is all this free time that he refers to?  As college students, we have little spare time during our work week to participate in leisurely activities, let alone watch enless hours of television.

This is an essay that is a precursor to Nicholas Carr's book, The Shallows, referenced in Steven Johnson's article

You don't have to read this article. I'm just going to talk about some passages in class.