CTCS 482 Transmedia Entertainment USC School of Units: 4.0 Fall—Monday—10:00 – 13:50 Location: SCA 216 Cinematic Arts Instructor: Kiki Benzon Critical Studies Division Office: SCI 101c Office Hours: Wednesdays, 14:00 – 15:00 or by appointment Contact Info: [email protected] T.A.: Erendira Espinoza-Taboada Office: SCA 221 Office Hours: Thursdays, 5:15pm – 6:15pm Contact Info: [email protected] Course Description This course investigates the historical, theoretical, and aesthetic dimensions of transmedia entertainment. Drawing from theories of multimodality and narratology, we will reflect on the formal complexity and narrative expansion potentiated by both digital and non-digital multimodal works. In thinking about how media forms converge to generate what Henry Jenkins calls “spreadable” and “drillable” storyworlds, we will examine contemporary transmedia products—from S tar Wars and The Lord of the Rings to Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead— as networked expressions across film, television, literature, games, the web, and other domains of representation and participation. Students will work analytically and creatively to build a critical understanding of transmedia entertainment—as both what it has been, and what it might become. Learning Objectives - understand theories of multimodality and mixed-media representation - analyze transmedia work in storytelling, journalism, advertising, education, activism, and art - consider the historical and aesthetic precedents for contemporary work in transmedia - examine the technological, design, and marketing strategies involved in creating successful transmedia works - critically assess the cultural forces governing the entertainment industry--and the nature and function of “entertainment” itself--from a variety of theoretical perspectives - work with team members to create a transmedia enterprise - discuss the creative, technical, and commercial components of transmedia entertainment with leading innovators in the industry 1 Required Readings and Supplementary Materials Jenkins, Henry, Sam Ford and Joshua Green. S preadable Media: Creating Value and Meaning in a Networked Culture. New York: New York University Press, 2014. Ryan, Marie-Laure, and Jan-Noel Thon, eds. S toryworlds Across Media: Towards A Media-Conscious Narratology. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2014. All additional readings will be provided through the course website or emailed to students as PDFs. Description and Assessment of Assignments Each student will deliver a 30-minute p resentation (20%) on a transmedia project or franchise that relates to the day’s assigned readings. As well as outlining the project’s history and structure--its evolution, cross-platform dynamics, stakeholders, etc.--the presenter should analyze the project in terms its aesthetic, technological, social, and/or other forms of cultural impact. Sign up for these presentations will occur in the first week of class. The e ssay (25%) will require students to write a critical analysis of some aspect of transmedia entertainment as it relates to contemporary culture. Given the limitations on essay length (2500-3000 words), the thesis should be sharply focused: advance a critical claim and support it through an analysis of one or two transmedia products. Potential topics will be provided, but a student may write on her or his own topic, so long as it is cleared with the instructor at least a week in advance of the due date. The t eam project (35%) constitutes the major deliverable for the course, and will require a good deal of creative and collaborative energy. You will be assigned to a group of peers, with whom you will imagine, plot, theorize, design, document, and pitch a transmedia project based on an existing narrative entertainment property. You will map out extensions of this property across multiple platforms towards narrative expansion and the enrichment of a coherent story world. At term’s end, you will present your project to a panel of industry specialists, and submit a bible that describes each narrative extension, reflects the aesthetic and technological contours of the project, and outlines methods for revenue generation, marketing, and dissemination. Participation (20%) constitutes an important part of the course, and it will be assessed in a number of ways. Part of the participation mark will be based on five entries posted by students to the course website by 17:00 on the day before class; these posts should include a brief commentary (a few paragraphs long) and a set of salient questions related to the week's reading assignment. The five posts will be worth 2% each (10% total). The other 10% of the participation mark will be based on the student’s level of engagement with ideas and themes in the course, as demonstrated by thoughtful and constructive contributions to class discussion and questions posed to presenters and guest speakers. Students can also participate by responding to peer entries on the course website, bringing to our attention course-related events or resources, or anything else that will enrich our understanding of transmedia entertainment. 2 Grading and Assignments Assignment Points % of Grade Essay 25 25% Presentation 20 20% Team Project 35 35% Participation 20 20% TOTAL 100 100% Assignment Submission Policy Written assignments should be submitted on time and in electronic form (PDF). Team project bibles can be submitted as hard copies during Exams Week. Contributions to the course forum should be submitted to the course website by 17:00 on the day before class (i.e. Sundays). Additional Policies Essays submitted after the due date will be penalized half a letter grade per day late to a maximum of four days, at which point the essay will receive a zero. Attendance is mandatory; if you need to miss class for medical reasons, please provide the instructor or T.A. with a doctor's note. Classes missed without documentation will result in a 2% deduction from your participation marks. Arriving late to and departing early from class is considered an absence. Laptops and tablets (but not phones) may be used during class, but only for note-taking or course-related web searches. Course Schedule: A Weekly Breakdown Please note: SAM = Storyworlds Across Media; SM = S preadable Media. WEEK 1: AUGUST 24 Introduction to Multimodality, Transmedia, and the Course Guest Speaker Jeff Watson is an artist, designer, and Assistant Professor of Interactive Media and Games at the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts. His work investigates how game design, pervasive computing, and social media can enable new forms of storytelling, participation, and learning. He is a Director at the Situation Lab, a design research laboratory cross-sited at USC and OCAD University, and is an associate faculty member at the USC Game Innovation Lab. He maintains a blog at remotedevice.net. 3 WEEK 2: AUGUST 31 The Institute Required Hull, Jeff. “Jeff Hull on the Games of Nonchalance.” Readings http://remotedevice.net/interviews/jeff-hull-on-the-games-of-nonchalance-a-guerrilla -street-war-against-banality-and-routine/ ---. “Trap Doors and Hatches All Around.” http://remotedevice.net/interviews/trap-doors-jeff-hull/ Guest Speaker Spencer McCall i s a director, editor, and producer, known for The Institute (2013), Rodeos Are Special (2009) and A rora (2014). The Institute is a documentary film that reconstructs the story of the “Jejune Institute,” an alternate reality game set in San Francisco, through interviews with the participants and creators. The game, produced in 2008, enrolled more than 10,000 players who, responding to eccentric flyers plastered all over the city, started the game by receiving their “induction” at the fake headquarters of the Institute, located in an office building in San Francisco’s financial district. Notes Screening: The Institute (2013) WEEK 3: SEPTEMBER 7 Labour Day – No Class WEEK 4: SEPTEMBER 14 Historical Context and Contemporary Transmedia Storytelling Required Adorno, Theodore, and Max Horkheimer. “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Readings Mass Deception.” Dialectic of Enlightenment: Philosophical Fragments. Edmund Jephcott (trans.). Stanford: Stanford UP, 2002. 95-139. Fiske, John. “Commodities and Culture.” U nderstanding Popular Culture. Oxon: Routledge, 1991. 23-47. Harvey, Colin. “A Taxonomy of Transmedia Storytelling.” SAM . 278-294. Jenkins, Henry. “Searching for the Origami Unicorn: T he Matrix and Transmedia Storytelling.” C onvergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. N ew York: New York UP, 2006. 93-130. ---. “Transmedia Storytelling 101.” http://henryjenkins.org/2007/03/transmedia_storytelling_101.html Suggested Freeman, Matthew. “Up, Up and Across: S uperman, the Second World War and the Readings Historical Development of Transmedia Storytelling.” Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television. 35.2 (2015): 215-239. Jenkins, Henry. “The Reign of Mothership” The Past, Present and Future of Transmedia.” Denise Mann (ed.). Wired TV: Laboring Over an Interactive Future. Rutgers UP, 2014. 244-269. Klinger, Barbara. “Pre-cult: Casablanca, radio adaptation, and transmedia in the 1940s.” New Review of Film and Television Studies. 13.1 (2015): 45-62. Guest Speaker Geoffrey Long ( www.geoffreylong.com ) is a storyteller, scholar, designer and 4 consultant exploring transmedia experiences and the future of media. Having previously been the lead Narrative Producer for Microsoft Studios, in a think tank under Microsoft's Chief Experience Officer and its Chief Software