The purpose of this course is not to produce expert web designers or computer coders; these are professions in their own right, one class could never provide all the knowledge and practice necessary. The goal for this course is to learn how to approach online communication rhetorically:
What are the affordances of various online spaces over non-digital print forms of publication? How does one determine one’s audience when an online text can potentially be accessed by people around the globe? How, as consumers of online texts, do we determine the reliability of what we read, see, and hear online? As producers of online texts, what do we need to know technically and consider rhetorically to effectively communicate? How do the enhanced multimodal components of online communication alter the rhetorical situation for readers and writers?
In order to compose online, we will learn the basics of the technologies that allow us to create web pages, blogs, and the digital audio, video, and still images that often make up parts of websites, but your success in the course is not dependent upon your ability to master any particular software program. Rather, your success depends upon your efforts to analyze your rhetorical situation and learn the technologies necessary for you to effectively produce online texts that meet the needs of that rhetorical situation.
Finally, while ample resources will be provided, many of the online texts we study will be supplied by you—as will much of the design of the texts you produce. In other words, your interests and questions about writing online will remain the center of this course.