[Air-L] Thoughts on "New Media Culture" class?

[Joseph Reagle]

Next semester I will be teaching an undergraduate course on "New Media Culture." While not necessary -- I can design the course as I wish -- I intend to be rather literal: focusing on the cultures of new media communities. This prompts three questions on which I welcome thoughts.

1. I still feel obliged to introduce new media in a historical and theoretical frame. ("New media" has been a topic of study longer than most students have lived.) That is, a concise introduction to the key periods, concepts, and figures. For example, in terms of periods, one can see the issue of hyper-textuality and narrative in the early 90s, questions of community and identity in the mid-90s, and more recently we have "social media." (Perhaps a small reference work (dictionary/encyclopedia) would be handy.)
2. What is an appropriate lens for exploring and comparing new media cultures? For example, values, identity (including anonymity), power, gender/race, boundaries, pro-sociology, language/jargon, and relation to other cultures (including the mainstream). In a related course, we encountered all these issues, but I was thinking it would be nice to have something up front.
3. What are some good cases and readings on new media cultures -- again focussing on the cultural aspects? (For example, the Well (historic), Anonymous, Facebook, Wikipedia, etc.).