Overview
The Transcriptions Project (Transcriptions: Literature
and the Culture of Information) was originally
given a NEH grant of $30,000 (along with federal
matching funds of $15,000) for the three-year
period from August 1998 to June 2001. Subsequently,
the grant period was extended to June 2002 to
allow Transcriptions to take full advantage of
the private donation (and concomitant matching
funds) it received late in the grant period. During
the time of the project, three faculty participants
left Transcriptions because of other commitments
at UC Santa Barbara (Charles Bazerman, Carl Gutiérrez-Jones,
Mark Rose), while two others arrived at UC Santa
Barbara to join Transcriptions (Rita Raley, William
Warner). The final group of faculty participants
is as follows: Alan Liu (Principal Investigator),
Christopher Newfield, Carol Pasternack, Rita Raley,
William Warner. This group will continue to oversee
the project in its follow-up phase after the NEH
grant.
The following are the major activities conducted
by Transcriptions during 1998-2002 (see also NEH
Interim Performance Reports, http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/about/proposals/
index.asp#performance). The narrative of these
activities includes comparisons to the original
project proposal as well as to the scaled-back,
revised work plan submitted to the NEH on May
27, 1997 (to adapt to the actual amount of NEH
funding).
Curriculum Development
The original Transcriptions proposal called for
the creation of new undergraduate and graduate
courses on the relation between the humanities
(especially literature) and information culture.
These courses were to have followed two "tracks":
- one devoted to the contemporary social, economic,
political, and cultural contexts "that
now make information such a powerful paradigm,"
- the other focused upon the "history and
theory of orality, literacy, manuscript culture,
early print culture, the book, the archive and
library, the technology of the canon (e.g.,
publishing history), literature as an academic
discipline, copyright, etc.—i.e., the
related contexts that have always made literature
itself an "information technology."
This goal has been met with the creation of such
undergraduate and graduate courses spanning the
above-described tracks as "Hypertext Fiction
and Poetry," "Business Culture,"
"Theory and Cultural History of 20th Century
Media," "Scroll to Screen," or
"Enlightenment Communications." (See
catalogue of Transcriptions courses: http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/curriculum/index.asp).
The goal of creating a "core" survey
course was also met through the development of
the lower-division lecture course, English
25: The Culture of Information.
As specified in the project proposal, most of
these courses have a full-featured Web site and
require students to learn information-technology
skills to conduct online research as well as to
create online content (typically: a Web project).
Students are supported in their technical learning
by workshops, drop-in technical support hours
with Transcriptions teaching assistants, and online
help guides created for the project. (See Resources
below.) In addition, graduate courses have been
supplemented by a substantial number of research
and teaching assistantships that allow students
to work closely with faculty in research, teaching,
colloquia, and technical development. (Typically,
two to three graduate students serve each quarter
as a research or teaching assistant. During the
grant period, 19 graduate students have been Transcriptions
assistants.)
The major qualitative change
in curricular plans was the creation midway through
the grant period of a new Literature
and Culture of Information (LCI) specialization
for undergraduate English Majors at UC Santa Barbara.
The specialization, in which English majors take
a minimum of four Transcriptions courses and participate
in extracurricular activities that include colloquia,
undergraduate research teams, and field trips
to technology laboratories, gives more shape to
the Transcriptions curriculum. Especially successful
have been the LCI undergraduate research teams,
each of which work under the supervision of a
Transcriptions teaching assistant (and report
to the full Transcriptions faculty and graduate-student
team) to produce research articles, bibliographies,
and interviews on topics relating to information
culture. (For more information on the LCI, see
http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/curriculum/lci/;
see also NEH
Interim Performance Reports.)
In quantitative terms, the revised project work
plan of 1997 had predicted the development of
13 course designs (called "modules"
in the proposal) to be taught in 19 instances
(10 undergraduate, 9 graduate). During the actual
grant period, Transcriptions developed 16 such
course designs and taught them in 20 instances
(15 undergraduate, 5 graduate). (The increase
in the proportion of undergraduate classes over
that predicted in the work plan is owing to the
creation of the LCI specializations, described
above.) The average enrollment in classes numbered
English 100-196 was 35. The average enrollment
in English 197 (senior seminars) was 15. And the
average enrollment in graduate classes (numbered
200 and above) was 8-15. English 25, the lower-division
lecture course, averaged 40-45 students in each
of the two years it has so far been taught. (Full
list of Transcriptions courses: http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/curriculum/index.asp#courses)
Research Development
One of the major changes that has occurred since
the original project proposal is the development
of a stronger research focus to complement curricular
activities. Based on faculty and graduate-student
interests in the area of the humanities and information
culture, this research was woven into project
activities to support the Transcriptions curriculum
through such extracurricular activities as colloquia
or visits to class by experts, undergraduate research
teams, etc. The main Transcriptions research activities
are as follows:
- Faculty Research: Transcriptions faculty
conduct research that contributes to, showcases,
or otherwise complements the Transcriptions
project. This research includes forthcoming
or in-progress books on the culture of information,
the relation of the humanities to business culture,
digital textuality, and network culture from
the Enlightenment to the present. It also includes
many talks given by Transcriptions faculty that
showcase the project. Recent talks featuring
Transcriptions include Alan Liu's presentations
at the National
Endowment for the Humanities, Vanderbilt
University, and the 2001
ACH-ALLC conference at NYU (streaming audio
file);Rita Raley's talk on "The Object
as Code" at the Technoptopias conference,
Univ. of Strathclyde, Glasgow, 2002 , and William
Warner's talk on "After 9/11: Wiring Networks
for Security and Liberty" at the Consortium
of Humanities Chairs at Univ. of Minnesota in
2001. (See Faculty Research: http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/research/index.asp#faculty;
see also Talks/Essays About Transcriptions:
http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/research/talks-essays/index.asp)
- Graduate-Student Research:
Graduate students participating in Transcriptions
either as research/teaching assistants or as
students in courses have created a majority
of the research "Topics Pages" for
the Transcriptions Web site (part of the original
project proposal). Topics pages provide overviews,
timelines, bibliographies, discussions of critical
issues, and other resources on specific topics
related to information culture. Examples of
Topics Pages include Jennifer Jones's Virtual
Realities & Imaginative Literature and
Christopher Schedler's Native
American Literature, Oral Tradition, Internet.
(See Topics Pages: http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/research/
topics/index.asp) Graduate students have
also helped create other Transcriptions research
resources, including the Transcriptions Bookshelf
and Guide to Electronic Literature (see below).
- Undergraduate Research: Undergraduates
enrolled in Transcriptions courses have also
contributed research Topics Pages. In addition,
undergraduates in the Literature & Culture
of Information (LCI) research teams have created
research projects on information culture for
the project's LCI Magazine (http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/curriculum/lci/magazine/index.asp).
(See above for description of
the LCI)
- Colloquium Series: New to the project
since its original proposal is the Transcriptions
Colloquium Series, which each year brings speakers
from various fields and professions into contact
with Transcriptions faculty and students. Although
formats for particular colloquia vary, the emphasis
is on small, intimate workshops or seminars
allowing for face-to-face discussion of key
issues and works. Colloquia, for example, have
included forums given by William Paulson, Richard
Grusin, J. Hillis Miller, Matthew G. Kirschenbaum,
M. D. Coverley, Michael Heim, Lev Manovich,
and Metacollege, Inc., as well as faculty and
graduate students from various UCSB departments.
(See Colloquium Series: http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/research/colloquia/index.asp)
- Transcriptions Bookshelf: The Bookshelf,
which is new to the project since its original
proposal, is a searchable database of reviews
and annotations of works in a variety of media
relevant to digital culture and new media. These
reviews are written by Transcriptions faculty
and students about works that they have been
reading/viewing in connection with their research
or teaching. Entries include, for example, reviews
of Daniel Aronofsky's Pi,
William Gibson's Agrippa,
Lawrence Lessig's Code
and Other Laws of Cyberspace, and Marie-Laure
Ryan's Cyberspace
Textuality. (See full Bookshelf
)
- Guide to Electronic Literature: During
the grant period, Transcriptions purchased the
full library of hypertext and other electronic
literature creative-writing works published
by the Eastgate Systems company (publisher of
the most influential, first-generation electronic
fiction and poetry). Subsequently, Transcriptions
graduate students created the Guide to Electronic
Literature to help instructors and students
use the Eastgate works (and, in the future,
other works). The Guide includes descriptions
as well as bibliographical information. (See
Guide to Electronic Literature: http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/research/new_media/elit_index.asp)
Online Resources Development
As planned in its project proposal, Transcriptions
has developed online materials to support the
use of digital technology, new media, and the
Internet in humanities instruction and research.
While some of these resources are specific to
the project (e.g., tutorials for technology in
the Transcriptions digital studio or the Coursebuilder
system that allows UC Santa Barbara English Dept.
faculty to publish course web sites), many are
designed to be generally useful and to serve Transcription's
larger mandate as a demonstration project. Transcriptions
uses these resources to complement the hands-on
guidance it also provides through workshops and
drop-in technical support hours. The main online
resources developed by Transcriptions are the
following:
- Project Web site
(http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu)
- As planned in the project proposal, Transcriptions
has created a large-scale Web site to facilitate
both the intramural teaching and research
functions of the project and the extramural
task of demonstrating Transcriptions as
a paradigm for integrating digital technology
in the core mission of a humanities department.
During the grant period, in fact, Transcriptions
went through two generations of its Web
site. The first (online from 1998-2001;
currently archived at http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/archive)
served to present the main ideas of the
project as it was in the process of development.
The second (the current site) was redesigned
to showcase actual accomplishments as well
as such new developments as the Literature
& Culture of Information specialization.
- Besides providing access to each of the
main areas of the project (curriculum, research,
resources, events, etc.), the Transcriptions
web site includes an extensive "about"
section that describes the assumptions,
goals, history, and practical details of
the project for the benefit of other humanities
departments seeking to create similar initiatives.
The "about" section also contains
the full text of funding proposals and performance
reports for the NEH as well as other funding
agencies.
- The Transcriptions Web site contains a
"resources" section that includes
the below online guides and help materials:
- Guides to Online Learning
& Research:
- Online Research Resources (library
catalogues, digital text archives, periodical
indices, etc.; includes both general-access
and UCSB-only resources) http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/learning/research_resources.asp
- Online Reference Resources (dictionaries,
thesauri, atlases, encyclopedias, etc.)
http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/learning/reference_resources.asp
- Online Resources for Writing and Speaking
(grammar and style guides, writing tips,
advice on oral presentations, etc.) http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/learning/writing_resources.asp
- Evaluating & Citing Online Resources
(checklists, exercises, examples, and annotated
links; also includes a printable form to
use in tracking and evaluating online sites)
http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/learning/evaluating_citing.asp
- Guides to Transcriptions (LCI) Course Technology:
- Resources for Instructors:
- Guide to Teaching with Information
Technology (annotated links to resources
and tools for designing courses utilizing
IT; also includes example sites) http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/instructors/teaching_with_IT.asp
- Coursebuilder (UCSB English Dept.
login required): Programmed by Eric Weitzel,
a Transcriptions research and teaching assistant,
Coursebuilder is a custom system that allows
UCSB English Department instructors to create
full-fledged course Web sites through the
use of Web forms. Course sites include pages
for overviews, schedules of reading, assignments,
student projects, etc., as well as class
notes pages (for outlines, texts, or multimedia
to be used during class meetings). Course
content is kept in a SQL Server database
that dynamically generates Web pages. Instructors
may choose one of a number of front end"skins"
for the display of their course site depending
on the nature of the course. Skins exist
for courses given by the Transcriptions
project and the UCSB English Department's
Early Modern Center and American Cultures
Center. There is also a skin for UCSB English
Department courses in general. (Example
of course created with Coursebuilder)
- Online Resource Evaluation Checklist
(printable form with questions to help students
evaluate the quality and trustworthiness
of online resources) http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/learning/evaluation_checklist.asp
Technology Facilities Development
- As planned in the project
proposal, Transcriptions used its NEH grant
and a specific $50,000 cost-sharing contribution
from UC Santa Barbara's College of Letters &
Science to create the Transcriptions Studio
(see http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/tech/
tech_facilities.asp#facilities). a combination
research-and-development lab and seminar room
located in the UCSB English Department (South
Hall 2509). The completed studio holds computers
at one end and a seminar table at the other
so as to create a hybrid space of intellectual
and practical use. Currently, the studio contains
eight workstations (450-500 Mhz PCs with 19-inch
and 21-inch monitors running Windows 2000),
a digital projector, two high-performance laptops
for mobile classroom and conference presentations,
a
 scanner,
a printer, a mini-DVD camcorder and Web cam,
and audio recording equipment. These machines
are networked to a set of servers managed by
the English Department (Web server, database
server, LAN-server, and domain name server).
The studio, which holds up to about 20 people,
is a mixed-use space where faculty and students
develop Web sites and classes or meetings are
held. It is not unusual to see students working
on the computers at one end of the room while
a class or colloquium occurs at the other end.
- In addition to what was
planned in the project proposal, Transcriptions
won a grant from the UC Santa Barbara Humanities
and Fine Arts Division that allowed it to pool
resources with the English Department to create
a new Multi-Station Computer Classroom. (See
http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/resources/guides/tech/tech_facilities.asp#multi)
This classroom significantly extends the instructional
use of information technology. It holds up to
36 people and includes the following equipment:
- In-place instructor's computer station
and digital projector
- Five networked laptops, each switchable
to the digital projector
- Ethernet ports for additional laptops
(brought by students or conference participants)
- Web cam and microphone equipment for meetings
with remote guest speakers
- VCR and DVD players
Such a multi-station, networked, and scalable
classroom gives Transcriptions an opportunity
to design new kinds of instructional activities
and assignments. Because of the limitations
of previous classrooms and infrastructure
(typically limited to one instructor's computer
and digital projector), Transcriptions was
in the past constrained in the way it used
instructional information technology (IT)—such
that, for example, the in-class display of
student Web projects was segregated from the
actual collaborative work needed to make such
projects (which occurred in a separate computing
lab facility) as well as from the online discussion
of such projects (which occurred asynchronously
by e-mail). Such compartmentalized IT made
it difficult to synthesize the right mixture
of IT practices. It also made it hard to consolidate
IT practices with face-to-face class discussion.
Transcriptions developed new pedagogical
methods and tools for the multi-station classroom
during summer 2002 and is currently preparing
for a demo presentation in Oct. 2002. These
methods and tools include:
- Participatory use of IT during class
discussion. Up to now, Transcriptions
instructors have usually used IT in the
classroom only to show students particular
digital resources (the equivalent of saying
to the class, "turn to page 121 in
your book") or to allow a single student
at a time to show a work or project. There
has been no good way for listening students
to participate actively in the use of IT
so that they can say in response, "Look
here instead" or "Look at it in
this way (invoking a different configuration
of the program, enacting a different algorithm
upon the data set, etc.). Transcriptions
hasis developed pedagogies that allow students
to take an active role in showing/commenting
on digital works during group discussion.
- Collaborative, team-based Web-authoring
assignments. Each quarter, Transcriptions/LCI
gives workshops for students on Web-authoring
basics and sets up times in labs so that
students can work together on assignments.
But such activities are not well suited
to the standard IT-equipped classroom in
which there is only a single computer and
projector; nor is it well suited to campus
labs where, though there are multiple stations,
the configuration of the computers, choice
of software, etc., are not controlled by
the faculty and cannot be accessed for group
activities at need (without advance scheduling).
Transcriptions uses its new Multi-Station
Computing Classroom to accommodate in-class
team-working on student projects and in-class
presentation/discussion of such projects.
- Real-time "chat" visits
with participating experts and other students
around the world. One of the highest
priorities of Transcriptions/LCI has been
to develop pedagogies that can take advantage
of a multi-station classroom to offer "real-time,"
in-class visits with people in remote locations—visits
in which the usual problems of chat environments
(e.g., a tendency toward fragmentation of
discourse) can be offset by a live sense
of community and the guidance of the instructor.
There are two uses of such pedagogy that
the project is implementing in particular:
- Chats with experts on information
technology and information culture,
including faculty at other universities,
researchers in engineering or science
labs, and people from the government
and business sectors of society. (Prof.
Rita Raley conducted a proof-of-concept
demonstration of a class chat visit
in her English 165 course.)
- Real-time interaction with courses
at other universities in the U. S. and
around the world.
- In-class discussion of complex, multimedia
works. One of the difficulties in teaching
recent "new media" literature
and art is that the works created by experimenters
in digital or networked literature/art are
very difficult to "show" in class.
For example, a work on CD-ROM or an online
work that is navigated through Flash or
Javascript links cannot easily be shown
because an instructor is unable to "link"
to the appropriate page but must instead
laboriously navigate to that page. Other
new-media or online works require significant
load-times. And some new-media literary/artistic
works purposefully disable the normal navigational
tools in a Web browser (e.g., the "back"
button) or create abnormal digital experiences
(e.g., art works that appear to take over
a user's browser automatically or create
non-standard interfaces that make it impossible
for a user to tell another user where to
click/go to see a particular page). Given
these circumstances, Transcriptions and
its Literature & Culture of Information
specialization for undergraduates is creating
pedagogies that utilize the multi-station
capabilities of its new classroom to mount
a repertory of sites and pages, each of
which can be switched to the digital projector
for display.
- New uses of digital sound in courses.
In keeping with the quick evolution of hypertext
fiction and poetry to new media writing,
teaching and research in Transcriptions/LCI
investigates material, literary, and aesthetic
artifacts whose properties include word,
image, motion, and sound. In one course,
for example, Professor Rita Raley links
two modes of experimental writing (visual
poetry and sound poetry) to digital new
media, a focus that encouraged students
to incorporate sound into their own Web-based
final projects. To facilitate pedagogy in
the areas of sound and recording media,
Transcriptions has acquired a high-quality
microphone and digital sound mastering software
for its studio and will be developing accompanying
pedagogical methods and resources (guides
for student research and practice of digital
sound, annotated examples of the way sound
is used in contemporary digital poetry,
bibliographies of resources, etc.).
Follow
Up
The original project proposal stated that Transcriptions
"in its concluding year . . .
will convene a series of planning meetings dedicated
to setting up a fully interdisciplinary 'Culture
of Information' program at UCSB." Because
of changing institutional circumstances, Transcriptions
has in fact followed a different route toward
a follow-up phase:
- Intramural: Within the sphere of UC
Santa Barbara, Transcriptions has created its
Literature
& the Culture of Information (LCI) specialization
for undergraduates (see description
above). This specialization comes with a
continuing commitment from the UCSB English
Dept. to support Transcriptions at the level
of at least one teaching assistant each quarter
(in addition to faculty instructional time),
with additional assistance dependent on other
funding sources. (See Fund
Raising below.) The LCI provides a focus
for continued research and curricular development
in the Transcriptions project. In addition,
Transcriptions is planning to create in the
English
Dept. a corresponding track for graduate students
(a "field" in information culture).
- Extramural: Outside the context of
UC Santa Barbara, Transcriptions was the inspiration
behind a successful proposal by William Warner
(Transcriptions participant) to initiate a "multi-campus
research group" in the the University of
California system called the Digital Culture
Project (DCP). Funded by the University of California
President's Office and directed by Prof. Warner,
the DCP is headquartered at UCSB in affiliation
with Transcriptions. Its main goal is to weave
together humanities and social science faculty
and graduate students from across the UC system
whose work bears upon digital technology and
culture. Each year, the DCP sponsors conferences,
graduate conferences, summer institutes, and
a residential fellowship at UCSB. (See Digital
Cultures Project: http://dc-mrg.english.ucsb.edu)
As exemplified by the presentation by Transcriptions
project participants Robert Adlington, Jeremy
Douglass, and Alan Liu at the 2001 DCP Summer
Institute, the DCP provides Transcriptions with
an opportunity to demonstrate its paradigm for
humanities-based computing to a wide network
of humanities researchers, instructors, and
students both from the UC system and from other
campuses.
.
- Publications: Though the original project
proposal did not predict that this would be
the case, the print publication of faculty research
will be another avenue of disseminating the
Transcriptions paradigm of humanities technology.
Project director Alan Liu's book, The Laws
of Cool: The Culture of Information (forthcoming,
Stanford Univ. Press) draws upon and features
the Transcriptions project in its concluding
part to make its argument about the pressing
need for the humanities to engage with information
culture, and vice versa.
Fund Raising
- Intramural: Transcriptions has been
very successful in using its NEH grant as a
catalyst to secure substantial one-time and
continuing cost-sharing funds from a variety
of agencies at the Univ. of California, Santa
Barbara. Highlights of funds raised from campus
resources include:
- $50,000 from the UCSB College of Letters
& Science to help fund the creation
of the Transcriptions Studio (see
above), followed by an additional $16,300
for equipment and furnishings
- Funding during each of the years 1998,
1999, 2000, and 2002 ($16,301, $12,000,
$14,000, and $15,000, respectively) from
the UCSB Instructional Improvement Program
for developing new courses and pedagogy
- $4,300 (plus additional teaching-assistant
salaries channeled through the English Dept.)
from the UCSB Division of Humanities &
Fine Arts for development of Transcription's
LCI specialization (see above).
- Continuing yearly cost-sharing support
from the UCSB English Department for faculty
and teaching assistant salaries, hardware,
software, supplies, and other costs.
- Extramural: Transcriptions has engaged
in a series of extramural fund-raising efforts.
Activities during the grant period include the
following:
- The project developed a database of UCSB
English department alumni and mailed a letter
requesting help with funding to approximately
600 of these contacts.
- Transcriptions faculty members Alan Liu
and William Warner worked with the UCSB
Development Office and the Dean of Humanities
to present the project at a meeting of the
UCSB Foundation, a private foundation that
supports university activities.
- Transcriptions director Alan Liu presented
the project to the Friends of the UCSB English
Department, a private group of community
members who help support the English Dept.
- Transcriptions director Alan Liu presented
the project at a donor event series called
the UCSB Chancellor's Community Breakfasts.
- Transcriptions faculty members Alan Liu
and William Warner worked with the UCSB
Development Office and the Dean of Humanities
to present the project before a group of
Santa Barbara area executives in the business,
software, and media fields who help fund
or organize sponsorship of campus engineering
and other programs.
- Transcriptions worked with the UCSB Development
Office and Dean of Humanities to secure
a gift of $12,000 from a private donor,
Richard Auhll, founder of the Circon corporation.
Fund-raising activities #1 and #6 were successful
in meeting the goal of $15,000 in gifts
necessary to release Transcription's federal
matching funds. However, other fund-raising
activities were unproductive. For more detail
on fund-raising activities, see NEH Interim
Performance Reports: http://transcriptions.english.ucsb.edu/about/proposals/
index.asp#performance
External Evaluation
The revised work plan for Transcriptions anticipated
visits by three extramural scholars for the combined
purpose of giving presentations at UCSB and evaluating
the project. In actuality, Transcriptions was
able to sponsor one such evaluation visit by J.
Hillis Miller, a scholar whose international influence
and recent book Black Holes (Stanford Univ.
Press, 1999) on the relationship between humanities
scholarship and information technology made him
particularly well-suited to the task. Prof. Miller's
evaluation letter of Jan. 27, 2000 is on file
with the NEH (and is also appended to the print-version
of this report).
The primary reason for curtailing additional
extramural evaluation visits (which, according
to the work plan, would have been from scholars
geographically distant from the West Coast) was
cost. Fully-reimbursed, extended visits by extramural
scholars are very expensive as compared, for example,
with visits by speakers in the Transcriptions
Colloquium Series (to whom the project offered
only small honoraria and had no obligation for
travel or lodging expenses). Transcriptions thus
cut back on long-distance, extended, fully-reimbursed
extramural visits because it of its need to work
within its scaled-back budget and also because
the most substantial portion of its private funding
(and its federal matching grants) did not materialize
until the very end of its original three-year
grant period. |
