Content, progress and pedagogy of the module

Objectives:

The digital revolution is having a great impact on cultural processes and society. Innovation runs at a high speed and there is a constant emergence of new paradigms and futuristic ideas for new developments and applications.

In this course students will have the opportunity to place their own work in the historical perspective of these developments, so they can effectively monitor and interpret current and future trends. Analytical tools are provided from a variety of disciplines in order to be on top of such rapid evolution in the field. Working with examples from, for instance, games, edutainment, performing arts, interactive storytelling, virtual reality, social media, and art installations, and by establishing comparisons with a wide range of media and art forms, students also learn how to work with, evaluate and design narrative structures as a key element for reconciling the interplay between immersion, engagement and interactivity in different creative applications.

Furthermore, the students also acquire knowledge on how to combine elements of persuasive communication and aesthetics in order to optimize the relation between content and convergent media technology. A final important objective of the course is to explore the dimensions of sustainability and social responsibility in interactive media technology.

Learning objectives

Knowledge

Students who complete the module will obtain the following qualifications:

• Understanding of the advent of digital culture in contemporary society
• Knowledge about new emerging and innovative technological paradigms
• Understanding about the social implications and the cultural context of interactive media technology and familiarity with the main academic disciplines that study digital culture
• Understanding of the importance and design implications of narrative structures in different applications of immersive and interactive media
• Knowledge about new methodologies for non-lineal interactive narrative and immersive story-telling.
• Broad understanding of the concepts behind virtuality (i.e. virtual, simulated and fictional worlds)
• Knowledge about a sustainability and ethical perspective of digital culture
• Knowledge about the cultural and creative industries

Skills

Students who complete the module will obtain the following qualifications:

• Be able to synthesize knowledge from a variety of academic disciplines such as anthropology, cultural studies, cybernetics, semiotics and economics to comprehend the cultural and social processes that originate with the development and expansion of new interactive, immersive and representational digital media
• Ability to analyse technologies in order to predict new trends of technological convergence and engage in innovative design
• Be able to analyse the trade-offs between immersion and interactivity in new digital systems as compared to other media and artistic forms
• Be able to analyse the specificities of cultural products and services based on digital media
• Be able to synthesize a rhetoric strategy and the aesthetic choices in the design of user experience in immersive and interactive applications

Competences

Students who complete the module will obtain the following qualifications:

• Be able to synthesize new fields of application for interactive, immersive and/or representational digital media
• Be able to synthesize case studies on particular current, emerging or future trends in the field.
• Be able to synthesize different theoretical perspectives and frameworks to contemplate user experience in narrative-based immersive and interactive applications
• Be able to analyse and characterize such emerging and future trends in terms of its contextual aspects and socio-cultural implications

Type of instruction

Refer to the overview of instruction types listed in § 17.

Exam

Exams