Class Overview

Overall, I enjoyed the class. I felt that the topics we discussed were interesting and appealed to me as a student since the material wasn't presented in the typical mundane manner that I was used to. I felt that the visual presentations eg. videos, photos, etc were a great help and related well to the themes presented in the Media Literacy Book and Rhetoric of Popular Culture. I thought that some aspects of the media literacy weren't as interesting as I would have thought. The chapters were in fact short and clear but sometimes I felt that they didn't pertain to the class in terms of what the course title was. I originally expected the course to be all about American popular culture and solely focus on advertisements and critiquing such visuals and methods but it was nice to take a different approach and look deeper into the reasons for which we consume what we do and rationalize the messages presented to us by the media. I really enjoyed the culture jams the most and being able to be creative with creating visual statements. The "Slap Chop" was the best! I also liked that the class environment was welcoming of all discussion topics and that there was room to come up with new ideas along the way and not solely stick to the syllabus. There was a lot of freedom and I liked that as the class progressed we were given control over what we wanted our final projects.

My only concerns were really with the blogs. Originally I was having a difficult time understanding what exactly was expected since to me a blog is all about free writing and jotting down one's opinions on certain subjects. Once I realized that there needed to be more integration from the text I felt a little bit better about writing them but sometimes was overwhelmed between the class blogs and syllabus blogs. I know that the purpose was to get a deeper sense of the material and become a more critical consumers but at times I found it a bit difficult to manage it all, especially since the class discussions sometimes didn't always apply to the book or where we were supposed to be in the syllabus. My suggestion would be that instead of necessarily calling them blogs, treat them as minor essay assignments in which all aspects of writing would be required so that students don't think they can just write down what they think about the matter and formulate it to read more like an essay with text references and with works cited. And to make a clear distinction between when In Class blogs were do and Syllabus blogs so that they don't become overwhelming considering that you are looking for well thought out, critical responses. Other than the blogs, I enjoyed every aspect of the class. I thought it was fun and enjoyed going to class. I never felt like I didn't want to go and liked the topic discussions as well as all of the personal side stories, which were often quite comical and made for a relaxing class environment.