Media Archaeology

The course aims to provide students with a general knowledge of the conceptual framework and the critical and theoretical tools of media archaeology, characterized by an interdisciplinary methodology that combines philosophy and critical theory with anthropology, the theory and history of cinema and media, and the history of technology. Through the in-depth analysis of selected case studies, the goal of the course is to reframe past, contemporary, or emerging media through an investigation of the dispositifs that anticipated them, as well as through an account of the genealogical processes and epistemic constructs that have informed their becoming. The course will particularly emphasise interrupted or dead-end paths, that have been neglected or overlooked from the institutional history of media and will pay special attention to the bodily techniques that the interaction with media implies. Through an archaeological approach to media and dispositifs, the course aims to offer a critical contribution both to further studies of media dynamics, and to future activities in the professional fields of multimedia design and communication.

Knowledge and understanding
At the end of the course, students
- will have developed awareness of the non-linear and discontinuous character of the history of media, becoming familiar with some of the methodologies proper to media archaeology
- will be able to identify connections between contemporary media and the media of the past, as well as to explain the relationship between the emergence of ideas and concepts in a certain historical epoch and the evolution of technologies and dispositifs

Ability to apply knowledge and understanding
At the end of the course, students are expected to be able to:
- put into practice a set of tool to analyse the history of media phenomena and to critically discuss the dominant media trend in history through alternative genealogical trajectories
- tackle different types of sources for an archaeological investigation of media (literary texts, audio-visual materials, optical and technological apparatuses)
- apply the conceptual framework addressed by the course to a critical analysis of contemporary media culture, relying upon the examination of the case studies
- employ the notions acquired in various professional contexts of communication, especially those concerned with the design, project, and management of media processes