Course MCM 0230: Digital Media

I want to use this week’s blog post as a space to discuss what this class has taught me. Never having taken an MCM class before, I began this class thinking that the subjects we would learn would be far from applicable to the real world. While many of the readings and themes we discussed in lecture are framed in highly theoretical ways, the main ideas we gather informs our understanding of how digital media affects us in our daily lives. From the “promiscuity” of my computer through its shared networks to the possibility of exposure, this class taught me how to recognize and how to be critical of the technologies that surround me. While it is easy to trust technology because of the benefits that it provides us, it is also easy to hate technology because of accounts, such as those of Edward Snowden, that demonstrate how the technologies we love can be used against us. While it can be scary to realize the hold that technologies have in our lives (before this class I didn’t think it ran so deep), I have also learned to not fear the technology since knowing how something works reduces the fear of it.