Small Infrastructures: Media, Technologies, Futures
Infrastructures often take the shape of enormous structures and digital networks, but they can also be small things. In this course, we will examine items such as seven-segment displays, film projectors,
typewriters, doors, utensils, packaging, and building codes. We will address the following two lines of
inquiry: (1) How have small infrastructures been imagined by films, architectures, policies, and high-tech companies? (2) How do small infrastructures shape power dynamics relate to ethnicity, gender, and class? Specifically, for whom have small infrastructures been designed? Who has been working alongside these small infrastructures? Our core material will be a set of texts including films, written documents, images, and material objects. In this composition course, we will learn to closely read not only written texts, but also visual and material objects.