A lecture/seminar satisfying the second half of the Reading & Composition requirement, R4B offers structured and sustained practice in the processes used in reading, critical analysis, and writing. Students engage with thematically-related materials from a range of genres and media. In response, they craft short pieces leading to longer expository and/or argumentative essays. Students develop a research question, draft a research essay, gather, evaluate, and synthesize information from various sources. Elements of the research process--a proposal, an annotated bibliography, an abstract, a works cited list, etc.--are submitted with the final report in a research portfolio. Students write a minimum of 32 pages of prose.

Yellow Sunflower Fields with Blue Skies, Two Guys on a Bus, Queen Has Entered a New Phase, Bongo Cat, doge, (Dogecoin!), Success Kid, Grumpy Cat, Rickrolling, Honey Badger Don’t Care, LOLCats, Nyan Cat, and others, fresh, dank, or dead, form the vernacular memetic language of the Internet. They’re part of our larger media ecosystem that mindfulness enters to gain insights for building stronger, healthier, and friendlier community. Energizing a global, multimodal social phenomenon powerful through its fertile remixing quality (spreading like, well, Baby Yoda), internet memes are irreverent, playful, nonsensical, and political. We discuss and analyze motivations for communicating in memes, creative techniques, meme creators and sharers, and memes’ appealing polysemous nature that invites diverse audiences to interpret them differently. To become more savvy digital citizens, we look at and discuss what it means to be human in the Information Age . . . 4IR. We’ll also discuss techno-social features of memes, their role in phatic communities, their genres, the (unwritten) rules of meme-related conduct, and whether the connections memes create are more important than their content. We also explore best research practices, how research relates to conversation and community, and the myriad ways that Berkeley’s libraries and librarians empower these. Throughout the semester you focus on a key issue, topic, or question of your choice and engage in process-based research to build an articulate, sound portfolio of inquiry that includes an abstract, annotated bibliography, research paper, and research presentation, among other assignments. Book List: Required Book List: Phillips, Whitney, and Ryan M. Milner. You Are Here: A Field Guide for Navigating Polarized Speech, Conspiracy Theories, and Our Polluted Media Landscape. MIT Press, 2020. Shifman, Limor. Memes in Digital Culture. MIT Press, 2014.

Enrollment is restricted to students who have satisfied the first half of the Reading and Composition requirement. This course satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition requirement.

Requisites

• Previously passed an R_A course with a letter grade of C- or better. Previously passed an articulated R_A course with a letter grade of C- or better. Score a 4 on the Advanced Placement Exam in English Literature and Composition. Score a 4 or 5 on the Advanced Placement Exam in English Language and Composition. Score of 5, 6, or 7 on the International Baccalaureate Higher Level Examination in English.

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.

Requirements class fulfills