AC103

FINAL TAKE-HOME ESSAY EXAM

INSTRUCTIONS: Please respond to two of the following questions. Each response should be approximately two pages (types, double-spaced) in length. Your responses are due before the end of exam period (absolutely no later than May 16). You are encouraged to consult all of the assigned materials for the course, but please do not discuss your responses with other members of the class.

Option 1: Several of the texts we have examined raise the specter of artificial intelligence -- of machines designed to approximate or exceed human or animal intelligence, strength, and response time. Focusing briefly on three texts, at least one of which appeared prior to 1955, discuss how Americans have imagined artificial intelligence at different points in time.

Option 1a: If you prefer, you can write a similarly structured essay about representations of the mad scientist instead of artificial intelligence.

Option 1b: You may also write about representations of the cyborg instead of artificial intelligence.

 

Option 2: Writing in 1893, Frederick Jackson Turner argued that the frontier experience was integral to American national identity. Turner expressed concern that the rise of a transcontinental, urban civilization, facilitated by revolutions in communications and transportation technologies, had compromised Americans' relationship to the frontier. And yet, as Turner predicted, the frontier myth and corresponding sense of Manifest Destiny persisted in twentieth-century American culture. Focusing on at least three texts, discuss how the American frontier myth has evolved in relation to technology from the nineteenth century to the present.

Option 3: Throughout the semester, we have noted that cultural constructions of technology intersect with cultural constructions of gender. Focusing on at least three examples, discuss that intersection. (If you prefer, you can substitute the category of nationality or race for that of gender in this question.)

Option 4: From nineteenth-century photography to late twentieth-century computer technology, machines have repeatedly revised Americans' conception of "the real." Focusing on three examples, discuss how particular technologies have affected Americans' perceptions of reality at different points in time.

Option 5: Another persistent theme in the course has been the relationship between technology and other forms of cultural expression, especially writing. Focusing on at least three examples, discuss how various texts have represented the relationship between literature and other higher art forms, on the one hand, and technology, on the other.