https://studiegids.vu.nl/en/courses/2025-2026/L_ZAMAACW022I) Knowledge and understanding:1) Students are able to identify, describe and understand recent media aesthetic developments, transformations and debates in relation to the environment and to situate them within a broader historical and/or theoretical context2) Students have demonstrable knowledge of relevant key concepts and corresponding terminology and methodologyII) Applying knowledge and understanding:3) Students are able to historically contextualize media phenomena, technologies and objects and apply theoretical frameworks and suitable terminology to discuss, interpret and critically analyze them.4) Students are able to relate own findings, views and approaches to current debates within the subject area.III) Making judgements:5) Students are able to critically compare current positions regarding media aesthetics and environments to define their position within the existing field of research IV) Communication:6) Students are able to lead an academic discussion, collaborate in groups, and present findings in class, and are equally able to plan and realize an independent research project, which results in an academic paper at a 400-level.The last few decades have witnessed a significant expansion of conceptual understandings of 'media,' both in terms of subject matter and theoretical approaches. The emergence of novel media objects and an increased focus on the intangible processes of mediation have reshaped our thinking about and with media. The course “Aesthetics of Media Environments” addresses these conceptual challenges by examining the aesthetic dimensions of contemporary media culture and their spatio-temporal interrelation with various environments. Aesthetic strategies, understood as more than mere acts of stylization or containers for content, organize perception, and structure interaction through and with media. These strategies are deeply intertwined with media economies, politics, and ecologies, encompassing but not limited to multiple environmental crises. This urges us to rethink forms of representation. So-called ‘hyperphenomena’, which elude direct human sensory perception due to their rapid, slow, distant, or imperceptible micro or macro scales, present challenges to human sensing and sense-making. Media, rather than being passive tools or mere extensions of the human sensory apparatus, actively participate in redefining and problematizing what it means 'to sense' under conditions where media become increasingly environmental while environments become heavily mediated. Media-saturated, responsive environments create specific 'sensing' milieus that operate with their own temporalities, transforming environments into milieus of mediation. The translation of data generated in these processes into intelligible and perceptible information (such as (moving) images, interfaces, diagrams, graphs, narratives, etc.) will be addressed as an urgent aesthetico-political issue of (more-than) human interfacing with environments and so-called 'nature.' The course explores how media technologies, multiple interfaces, and corresponding uses organize and reorganize perception. It investigates how media practices contribute to the formation and re-formation of different aesthetic regimes. The course engages with the aesthetic challenges posed by intensified global computation, ‘medianaturecultural’ interconnectedness, technological sense acts, and the emergence of ‘technoecologies of sensation’.Weekly seminar meetings incl. introductory lecture(s). Regular attendance is expected; attendance rules follow the Faculty Teaching and Examination Regulations (TER). Unexcused or repeated absences will lead to expulsion from the course.Moderation & in-class presentation incl. glossary term & literature research (30% of the final grade) & Final paper, (70% of the final grade, level 400) Both assignments have to be successfully completed to receive the final grade. The minimum passing grade for the seminar paper and the course as a whole is 6.0. Suspected plagiarism in any form –including AI-assisted – will always be reported to the Examination Board in accordance with Faculty regulations. Correlation of course objectives and assessment:Objective 1: presentation (glossary), final paperObjective 2: presentation (glossary), final paperObjective 3: presentation, final paperObjective 4: presentation, final paperObjective 5: presentation, final paperObjective 6: presentation, final paperCorrelation of course and end terms of the program: 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9.All required literature will be made available in the Canvas online environment.This course is compulsory for MA students of Comparative Arts and Media Studies (CAMS). Students of other tracks within the MA Arts and Culture, Heritage Studies, and the RMA Humanities, Critical Studies in Art and Culture, and exchange students may be admitted upon request. Please note that the number of places for non-CAMS students is limited and dependent on the size of the CAMS group in the respective year. Maximum of students in this course is 25.You need to register for this course yourself. The (de)registration deadlines can be found on VU.nl The maximum number of students for this course is 25.Students are expected to be proficient in all academic skills and research techniques expected of those with a university BA degree in the humanities. These include, among others, locating scientific literature, finding and delimiting primary and secondary sources and assessing their reliability, formatting a bibliography according to a stylesheet, structuring academic texts & arguments, writing a literature review, etc.