Announcements

MACS faculty member Christian Sandvig on American Public Media Marketplace

Listen to Christian Sandvig discussing new wireless white space technology on Marketplace. New high speed wireless Internet.

MACS affiliate faculty members win Helen Corley Petit Award

In addition to promotion to Associate Professor with tenure, two Media and Cinema Studies affiliate faculty members, Anna Stenport (Germanic Languages and Literatures and Scandinavian Studies) and JB Capino (English), have been awarded the Helen Corley Petit Award, which is given to promotion dossiers that have been recognized for their excellence and extraordinary accomplishments during the tenure probation period by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Cameron McCarthy to take part in upcoming lecture series, "Visualizing the Global Context"

Cameron McCarthy, professor of media and cinema studies, will take part in the upcoming lecture series, "Visualizing the Global Context." The series promotes a discussion of the importance of cultural knowledge and the proliferation of images to the central problem of social integration of twenty-first century social actors into late modern life defined as it is by processes of globalization. With lectures scheduled throughout the month, McCarthy will speak on “YouTube, Music, Mobility and the New World Diaspora” on May 20. The series is an online presentation, viewable in Room 323 in the College of Education, at 1 p.m. This seminar is sponsored by the Global Studies in Education On-Campus Program.

Kevin Hamilton received New Digital Humanities Start-Up grant from National Endowment for the Humanties

Kevin Hamilton, media and cinema studies affiliiate faculty member, has received a New Digital Humanities Start-Up grant from the National Endowment for the Humanties to support the development of a prototype platform for studying and exhibiting digitized historical films, using government films documenting the development of the United States nuclear weapons program. His project, titled "Re‑Framing the Online Video Archive: A Prototype Interface for America’s Nuclear Test Films," will be funded at the level of $49,999.

MACS professor Cameron McCarthy presented keynote at education and immigration conference in Spain

Cameron McCarthy, professor of media and cinema studies, was invited to give the keynote address for the conference entitled "VII SIMPOSI: Llengua, educació i immigració" did at the University of Girona in Spain in November of last year. He was interviewed on his research on identity in the context of neoliberal transformation taking place in the 21stcentury and his specific reflections on theorizing race and cultural identity post my 1994 publication of Racismo y Currículum by Morata Press in Madrid, Spain. The interview was just published in the journal Mugak (2011, n. 54).

Valdivia honored by International Communications Association for feminist scholarship

Angharad Valdivia, department head of media and cinema studies and interim director of the Institute of Communications Research. Read more...

Cinema Studies doctoral minor to join Drew University faculty

Audrey Evrard (Ph.D. student in French, with a Cinema Studies minor) will be joining the faculty of Drew University (NJ) in the Fall as Assistant Professor of French.

MACS professor Lisa Nakamura to present Attallah lecture at Carleton University

Lisa Nakamura, professor of media and cinema studies, will present the Attallah Lecture part of the 6th annual conference sponsored by the Communication Graduate Caucus at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. Her talk, "'Flag as Inappropriate': Neglected Discourses of Racism, Sexism and Homophobia in Online Games," will be presented Thursday, Mar. 10, at 5 p.m. at the Marriott Hotel, 100 Kent St.

MACS graduate minor Jing Jing Chang named assistant professor in global cinema at Wilfrid Laurier University

Jing Jing Chang (Cinema Studies Graduate Minor, History Ph.D. candidate) has accepted a position as an Assistant Professor in Global Cinema in the Department of English and Film Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada. She will defend her dissertation, "Towards a Local Community: Colonial Politics and Postwar Hong Kong Cinema," on April 7, 2011, and will begin her new job in August, 2011.

Molina-Guzman to present Annenberg research seminar at USC

Professor Isabel Molina-Guzman, associate professor of Latina/Latino studies and research associate professor in the Institute of Communications Research, has been invited to give an Annenberg Research Seminar Lecture at the University of Southern California on Monday, March 7. Her talk, "From J.Lo to Sotomayor: Critical Reflections on the Commodification of US Latinidad," will cover the ways in which transnational, multiethnic, racially flexible Latina/o identities and bodies are deployed by the U.S. media are central to making sense of contemporary discourses about ethnicity, race and gender. "By reflecting on examples from the past ten years of news, television, film and online discourses about US Latinas/os, I explore the limits, possibilities and consequences of Latinas' contemporary global marketability," she said. "Using the concepts of 'symbolic colonization' and 'symbolic ruptures,' I think through how symbolic value is inscribed upon mediations of Latinidad and how the signifiers of Latinidad are in turn redeployed to produce moments of cultural resistance." More information.

Call for Entries: Edwin Jahiel Undergraduate Writing Award

The Department of Media and Cinema Studies announces the annual Edwin Jahiel Undergraduate Student Writing Award. Submissions will be accepted until the Maarch 9 deadline. The Department will award $250 for a research paper in the area of Cinema Studies, written by an undergraduate student. This award honors the numerous contributions of Dr. Edwin Jahiel, professor of French and Cinema Studies and founding director of the Unit for Cinema Studies. Download more information (PDF).

MACS professor to deliver keynote at Canadian communication conference in June

Lisa Nakamura, professor of media and cinema studies, Asian American students and gender and women's studies, will deliver the keynote address to the Canadian Communication Association's annual conference in June 2011 at the University of New Brunswick & St. Thomas University, New Brunswick. Her talk, "Race, Labor, and Indigeneity: The Birth of the New Media in the American West," will address issues of racialized labor. The abstract includes the following description, "Contemporary digital media production centers on the Asia-Pacific region--Silicon Valley and China, sites where software and hardware are made. Asians and Asia have become racialized as digital; the "nimble fingers" of Asian women are a key resource in digital industries. However, this gendering and racialization of computer manufacture as women of colors' work has a forgotten earlier history. In 1970 Fairchild Corporation, a key electronics manufacturer, opened a fab plant on the Shiprock Indian reservation in New Mexico and became the largest employer of Indians in the U.S. Asian and Indian women were included in similar industrial discourses of racialized labor, lack of mobility, and docility that inform digital production cultures today."

MACS professor contributed to College of Engineering report on Chilean earthquake

Angharad Valdivia, department head of Media and Cinema Studies, contributed to the Mid America Earthquake Center's recent report, "The Maule (Chile) Earthquake of February 27, 2010: Consequence Assessment and Case Studies," published by the UI College of Engineering. The report resulted from field work in Chile in April 2010 and focuses on the social and communications elements that influenced the effects this earthquake had on Chile. Valdivia wrote the chapter, "Socio Economic Features and Impact on Communications." She will present her findings at a January 27 talk at the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies on the Urbana campus.

MACS professor Ramona Curry wins NEH fellowship

Ramona Curry, associate professor of media and cinema studies, English, and gender and women's studies, has won a prestigious 2011 National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship, the only one given on this campus this year. This award will give Professor Curry release time throughout the year to finish her book-in-progress, "Trading in Cultural Spaces: How Chinese Film Came to America."

MACS welcomes new media professor Kevin Hamilton

Kevin Hamilton, associate professor of new media, has joined the Media and Cinema Studies Department as an affiliate faculty member.

"MACS welcomes Professor Hamilton whose expertise in art and new media closely dovetail with faculty and student interests," said Angharad Valdivia, MACS department head.

Upcoming Lecture: Mark Williams, December 3

Media and Cinema Studies presents Mark Williams, Associate Professor, Dartmouth College, with his lecture, "Old Means, New Ends: 'The Orchid Award' and TV Historiography," December 3, at 4:30 p.m., in 319 Greg Hall. This project suggests the still important work to be done regarding television history and the significance of television to our notion of history, via an analysis of a kinescope episode of The Orchid Award (1953), the first television series hosted by Ronald Reagan. The episode under consideration is a 15-minute tribute to Liberace, who was at the peak of his initial, television-centric celebrity. Part of my presentation will be a consideration of the backstory to gaining access to this kinescope, which is emblematic of both the challenges and the imperatives to research on early television. But the analysis pursues additional historiographic differentials, especially in relation to the sponsorship of the program and an overriding tenor of open secrets in the public sphere. The primary focus will be a textual analysis of this aesthetically novel program that culminates in what is perhaps the queerest moment on 1950s television.

MACS graduate minor among record number of students at Illinois awarded Fulbright Scholarships

Paul Hartley, of Las Cruces, N.M., (a Media and Cinema Studies graduate minor) will investigate how musical films contributed to forming and maintaining Turkish national identity between 1950 and 2001. He will incorporate this research from his Fulbright year in Turkey into his dissertation. Hartley, a doctoral student in musicology, also has experience as a professional orchestral clarinetist and performer of Balkan music. Hartley will pursue a career in academia. Read more...

Courses NOW AVAILABLE for Spring 2011

• Media Studies courses
• Cinema Studies courses
• Additional Courses and Options for Fulfilling the Major

 

A Night at the Oscars Student Film Screening, October 20, 7 p.m.

The Department of Media and Cinema Studies presents "A Night at the Oscars," a series of Academy Award-winning short, independent student films. Hosted by JAMS: Journalism, Advertising, and Media Students.

 

 

 

MACS professors present at Latin American Studies Association conference in Toronto

At the Latin American Studies Association in Toronto in early October, Media and Cinema Studies and the Institute of Communications Research had plenty of representation. Professor Angharad Valdivia gave a talk titled, "How to color within the lines:  Disney returns to Latin America." Professor Isabel Molina, presented "Ugly Betty and the Global Producing and Consumption of Latinidad," and PhD candidate Michelle Rivera (pictured at right) gave a presentation titled, "Raggeaton Latino No?:  Global Latin Music Audiences Respond."

Cinema studies professor Richard Leskosky retires after 36 years of teaching

Professor Richard Leskosky celebrated his retirement with a reception on Tuesday, October 12, in the Lucy Ellis Lounge. Leskosky retired after 36 years working in some form or other with Cinema Studies at the U of I.  He transferred to the College of Media when Cinema Studies merged with Media Studies.

New course available for Fall 2010

A new course has been added for the second 8-weeks of the Fall 2010 semester. MS 199 Visual Communication: Still and Moving Images will meet October 18 through December 8 in 130 Wohlers. This course is intended to introduce students to approaches of reading and creating powerful visual messages. We will explore a range of visual media: from ancient pictographs to art, still photography, moving images and informational graphics. The emphasis will be on learning to interpret other people's visual messages and using that skill set to create deliberate visual stories ourselves. We will examine different theories of visual communication with the intention of broadening our visual intelligence and expanding our creative capacities. The course will be taught by ICR PhD candidate Dora Valkanova. Logon to Student Self-Service into register...

MACS Professor Ron Jackson publishes two-volume encyclopedia of identity

Ron Jackson, professor of media and cinema studies and department head of African American studies, has just published a two-volume "Encyclopedia of Identity" with Sage Publications.  Within this major reference work, Jackson maintains, "No matter whether it is a discussion of nationhood, race, family, adolescence, or popular culture, identity is a mainstay in everyday conversations about who we say we are as individuals and citizens within a local or national community."  The Encyclopedia of Identity, with over 100 contributors, 300 entries, and over 1000 pages presents a broad, comprehensive overview of the definitions, politics, manifestations, concepts, and ideas related to identity.  The encyclopedia is designed for readers to grasp the nature and breadth of identity as a communication, psychological, social, anthropological, and popular idea.  For more information or to order a copy, please visit Sage Publications. 

Media and cinema studies professor Anita Chan wins Mellon Fellowship

Anita Say Chan, assistant professor of media and cinema studies, has been awarded a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship with the Committee on Globalization and Social Change at the Graduate School, City University of New York.  She will spend the 2010 academic year in New York City to work on a project on Information and Communications Technology-based national development initiatives in Peru that encourage the adoption of technological and legal resources of the information economy, including intellectual property titles, mobile digital technologies, and open software. "Most heavily promoted among rural and marginalized populations, they come with the promise of not just enabling economic reform and national integration," said Chan, "but just as critically to unleash the inner productive potential of individual participants."

Fall 2010 MACS courses still open

The Department of Media and Cinema Studies still has several courses open for the Fall 2010 semester, including Popular Culture, Digital Games, Planet Google, Film as Business: Disney as Case Study, Film Theory and Criticism, and Film and New Media. Study about the most contemporary and popular media issues of today! Download course descriptions for more information...

New MACS Professor

Julie Turnock (PhD, University of Chicago; MA, University of Amsterdam and Indiana University; BA, Georgetown University) has been hired to join the Media and Cinema Studies Faculty as an Assistant Professor beginning in Fall 2010. Turnock is currently a Mellon Fellow in residence at University of California, Davis. She is finishing a book entitled “Plastic Reality: Special Effects, Art and Technology in 1970s US Filmmaking.” She will teach courses on Global Cinema as well as on her area of expertise. Read her Faculty Profile...