Film and Media Studies Commons^™

Mdocs Poster-Fall 2018, Course Offerings, Jesse Wakeman

MDOCS Publications

Fall 2018 Course Offerings:

Documentary Fundamentals:

• Documentary Storytelling
• Intro to Audio Documentary
• Documentary and Narrative Screenwriting

• Storytelling: Video
• Storytelling: Game Development
• Storytelling: Mapping

• The Artist Interview
• Festival Curation

The Essential New York City Films, Nikola M. Durkovic

All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Films play significant part in the creation and preservation of the New York City’s image and must be consulted by anyone interested in exploring the City’s history and character. The essential New York films tell stories about New Yorkers and how they deal with their reality of extreme diversity and competition. In my opinion, there are six essential New York City films: Shadows (1959), The Panic in Needle Park (1971), Mean Streets (1973), Taxi Driver (1976), Manhattan (1979), and 25th Hour (2002). My goal is to explore the essential New York films and demonstrate how their content and ...

Making It Pay To Be A Fan: The Political Economy Of Digital Sports Fandom And The Sports Media Industry, Andrew Mckinney

All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation is a series of case studies and sociological examinations of the role that the sports media industry and mediated sport fandom plays in the political economy of the Internet. The Internet has structurally changed the way that sport fans access sport and accelerated the processes through which the capitalist actors in the sports media industry have been able to subsume them. The three case studies examined in this dissertation are examples of how digital media technologies have both helped fans become more active producers and consumers of sports and made the sports media industry an integral and vanguard ...

Illusions Of "Blackness" In Contemporary Visual Culture, Michaël Dorn

MFA in Visual Arts Theses

My thesis begins with a primer of the historical concept of “black(ness)” and the roots of its racialization. Intertwined throughout my discussion in Section I, I will highlight a few of my research findings and discuss some of the installation images that I created as I studied the work of contemporary artists who use lexical and literal figurative “blackness” in their work—in particular, the oeuvre of Kerry James Marshall as featured in his retrospective exhibition Mastry. My discourse unfolds with a brief etymological review of both the English word “black” and its precedent conceptual forms in Section II ...

The Zombie Apocalypse Has Already Happened: Queering Subjectivity In Zombie Film, Jessica Dunn

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation traces the encounter between psychology as a human science and the viral zombie film genre using the collaborative works of Deleuze and Guattari in conjunction with the queer anti-humanist theories of Colebrook and Halberstam. I interwove thematic (i.e. plot, dialogue, character development) and cinematographic (i.e. shot composition, editing, lighting, musical score) analyses of fourteen viral zombie films with theoretical arguments regarding the deterritorialization of the human subject and its relevance to psychology as a human science. The films were selected from the plethora of viral zombie films released after the turn of the 21st century. The ...

Illuminating The Trauma Of The Closet Among Sexual Minorities: A Cinematic-Phenomenological Study Of Existential Rights, Nisha Gupta

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is a phenomenological research study about the lived experience of being in the closet as a sexual minority. This study’s research findings are represented in two distinct but overlapping ways: a traditional written hermeneutic interpretation, and a short film called “Illuminate” which cinematically brings to life the closeted lifeworld. To produce this film, I developed an innovative research method called “cinematic-phenomenology.” As a researcher, I conducted phenomenological research interviews with five self-identified sexual minorities about their lived experiences of being in the closet. During interviews, I helped participants describe their felt sense of the closet through symbolic ...

In The Groove: A Documentary About Vinyl, Jared Endsley

Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this thesis project, ‘In the Groove’ is to tell the story of why vinyl records, a music format written off as a casualty to the digital age is experiencing a cultural resurgence. In the last several years vinyl records have been the only musical format to record positive sales growth.

For many musicians today, pressing their music to vinyl records yields the greatest return on investment. However, vinyl remains a niche market, supported by a devoted fan base.

This film focuses on a group of artists and vinyl enthusiasts as they navigate this new marketplace.

Easy Riders Lost In America: Marx, Mobility And The Hollywood Road Movie, Steven E. Alford

Class, Race and Corporate Power

The movement of people and settlement of the American west has been psychologically and sociologically represented as engendered by a sense of Manifest Destiny. Yet, the western migration was fueled by capitalist corporations seeking profit by exploiting international markets for goods through extractive practices (principally animal pelts, fish, and lumber): the Hudson's Bay Company, the North West Company, and millionaire American capitalist John Jacob Astor. The economic foundations of settlement have, however, been erased in cinematic representations of this history, replaced first by the Hollywood Western and its myth of frontier individuality, and subsequently by the Hollywood road movie ...

Is Slumdog Millionaire A Retelling Of The Ramayana? (Hindi), William L. Blizek, Michele M. Desmarais

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a Hindi translation of the article that appears in English in this same issue.

Is a banner with a picture of Rama and Sita on it and the word, “Ramayana,” the only link between the film Slumdog Millionaire and the great Hindu epic? In this paper we explore elements in the film that correspond to elements in the Ramayana. There is no one-to-one correlation, and some relationships between the two are, in fact, mirror images. However, there are enough correlations and influences to suggest that the film might be considered a retelling of the Ramayana. We also acknowledge ...

Women & Tolkien: Amazons, Valkyries, Feminists, And Slashers, Robin A. Reid Dr.

Journal of Tolkien Research

This paper reports on an early pilot project that asks women who self identify as readers or fans of Tolkien's work and/or teachers who have taught Tolkien's work, and/or scholars who have published on Tolkien's work to answer a few open-ended questions about their reasons for enjoying his work. By "women," I mean anybody who identifies as a woman. By "Tolkien's work," I mean any of his published novels, stories, poems, or academic essays. The study arises from the question that is often asked of fans of Tolkien's work: why do women so ...

The Underdog Narrative In Movies: When Our Memories Fail Us, Nadav Goldschmied, Jessica Ruiz, Sydney Olagaray

Heroism Science: An Interdisciplinary Journal

Heroes who win are adulated. Underdogs are a special class of heroes who are facing especially daunting odds. Why do people extend support to underdog entities in light of their bleak odds for triumph? The current study explored the idea that the underdog narrative is one of ultimate success and that this schema is strong enough to elicit false memories. We surveyed participants’ recollections of two boxing movies. As predicted, participants accurately remembered James Braddock beating the world champion in the end of Cinderella Man (underdog consistent plot) but failed to recall Apollo Creed beating Rocky Balboa in Rocky I ...

Thematic Fields, Transgressive Religion, Adam Lovasz

Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies

In my article, I examine a segment of the 2013 horror anthology, V/H/S/ 2. Entitled „Safe Haven” and directed by young directors Timo Tjahjanto and Gareth Huw Evans, this segment stands out for its religious and metaphysical subject matter. Examining broader media theory concerns relating to the „found-footage horror” subgenre, I consider how, during the course of „Safe Haven”, the screen as frame is gradually supplanted by the increasingly unreal events portrayed in the segment. I seek to simultaneously engage with the question of realism in found footage films, while also utilizing Evan Calder-Williams’ notion of „horrible form ...

Sacred Time In The Work Of Makoto Shinkai, Kassandra I. Schreiber

Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis looks at two works of anime director, writer, and producer Makoto Shinkai and examines how they create sacred experiences through the visual and narratological construction of time. Mircea Elaide’s concept of eternal return is joined with Gilles Deleuze’s film theory of Time-Images and time crystals to analyze the creation of sacred moments: moments of rejuvenation and reorientation. Not only are the two films, 5 Centimeters per Second and Your Name, read through the lens of these theories but these movies also illustrate how anime is unique art form that is well suited for the manipulation of ...

“Recognize Me”: An Analysis Of Transgender Media Representation, Jackson Taylor Mclaren

Major Papers

The representation of transgender people in popular media has been overwhelmingly problematic. Historical representations of transgender characters in fictional television have featured stereotypical and negative portrayals that do not accurately reflect the real experiences of transgender people. Both the quantity and quality of transgender representation across all forms of media is an issue.

This research examines two popular television shows that feature transgender characters. Using a mix methods approach of Content Analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis, the first four seasons of Orange is the New Black and The Fosters are examined. This research seeks to examine how the fictional transgender ...

Oana Panaïté. The Colonial Fortune In Contemporary Fiction In French. Liverpool: Liverpool Up, 2017., Nanar Khamo

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Review of Oana Panaïté. The Colonial Fortune in Contemporary Fiction in French. Liverpool: Liverpool UP, 2017. 206 pp.

Performing The Quality Of Imperceptible Interactions Between Individuals: A Technological Challenge Regarding The Collective, Marine Theunissen

Proceedings from the Document Academy

Contemporary technologies allow incredible possibilities of capturing individuals, but a problem arises when it comes to capturing a chorus, that is to say a "collective body" in motion. This proposal will address the problem of the sensitive capture of the quality of the interrelations between individuals, and of their refined interpretation through algorithms to "output” them in other forms. We will address two questions on the subject: how to capture the relations between individuals within a collective? How to create a circular-causal loop, whose artistic material (the digital data) is the interrelations of a collective, without engendering redundancy in their ...

Filming The Stage: Reflections On The Historical And The Aesthetic Perspectives Of An Essential Archive Of The Future, André Deridder

Proceedings from the Document Academy

Since the appearance and growth of cinema, a close but sometimes ambiguous relationship has been forged between the “Seventh Art” and the performing arts. Although cinema evolved quickly to become an art form in its own right, the stage and the productions produced for this space remain an object of attention for film directors. The relationship between the audio-visual sector and the presentational arts torments historians, creators and aestheticians alike. Experimented with and made use of by some, with varying degrees of success, fully rejected by others, the filming of the stage always raises many practical questions as well as ...

A Documentary-Material Approach For Performance, Marc Kosciejew

Proceedings from the Document Academy

This article begins a conceptual discussion about the relationship between documentation, performance, and materiality. It argues that a documentary approach helps show the roles played by documents and practices with them in performance’s materialization and constitution. It presents the start of a documentary approach for analyzing performance by discussing some ways in which documentation helps provide a material basis for performance beyond its enactment whilst simultaneously materializing and constituting it in and for other diverse contexts.

Made Up: A Devised Short Film, Justine Musselman

Honors College Theses

I've explored and studied the use of devising in theatre, and decided to bring that process to the making of a short film. Devising is the process of an ensemble creating a piece together in a collaborative and creative environment. These devised works start without a final script and are formed through discussion, improvisation. and ensemble exercises. Film is a new medium for devising and allows for unlimited creative opportunity and exploration. My devised short film utilizes dramatic makeup as an artistic device to assist in the storytelling. The narrative focuses on the idea of how we present ourselves ...

Femiliar: An Artistic Exploration Of Feminism Through Comedy, Mesa Story Melton

Honors College Theses

This project seeks to examine feminism through the widely accessible means of comedic performance. I have written, created, and acted in a web series that I established for several reasons: namely, to diffuse information about the oppressions that female-identifying individuals face in their everyday life as well as in the larger scheme of existence, but also to attempt to create a community of intersectional communication and collaboration where women can go to express their grievances and inspirations as well as seek comfort for the issues that plague them by nature of their gender identification. The show, Femiliar, is a sketch ...