The Society for Cinema and Media Studies annual conference, held this March 25-29, was in many ways a media event. But what kind of media event was it, and what are the implications of the conference's more public presence?
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#SCMS15: The Conference as Media Event
Tammi Terrell: Marketing Mortality and Reading Album Art
Marvin Gaye has been in the headlines in recent weeks, thanks to a court decision holding musicians Pharrell and Robin Thicke responsible for borrowing Gaye’s intellectual property in their single, “Blurred Lines.” While Gaye’s family has much to gain in safeguarding his legacy and its profit potential, the challenge of outside parties negotiating the...
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Screening Socialism: Television, Public Space and the Ideals of Progress
Post by Sylwia Szostak, Research Associate, Department of Social Sciences, Loughborough University This is the third installment in the ongoing “From Nottingham and Beyond,” series, with contributions from faculty and alumni of the University of Nottingham’s Department of Culture, Film and Media. This week’s contributor, Sylwia Szostak, completed her PhD in the department in 2014. The majority of...
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Aesthetics and Affiliation in Gotham
When Fox’s drama Gotham first premiered, it immediately became clear that its villains were going to be one of the primary foci. After all, while the series’ ostensible protagonists are Detective Jim Gordon (Ben McKenzie) and the very young Bruce Wayne (David Mazouz), Gotham’s aesthetic suggests that it is actually the two primary villains, Fish Mooney...
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Radio Studies at SCMS 2015
Alex Russo previews the radio oriented papers, workshops, and presentations at this week's upcoming Society for Cinema and Media Studies conference in Montreal.
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Mario is Mobile!: Or (Nintendo’s Platform Panic?)
Nintendo's move into mobile gaming signals a shift in strategy, but one carefully articulated in order to—for now—maintain the company's gaming philosophy.
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On Tim Burton’s Dumbo
Last week's announcement that Tim Burton will direct a remake of Disney's Dumbo is a reminder that in Burton's career we witness the convergence of the aesthetic logic of allusionism and the corporate logic of franchising.
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The Gendered Politics of Digital Brand Labor
In the so-called “attention economy,” brands increasingly harness the immaterial labor of social media participants. To what extent can these digital activities by understood as gendered? This post draws on findings from a recently published International Journal of Cultural Studies article to explore the gendered politics of social media labor.
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Edgar Dale, Educational Radio, and Sensory Learning
What makes technology educational? Brian Gregory prompts this inquiry in his consideration of how Edgar Dale's ideas about sensory learning fit into the history of educational radio and ed tech.
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What the Canadian Netflix Says About Canadians (and Netflix)
There is a difference between the Canadian edition of Netlix and the Canadians who watch Netflix. What does that mean for the future of the service in Canada?
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American Sniper: Silence and Fury
Post by Debra Ramsay, Research Associate, Technologies of Memory Project, Glasgow University Following is the second installment in the series of fortnightly blogs “From Nottingham and Beyond,” featuring contributions from faculty in the University of Nottingham’s Department of Culture, Film and Media and our alumni working in higher education or media industries in the U.K. and abroad. This week’s...
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What to Make of the Historic Net Neutrality Win
The FCC’s new Open Internet rules are a major come-from-behind victory for net neutrality. How in the world did this actually get done? And what exactly happens now?
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Selma, “Bloody Sunday,” and the Most Important TV Newsfilm of the 20th Century
The most consequential TV newsfilm of the 20th century records the beating of voting rights marchers on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama on March 7, 1965. It led directly to the passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act. With the 50th anniversary commemorations of “Bloody Sunday,” network and cable news channels...
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Kim Gordon’s Self-Fashioning
In her memoir, Girl in a Band, musician Kim Gordon addresses how fashion and music are mutually constitutive outlets for creative expression and feminist critique.
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The Conflicted Populism of Parks and Recreation
Though widely praised for its political optimism and progressiveness, NBC's Parks and Recreation also expresses a more complex and pessimistic view about the American voting public.
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Straddling the “Edge”: The Invisible Trend of Religion on TV
With religion on fictional television growing, why is it so difficult for press and PR to acknowledge this shift within the industry?
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