The Empty Centre: The Legacy of Thomas Elsaesser
Floris Paalman reflects on the legacy of Thomas Elsaesser and discusses the importance of space and architecture to his theories of film and media.
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Postscriptum: Remembering Thomas Elsaesser
Igor Krstic remembers the film scholar Thomas Elsaesser and reflects on his impact as a teacher and mentor.
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Ser Humano/Ser Urbano: How Urban Art in Mexico Became a Carrier for So-Called Universal Values
In the first of her series of posts on transnational public art movements, Caitlin Bruce explores tensions around the relationship between urban identity and street art in Mexico.
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Shannon Mattern on “5000 Years of Urban Media”
In this special podcast Q&A Mack Hagood interviews Shannon Mattern on her new book, Code and Clay, Data and Dirt, focusing on her discussion of sound.
Read MoreStudent Voices: Undergraduate Research Section
“It Takes a Village…”: The Use of Childhood to Negotiate Questions of Migration and European Identity in Le Havre
Anushka Robinson explores Aki Kaurismäki’s take on migration, Fortress Europe, northern France, and community ties through theories of childhood and affiliation.
An Archive of Shirkers (2018): Collaging Different Theories of the Archive
David Chan brings several theories of the archive to bear on the recent documentary Shirkers, asking how the film’s openness as a text and mission of collecting a lost film relate to the specificities of place and embodied difference that gave rise to the project.
Worlds Under Watch: The Moving Surveillance-Image and Its Institutions
Cedric Bobro traces the linguistics roots of surveillance and the fantasy of the omnipotent view through ghosts and AI to the modern surveillance apparatus.
Getting Lost in “Wondaland”: Political Worldbuilding and Timeless Affects in Janelle Monáe’s Metropolis
Mathilde Fauteux explores the political spaces of Janelle Monáe’s work, concentrating on both the diegetic spaces that make up her recent projects and the transmedia spaces those projects occupy and create.
Introduction: SCMS-U & Student Voices
In her introduction to this installment of Student Voices, Amy Corbin contextualizes the essays in the work of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies’s undergraduate conference, which she co-organized. She also provides a platform for Jeffery Lin, an invited contributor, to discuss the ongoing protests on Hong Kong and his reasons for withdrawing his essay.
Directing the Consumer’s Attention through Public Screens: A Critical View
[Ed. note: this post is part of a Student Voices section on Hong Kong, Shanghai, cities, screens, and spectacle. For more background on the…
Prior Issue
An Update on Grenfell
In this conclusion to her two-part look at the Grenfell crisis, Anna Viola Sborgi examines the aftermath of a crisis and the ways in which activists have and have not been successful in ensuring continued focus on the underlying issues.
Of Drones and Angels: GAIKA’s Sonic Images of Urban Resistance
Alessio Kolioulis examines the work of GAIKA – music, videos, and films – and explores the critiques of surveillance and state control running throughout.
The Day Social Housing Hit Mainstream Media
In the first of a two-part look at the Grenfell Tower crisis, Anna Sborgi examines the complicated relationship between the media and social housing in contemporary London.