RMeS RMa Course: Trending Topics – Engaging Objects
When? 12, 19 & 26 February, 5 March 13.00 – 17.00 / presentation day: 19 March 2021 12.00 – 18.00 / deadline paper: Mid April (tbc)
Where? University of Amsterdam, ONLINE
ECTS? 6
Coordinator? Dr Maryn Wilkinson (UvA)
Guest lectures by?Eliza Steinbock (UL), Etienne Augé (EUR), Markus Stauff (UvA), Marek Jancovic (VU), Sal Hagen (UvA), Clemens Apprich (RUG), Stijn Postema (UvA), David Cheruiyot (RUG)
Organisation? RMeS
For? First and second year RMa students in Media Studies, who are a member of a Dutch Graduate Research School (onderzoekschool). Students who are members of RMeS will have first access. RMeS staff and PhD researchers are welcome to sit in on specific sessions; PhD’s who are interested, can send an e-mail to RMeS if you intend to attend one or more seminar sessions: rmes-fgw@uva.nl.
Registration
THE COURSE IS FULLY BOOKED, please send an e-mail to rmes@rug.nl with your name, university and research school. We will put you on our waiting list.
General description:
Each spring, the Research School for Media Studies offers a Trending Topics course where faculty members from eight participating universities (UvA, UU, VU, EUR, UL, UM, RUG, RUN) present the latest research in their fields of interest through a series of lectures and workshops. The course invites RMA students to participate in an international, cutting edge research environment, while earning credits towards their degree. It presents a unique opportunity to get to know other students and leading academics from all over The Netherlands, in an open setting of engaging and ambitious exchange that would prove particularly fruitful for students who are aspiring to pursue a future career in academic research or teaching. All eight universities accept the credits earned in this module.
The field of media studies today is decreasingly tied to specific media types (film, television, or digital media) or practices (e.g. journalism), and instead often turns towards the areas of interaction between them, and their shared concepts and ideas. Larger trends such as globalisation, digitisation and convergence have prompted researchers to study the complex interrelation of technological changes and media content, as well as the new relations between users and producers, while different modes of media consumption have brought about new areas for aesthetics and politics that continue to require intense critical enquiry. These crossovers are both theoretically and methodologically challenging. Moreover, it requires us to rethink our engagement with specific media objects, and our critical analysis skills. Close reading remains incredibly important, but it can no longer stay isolated. In order to improve and enrich our understanding of the media objects we engage in our research, it is important to understand where different perspectives add to, overlap, or digress from one another.
In the ‘Trending Topics – Engaging Objects’ course, the lecture sessions will each take a specific media objects as a primary case study (from the field of film, television, digital media, and journalism studies), and bring two guest lecturers and their respective areas of expertise into dialogue about their objects. Each afternoon will be dedicated to the analysis, research and discussion of specific media objects. A fifth session revolves around student presentations in preparation of their final written assignment. All sessions, assignments, readings and preparatory work will be supervised and marked by dr. Maryn Wilkinson (UvA), the coordinator of the course. The grading will be based on both the presentation (30%) and the final written assignment (70%).
Venues:
- ONLINE
Programme:
13.00-17.00 on Friday, February 12th, 2021:
Thinking through aesthetics and media ‘futures’
- Eliza Steinbock (UL)- The Riotous State of Trans Visual Culture
- Etienne Augé (EUR) – Futures and academia
13.00-17.00 on Friday, February 19th, 2021:
Rethinking formats
- Markus Stauff (UvA) – Formats and Forensics: Creativity and Restraint in Sports’ Visual Culture
- Marek Jancovic (VU) – The Format as a Mask: Tracking Online Reformatting Practices
13.00-17.00 on Friday, February 26th, 2021:
New reflections on social media use
- Sal Hagen (UvA) – /us/ and (((them))): Repurposing memes to study radical online subcultures
- Clemens Apprich (RUG)– Pattern Discrimination: Data, Information, Knowledge
13.00-17.00 on Friday, March 5th, 2021:
New directions in journalism
- Stijn Postema (UvA) – Artistic Journalism
- David Cheruiyot (RUG) – One world, one journalism risk? The rise of digital media criticism