Application deadline: December 1, 2016
Media Arts + Practice
USC School of Cinematic Arts
3470 McClintock Avenue, SCI 101
Los Angeles, CA 90089-2211
T 213 821 5700
[email protected]
The interdisciplinary Media Arts + Practice PhD program (iMAP) within the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California is now accepting applications for fall 2017; the deadline is December 1, 2016.
iMAP is a practice-based program at the intersection of cinema, media, design and critical theory in which students explore the boundaries of cinema understood in its broadest sense while also creating new forms of scholarly expression.
What is the cinematic when it becomes immersive, mobile, environmental, playable, generative, virtual, ambient, live and spatialized? What role can hybrid scholar-practitioners play in the evolution of these forms within a critical, ethical and political framework? And how can we express our findings through new forms of scholarship?
Core to the iMAP program is its transdisciplinary ethos; after completing foundational coursework, students design their own curricula, drawing on expertise across all divisions with the School of Cinematic Arts. Students also have access to the School’s state-of-the-art facilities and research labs, and they are encouraged to collaborate with students and faculty across the USC campus.
Research Labs
iMAP students participate in the numerous research labs that are core to the School of Cinematic Arts and its role within a leading research university. Research groups include:
–the Mobile and Environmental Media Lab led by Scott Fisher
–the Game Innovation Lab led by Tracy Fullerton
–the Mixed Reality Lab led by Todd Richmond
–the Jaunt Lab led by Candace Reckinger
–the Creative Media & Behavioral Health Center led by Marientina Gotsis
–the World Building Media Lab led by Alex McDowell
The areas of research investigated by iMAP students are broad, and currently include: interactive architecture; wearable media; media activism; affect; embodiment and tangible interfaces; transmedia story design; remote sensing; sound studies; immersive journalism; and neurocinematics.
Fellowship opportunities
All PhD students are fully funded through fellowships that offer tuition coverage, a stipend, as well as opportunities to serve as paid research and teaching assistants.
Faculty
The iMAP faculty includes:
–Vicki Callahan, co-editor of Future Texts: Subversive Performance and Feminist Bodies
–Scott Fisher, a pioneer in virtual and augmented reality
–Perry Hoberman, a media, installation and performance artist
–Norm Hollyn, author of The Film Editing Room Handbook and The Lean Forward Moment
–Aniko Imre, author of TV Socialism and an expert in film and media theory, global television, national and transnational media and European media
–Henry Jenkins, whose scholarship addresses transmedia, fan culture, and the civic imagination
–Andreas Kratky, a media artist whose work includes algorithmic cinema and interactive installation
–Virginia Kuhn, director of the Large Scale Video Analytic, which applies the power of supercomputing to analyzing vast video archives
–Christine Panushka, an award-winning artist and filmmaker/animator
–Tara McPherson, the founding editor of Vectors, a journal of interactive scholarship; co-creator of Scalar, an innovative authoring platform; and author of Feminist in a Software Lab
–Kathy Smith, an Australian artist who works with painting, animation, installation and sound
–Mary Sweeney, a film director, writer, editor and producer
–Holly Willis, author of Fast Forward: The Futures of the Cinematic Arts
Apply
The iMAP program is practice-based, and as such, students are encouraged to be creative and reflective in designing, defining and articulating their research methods and scholarship. For this reason, the program seeks candidates who are interested in helping define new fields; those willing to combine theory and practice; and those ready to face the challenges of uncharted scholarly territory.
Further information and application materials are available here.
Email Elizabeth Ramsey, assistant chair, at [email protected] with specific questions.
