Current Students
HADIL ABUHMAID, PhD candidate, Media Studies
Research Interests: film and culture, community cultural development, and communication.
MELODY ALLISON, PhD, Environmental Studies
Research Interests: Environmental Philosophy, Degrowth, Science Communication, Podcasting
Vasil (Will) Arangelov, PhD Communication and Media Studies
Research Interest: Gaming Communication, Media Psychology, Media Effects E-Sports, Interpersonal Communication
CHAILEN AUGUST, PhD, Indigenous, Race and Ethnic Studies
Research Interests: Black studies, Hip Hop, Black Popular Culture, African Diasporic Culture, race/ethnicity, mobility, black geographies, Afrofuturism
NAHLA BENDEFFA, PhD, Communication and Media Studies
Research Interests: Critical Cultural Studies, Political Economy of the Media, Platform studies, Food Media
AIDANA BOLATBEKKYZY, PhD, East Asian Languages & Literatures
Research Interests: Confinement Literature, Censorship, Spatial Politics, State Terrorism
ZOË GAMELL BROWN, PhD, Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies
Research Interests: Boviander ecological knowledge, Caribbean restorative cartographies, Critical autotheory, Critical ocean studies, Culinary catharsis, Healing praxis, Hyperrealism, Queer diaspora
SHANE L. BURRELL, PhD, Media Studies
Research Interests: Virtual reality, media effects, culture, gaming studies, new media, identification, embodiment, and immersion
ASHER CAPLAN, PhD, Philosophy
Research Interests: Philosophy of Media and Technology, Social/Political Epistemology (esp. trust, expertise, and misinformation), AI Ethics, American Pragmatism
TERI CHEONG, PhD, Department of English
Research Interests: Queer and Disabled representations in pop culture and new media
SPENCER CHERASIA, PhD, Media Studies
Research Interests: Digital Games studies, Re-contextualized Artistic, Architectural, and Artifactual Semiotics with Video Gameplay
GABRIELA CHITWOOD, PhD, History of Art and Architecture
Research Interests: Medieval Architecture, digital modeling and reconstructions, and Digital Humanities broadly
ASH CONNELL-GONZALEZ, PhD, English
Research Interests: Comics and Comic Theory, Androids, Queer Studies, Post-Modern Narratives, New Media and Culture, Post/Transhumanisms, Digital Narratives
RYAN DAVIES, PhD, English
Research Interests: Game Studies, Tabletop Studies, Queer Studies, Disability Studies/Crip Theory, Critical Race Theory, Cinema Studies, Speculative Fiction
MEGAN DENNENY, PhD, Communication and Media Studies
Research Interests: Adolescent Media Use, Adolescent Risk Behaviors, Sexual Health and Gender Violence Prevention, Higher Education and Media Studies
MICHAELA FLAHERTY, PhD, Communication and Media Studies
Research Interests: Themed entertainment, popular culture media fandom, television and film culture, gender and sexuality studies
LAURA GATTIS, PhD, SOJC
Research interests: The connection between politicized news sources and the core beliefs of their audiences regarding climate change
KATHLEEN ANN GEKIERE, PhD, English and Environmental Studies
Research interests: Speculative Fiction, Video Games, Digital Humanities, Ecocriticism, Environmental Humanities, Posthumanism, Animal Studies, Science Fiction, Science Studies, Eco-feminism
SOPHIE GREWELL, PhD, Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies
Research Interests: trans-indigenous relationality, Indigenous cartographies, Hawaiian mobilities, global Indigeneities, Indigenous digital methods
JOHN GUZMAN, MA, Media Studies
Research interests: the intersections of environmental criticism, disability studies, and media – particularly the complications introduced by new media and technologies.
THEODORE HARRISON, PhD, Media Studies
Research interests: how minority media representations function in American society, specifically how they interact with and impact minority populations
FRIDA HEITLAND, PhD, English
Research interests: Comics Studies, Ecomedia, and Video Game Studies
MARENA LEAR, PhD, Comparative Literature
Research Interests: 20th and 21st Century English Language Poetry/Poetics, Latin American Film & Literature, Film and Digital Media Studies, Feminist Theory, Gender Studies
PEARL LEE, PhD, Comparative Literature
Research Interests: Biopolitics; Neo-Marxism; 20th- and 21st- century East Asian and Latin American literatures engaging with neoliberalism; Asian diasporic literature; film, animation and comic studies
RACHAEL SOL LEE, PhD, English and Environmental Studies
Research Interests: 21st and 22nd century fiction, urban landscapes, queer cultural production, affect theory and posthumanisms, environmental justice
YEI WON LIM, PhD, Comparative Literature
Research Interests: Transnational flows of film, film reception, media production and practices in South Korea and Southeast Asia, Diaspora studies
MADALYNN MADIGAR, PhD, English
Research Interests: Indigenous Futurisms, Petro-cultural studies, Media Studies, Energy Humanities
OLIVIA MATSUOKA, PhD, English
Research Interests: 20th and 21st-century speculative fiction, Asian/Asian American literature, narrative theory, postcolonial theory, digital humanities
MOLLY MCBRIDE, PhD, Anthropology
Research Interests: Queer cultural production in the US, metronormativity, folklore, and digital humanities
ANDREW MCLAUGHLIN, PhD, Media Studies
Research interests: commodification and representation of veterans and military culture in media; visual rhetoric, persuasion, and experimental and documentary filmmaking
SAM MILLER, PhD, English
Research interests: Paracinema, Cinephilia, Aesthetics, Critical Theory, Post-Cinema, Digitization, and Home Media
MARIAM NADEEM, PhD, Comparative Literature
Research Interests: 20th Century English, Arabic and Urdu Literature, Archives of Communist Internationalism in South Asia and the Middle East, Anthropological Critiques of Secularism
GOWRI NAIR, PhD, English
Research Interests: Comics, Visual Media and Culture, Media reception, Human Rights and Literature
NISHAT PARVEZ, PhD, Communication and Media Studies
Research Interests: Political Communication, Journalism, New Media, Trust in media, Gender and Identity, Critical Cultural Studies
GERARDO PISACANE, PhD, Romance Language
Research Interests: Digital Humanities, Queer Studies and Television Studies, with a focus on online content providers such as Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and the changes they ignited within the television landscape.
GENEVIEVE J. PFEIFFER, PhD, English
Research Interests: Genevieve is interested in the intesections of the ecohumanities, particularly multispecies studies, and new media.
RAMTIN RANJPOUR, PhD, Strategic Communications
Research Interests: Public Relations Management, Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC), Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Brand Culture, User Experience (UX), Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), Emerging Technologies, Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
AMANDA ROBINSON, PhD, German
Research Interests: Black/Trans Sexuality, Black Feminism, Digital Feminism, Intersectionality
FARIA SHAIKH, PhD, Media Studies
Research Interests: Human-Technology Interactions, Health and Science Communication, and Media Psychology
SABRINA SONNER, PhD, Communications and Media Studies
Research Interests: Play Studies, Game Studies, Immersive media, and Community Formation
HAIFA SOULIMI, PhD, Political Science
Research Interests: I am interested in Democratization, Politics of the MENA region and the Mediterranean including the role of mass media in political change. I am also interested in the US foreign policy in the Middle East and North Africa and Media representation of such policies. My latest work was on the democratic consolidation in Tunisia.
STEPHEN SSENKAABA, PhD, Communication and Media Studies
Research Interests: New Media, Storytelling, Folklore, Journalism Practice in Africa
ANU SUGATHAN, PhD, English
Research interests: Comics and Graphic novels, Postcolonial Theory, Visual Culture, South Asian Literature and Cinema.
SOFIA VICENTE-VIDAL, PhD, Anthropology
Research Interests: heritage, labor politics, indigeneity, globalization, transnationalism
ANDREW WILSON, PhD, Communication and Media Studies
Research Interests: Game Studies, Cultural Studies, Social Media Studies, Gender & Identity, Hegemony, Power
NICK WIRTZ, PhD, Comparative Literature
Research Interests: Representation and indexicality in American, European, Japanese visual media (comics, photography, technology); semiotics; media genealogy; abstraction; nonfiction; visual rhetoric; ethics; trauma
GENEVIEVE WITTER, PhD, English
Research Interests: Comic Studies, Queer studies, Environmental Humanities, Digital narrative and media, Posthumanism
EMRAKEB WOLDEAREGAY, PhD, Media Studies
Research Interests: health promotion, development campaigns and political communication, audience research of legacy and new media, and audience research on identity formation of marginalized groups such as women and unemployed youth
SHUXI WU, MA, Asian Studies
Research Interests: Platform Studies, Infrastructure Studies, Critical Internet and Algorithm Studies, Chinese Cyberspace, Platform Urbanism, Platform Capitalism
SHUO XU, PhD, Media Studies
Research Interests: New Media, Media culture studies, and Media
Censorship in China
ASAKO YONAN, PhD, IRES
Research Interests: My research falls at the intersection of Asian American studies, digital humanities, Japanese American incarceration, and critical race and ethnic studies
HAOPENG YUAN, PhD, Communication and Media Studies
Research Interests:
TINGYU ZOU, PhD, Media Studies
Research Interests: Communication of health-related issues via new media