WSU Center for Arts & Humanities Faculty Fellowship
I am honored to receive a 2022-2023 WSU Center for Arts and Humanities Faculty Fellowship.
Media Maker, Academic, Nerd
I am honored to receive a 2022-2023 WSU Center for Arts and Humanities Faculty Fellowship.
In April, I was honored to receive the 2022 WSU President’s Awards for Leadership.
I am excited to announce that I have published my essay “The Politics of Survey Cinema History Textbooks” in the peer-reviewed journal “The Projector: A Journal of Film, Media, and Culture.”
The genesis of this essay harkens back to when I was a community college instructor. There I taught “Introduction to Cinema History” nearly every quarter. Teaching that class over and over again caused me to think a lot about what is present in the cinema studies and what is absent or obscured. I kept asking myself: “Why? Why this material in this way?” I realized over time that there was no divine declaration of what is important in film history. The canon is a man-made construction. I started to interrogate the way cinema history is framed in several survey textbooks to interrogate their politics.
Summary:
Cinema history textbooks have long served as an introduction to the discipline and, for as long as they have been used, they have been criticized. Writing in 1950, James Card states, “The student turns to the film histories and there finds confusion, gossip, and the wildest sort of speculation.” This article uncovers the politics of contemporary survey cinema textbooks, including Flashback: A Brief History of Film (2009) by Louis Giannetti and Scott Eyman, A Short History of the Movies (2010) by Gerald Mast and Bruce Kawin, Movie History: A Survey (2011) by Douglas Gomery and Clara Pafort-Overduin, and Film History: An Introduction (2018) by Kristin Thompson and David Bordwell. Building on work in education and cultural studies, the article analyzes problematic canonized patterns, which include a tendency to obscure the contributions of women and people of color, a preference for framing film as an art form, and a general simplification of film history that discourages students from thinking critically about what is missing or marginalized in the historical narrative.
Citation:
Gregory, Ruth. 2022. “The Politics of Survey Cinema History Textbooks.” The Projector: A Journal of Film, Media, and Culture. Accessed January 01, 2022. https://www.theprojectorjournal.com/the-politics-of-cinema-history-textbooks.
In February 2021 I was honored to be selected as the Oustanding Faculty member from the College of Arts and Sciences during an online ceremony sponsored by the Washington State University Provost, Dr. Elizabeth Chilton. During the ceremony College of Art and Sciences Dean Todd …
From Fall 2015 – Spring 2019 I had the pleasure of producing about 200 tutorial and informational videos for the Sustainable Heritage Network. The Sustainable Heritage Network (SHN) is an answer to the pressing need for comprehensive workshops, online tutorials, and web resources dedicated to …
I had a great time checking out the Virtual Reality pieces at SIFFX on June 5th.
The pieces were shown on Samsung Gear VR sets and the HTC Vive. The headsets were impressive and helped a lot with the stabilization issues that I’ve seen with other VR headsets.
It was great to see Music of the Spheres in a higher quality headset that did not bobble with the natural motion of your head. Maybe we’ve now solved some of the sea sickness issues associated with VR experiences – one can only hope!
I was also impressed with the work of Nonny de la Pena whose VR work is what she calls “immersive journalism.” She uses animated Virtual Reality environments to immerse her audience in different experiences. Many use source footage as the basis for the animation and/or audio. Her work is incredibly powerful and I highly recommend checking it out if you get the chance.
My new project – Music of the Spheres – has launched. Check it out at spheresseries.com. Music of the Spheres is the first series to completely tell its story using 360 degree technology; blazing a new trail for motion picture storytelling. The storyline of Music …
Maikaru and A Dose for Dominic are going strong on the film festival circuit. Here are a couple of ways you can check them out.
A Dose for Dominic
Marblehead Film Festival – Marblehead, Massachusetts – Thursday, July 3, 9:00–10:30 PM, in Crocker Park, 11 Front Street
Columbia Gorge International Film Festival – Washougal, Washington – August 1st – 17th
Sprout Film Festival – Traveling around the US
Reel Northwest on KCTS
Maikaru
Audience Award Voting online until July 14th
1 Reel Film Festival – Seattle, Washington – August 30 – September 1
Port Townsend Film Festival – Port Townsend, Washington – September 19 – 21
Maikaru is up an Audience Award through The Audience Awards website. Please consider watching and voting for our film… and then vote again (you can login and vote once a day).