Newsbrief November

We invite you to join us for the 2021 SCMS Virtual Conference! Over 450 sessions, workshops, meetings, receptions, and special events will be offered.

Conference registration is now open and more information about the virtual platform will be available in January.

Conference Rate: Supporter | $275

The Supporter Level helps SCMS subsidize the under waged, student, and unsubsidized rates below. By paying this rate, you will support early-career colleagues, students, and precarious members attending the conference! As a "supporter," $130 of your $275 rate is tax-deductible (for U.S. taxpayers); a donation letter will be emailed to the address in your profile, so please make sure your profile is correct. In addition, you will be listed on the SCMS website’s Donor Wall and in the Donors section of the virtual conference platform.

Conference Rate: Standard | $145

Applies to all members not included in any other category.

Conference Rate: Student or Unsubsidized | $75

Applies to graduate and undergraduate students; new and mid-level professionals who receive no financial support from their institution; and part-time or retired members.

Conference Rate: Under-Waged or Unwaged | $55

Applies to members who are between jobs or unemployed. It may also apply to graduate students experiencing exceptional hardship this year.

Seminar topics now available!

Nine seminar topics will be offered at the 2021 SCMS virtual conference. Seminars are designed to provide members with different options for productive conversations about scholarly topics. All seminars will be held on Sunday, March 21. Seminars are not subject to the one-role policy, so you can be involved in a seminar and a panel, workshop, or roundtable.

Seminar Registration Opens for Student Participants: Tuesday, January 5, 10:00 AM Central Time

Seminar Registration Closes for Student Participants: Thursday, January 7, 5:00 PM Central Time

Seminar Registration Opens for All Participants and Auditors: Friday, January 8, 10:00 AM Central Time

Participant and auditor registration will be live on our website in January.

If you are interested in chairing at the 2021 virtual conference, we are looking for volunteers to chair panels that have been comprised from the accepted open call papers. Panel chairs are listed on the program as panel participants and serve an important community function by facilitating discussion among panelists and attendees. Given this year’s virtual format, volunteers are especially welcome and will play a critical role to support the virtual SCMS community.

Please fill out the form no later than Friday, December 18 at 5:00PM CT.

The latest issue of Journal of Cinema and Media Studies (JCMS) is now available!

Complete issues with full-text articles (from 1999 to present) are also available to members to read online at Project Muse. Click here to read the latest volume of Journal of Cinema and Media Studies online.

Journal of Cinema and Media Studies is published quarterly by the Michigan Publishing, in cooperation with the Society for Cinema and Media Studies. Members of the society receive access to the journal as one of the benefits of membership.

We are sincerely grateful for the donations we received this year, whether you donated your conference registration fee or contributed directly to SCMS. No matter the amount, your donations were instrumental in helping us navigate this challenging year. Your year-end tax-deductible contribution helps SCMS continue to bolster our ongoing mission in support of the outstanding work of our member scholars and helps us provide grants to fund caregiving, travel, and registration waivers for our neediest members.

Haven't donated? There is still time! Consider registering for the conference at the Supporter Rate, which includes a tax-deductible donation in your fee, and/or give an end-of-year donation. Can't afford the Supporter Rate? Any amount is welcome!

EPISODE 56: FASCINATING BRAIN MATTER

December 16, 2020

Aca-Media is back with a series of fascinating conversations. First, we talk with Cara Dickason about her work on surveillance and teen girl media, the Graduate Student Organization, and the Precarious Labor Organization, SCMS+, and more. Then we talk with two 2020 SCMS Award winners: Jinsook Kim, who won the Student Writing Award, and Allison Whitney, who won the Distinguished Pedagogy Award.

TALKING TELEVISION IN A PANDEMIC, EPISODE 8: POLITICS

November 24, 2020

Our special series “Talking Television” is back for a second season, now as “Talking Television in a Time of Crisis.” In this episode, we discuss how television manages, amplifies, and contains our collective anxieties about the election and about other political issues, and we ask: How can we best use television to promote democratic aims?

Listen to both episodes here: www.aca-media.org

SCMS is saddened to learn of the passing of Jackie Byars. A tribute to her written by fellow colleagues will be shared via social media.

Carsey-Wolf Center Virtual: The Queen's Gambit

Patrice Petro, Past President of SCMS and Professor of Film and Media Studies, Dick Wolf Director of the Carsey-Wolf Center, and Presidential Chair in Media Studies at University of California, Santa Barbara, hosted a virtual Q&A at the Carsey-Wolf Center on The Queen’s Gambit on December 3. She interviewed UCSB alumnus and series co-creator Scott Frank. You can view the Q&A here.

Series on Reality-TV to Include Scholars' Perspective

SCMS member, Lindsay Giggey helped develop and has been working as Associate Producer on, a 7-part docuseries focusing on the history of reality television for E! Entertainment Television called For Real. The series stars American radio and television talk show host, producer, writer, Andy Cohen. Each episode will take on a different aspect of the genre and trace its development. In addition to interviews with stars, producers, and network executives, the series will feature commentary from several prominent reality television scholars in order to contextualize how reality TV is one of the defining genres of our time. Who are the scholars? We will have to stay tuned to find out! Lindsay Giggey received her Ph.D. in the Cinema and Media Studies program at the University of California, Los Angeles. She also served SCMS as the Graduate Student Representative on the Board of Directors from 2013-2015. Congratulations, Lindsay!

Read more about the upcoming series here.