Some of the following resources are found in the Reference shelving on level 2 of University Libraries and this is indicated next to the call numbers. All are available in print, but where electronic access is available, links have been provided. If you prefer print, please search by title in IUCAT.
The Promise of Cinema by
Rich in implications for our present era of media change, The Promise of Cinema offers a compelling new vision of film theory. The volume conceives of "theory" not as a fixed body of canonical texts, but as a dynamic set of reflections on the very idea of cinema and the possibilities once associated with it. Unearthing more than 275 early-twentieth-century German texts, this ground-breaking documentation leads readers into a world that was striving to assimilate modernity's most powerful new medium. We encounter lesser-known essays by B#65533;la Bal#65533;zs, Walter Benjamin, and Siegfried Kracauer alongside interventions from the realms of aesthetics, education, industry, politics, science, and technology. The book also features programmatic writings from the Weimar avant-garde and from directors such as Fritz Lang and F.W. Murnau. Nearly all documents appear in English for the first time; each is meticulously introduced and annotated. The most comprehensive collection of German writings on film published to date, The Promise of Cinema is an essential resource for students and scholars of film and media, critical theory, and European culture and history.
Documentary and Disability by
This edited collection of contributions from media scholars, film practitioners and film historians connects the vibrant fields of documentary and disability studies. Documentary film has not only played an historical role in the social construction of disability but continues to be a strong force for expression, inclusion and activism. Offering essays on the interpretation and conception of a wide variety of documentary formats, Documentary and Disability reveals a rich set of resources on subjects as diverse as Thomas Quasthoff's opera performances, Tourette syndrome in the developing world, queer approaches to sexual functionality, Channel 4 disability sports broadcasting, the political meaning of cochlear implant activation, and Christoph's Schlingensief's celebrated Freakstars 3000.
Keywords for Media Studies by
Introduces key terms, research traditions, debates, and their histories, and offers a sense of the new frontiers and questions emerging in the field of media studies Keywords for Media Studies introduces and aims to advance the field of critical media studies by tracing, defining, and problematizing its established and emergent terminology. The book historicizes thinking about media and society, whether that means noting a long history of "new media," or tracing how understandings of media "power" vary across time periods and knowledge formations. Bringing together an impressive group of established scholars from television studies, film studies, sound studies, games studies, and more, each of the 65 essays in the volume focuses on a critical concept, from "fan" to "industry," and "celebrity" to "surveillance." Keywords for Media Studies is an essential tool that introduces key terms, research traditions, debates, and their histories, and offers a sense of the new frontiers and questions emerging in the field of media studies. Visit keywords.nyupress.org for online essays, teaching resources, and more.
New Television by
Even though it's frequently asserted that we are living in a golden age of scripted television, television as a medium is still not taken seriously as an artistic art form, nor has the stigma of television as "chewing gum for the mind" really disappeared. Philosopher Martin Shuster argues that television is the modern art form, full of promise and urgency, and in New Television, he offers a strong philosophical justification for its importance. Through careful analysis of shows including The Wire, Justified, and Weeds, among others; and European and Anglophone philosophers, such as Stanley Cavell, Hannah Arendt, Martin Heidegger, and John Rawls; Shuster reveals how various contemporary television series engage deeply with aesthetic and philosophical issues in modernism and modernity. What unifies the aesthetic and philosophical ambitions of new television is a commitment to portraying and exploring the family as the last site of political possibility in a world otherwise bereft of any other sources of traditional authority; consequently, at the heart of new television are profound political stakes.
Before you can start any research on your topic, you must have a background knowledge of it. Books and websites can provide you with that knowledge.
This is important because:
Remember, background information is always a starting point for research, not an ending point.
Boolean Logic is a way to link together keywords in a search tool so that we can control the types of results we get from a catalog, search engine, or database.
AND - Combines keywords so that results contain both or all keywords.
For example: Burgers AND fries, or Environment AND Fracking AND Water
OR - Indicates that you will take either or any of your keywords
For example: Fracking OR "hydraulic fracturing" OR "horizontal drilling"
NOT - Indicates that you want a keyword excluded from your search.
For example: Jaguars NOT Cars
Tips: Put phrases in quotation marks (e.g.: "soap opera") to get an exact match. Use parentheses to isolate synonyms from other concepts you want to combine them with. See the help menu of a search tool for tips specific to the tool.
Search Statements combine keywords with some or all of the above operators to tell the search tool exactly what to do. If you think of each of your key ideas from your research question as a concept, you can then brainstorm different ways of saying each concept. In this example, the concept of "woman" can be represented by various words. Try to think of synonyms or closely related words for each of your concepts. It is useful to group synonyms together with the 'OR' operator in parentheses to tell the search tool to look for any of those words before combining them with the others. Here's a sample search:
(Women OR Woman OR Female) AND Sports AND "Pay Gap"
This will return results that include the words women, sports, and "pay gap"; woman, sports, and "pay gap"; or female, sports, and "pay gap." Any result that has at least one of the words from the parenthesis and both of the other two concepts will most likely help you answer your research question!
Using the parentheses is useful in a single search box, but if you use the Advanced Search Screen (see below), you can keep separate concepts to separate boxes. Be sure to keep all synonyms or related words in the same horizontal line.
