Faculty
Research & Creative Work
The faculty of the School of Communications and Theater pursue numerous scholarly and creative projects. Research and creative work within the School meet the highest standards of professional work, and encourage students to develop both an intellectual background and a sense of social responsibility.
Award-winning creative faculty members boast extensive professional experience as filmmakers, journalists, television producers, theater directors, speechwriters, advertising executives, and public relations practitioners.
Our highly ranked scholarly researchers focus on contemporary theory and research issues, covering mass, interpersonal, political, intercutural, international, and development communication, as well as emerging technologies.
Research and creative faculty are actively involved in the interdepartmental PhD program in Mass Media and Communication, as well as graduate programs in Broadcasting, Telecommunications and Mass Media (MA), Film and Media Arts (MFA), Journalism (MJ), Strategic and Organizational Communication (StOC), and Theater (MFA).
Recent awards and achievements are listed below.
Michael Maynard, Associate Professor and chair of the Advertising department, published "Hyping the efficiencies of fast(er) food: The glocalization of McDonald's Snack Wrap in Japan" in The Culture of Efficency in 2009. Last year, in 2008, he published "Reports of the Death of the 30-second Commercial Have Been Greatly Exaggerated" along with Alison Care, in Pennsylvania Communication Annual 28-48 and "The Advertising Internship: Tips on Optimizing the Academic and Business Community Relationship" along with fellow SCT Professor Dana Saewitz in the Journal of Advertising Education Fall 31-34. Professor Maynard and Professor Saewitz's "Learning from the Industry: Employer Internship Satisfaction Survey" was awarded top paper in division at the National Conference of AEJMC in August 2008.
Assistant Professor Jin Seong Park published "The Social Reality of Depression: DTC Advertising of Antidepressants and Perceptions of the Prevalence and Lifetime Risk of Depression" in 2008 in the Journal of Business Ethics 379-393. Professor Park's "Effects of Consumer Mood States on Processing of Disease" was awarded top faculty paper at a conference held by the Association for Marketing and Healthcare Research in February 2009.
Communications Program
Professor Scott Gratson served the Temple community in many ways other than as outgoing co-chair of the Faculty Council. For example, he gave a riveting introductory address to the incoming Class of 2012 at the university’s convocation ceremony. Gratson served on the President’s Inaugural Council on Diversity, and as SCT director of the Temple University Undergraduate Research Forum and Creative Works Symposium. And his students continued to present their research at regional and national conferences.
Professor Warren Bass completed Tsunami Stories a feature length documentary on the disaster that claimed 295,000 lives (premiering at the Athens International Film Festival); Dance of the Masks a documentary portrait of David C. Driskell the country's most prominent living African American (premiering at the African American Museum in Philadelphia); Burning Bright an experimental animation; and (in collaboration with stage director Doug Wager and Journalist Yvonne Latty) Professor Bass filmed, directed and edited the video components of the multimedia stage production In Conflict as well as the two-and-a-half hour dramatic DVD of the production. In Conflict opened at Temple University Theaters in fall 2007 to strong reviews with subsequent performances in 2008 at Long Wharf Theater New Haven, Carnegie Mellon, the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland where it received the Fringe First Award, and a three month off-Broadway run at the Barrow Street Theater in NYC this fall. His civil rights documentary At the Wall received recognition in eleven international film festivals in 2007-2008 including four international awards.
Dr. Chris Cagle published "Pseudodocumentary and the Emergence of the Documentary Field" in Cinema Journal Winter 07-08; "Two Modes of Prestige Film" Screen issue 38.3 (fall 2007) received the Screen Best Essay Award for the past two years; and a review of Uncovering the Holocaust: The International Reception of Night and Fog, Ewout van der Knaap, ed. in Scope, no. 10 (February 2008). Chris teaches FMA's large freshman Intro to Film & Video Analysis course and graduate seminars in media history/criticism/theory; and developed Race & Ethnicity in Film as a Gen Ed course which was taught this fall.
Dr. Roderick Coover returned from a 2007-2008 Study Leave. He completed Vérité to Virtual (a DVD of the videotaped proceedings of the 2006 Media Conference at Temple hosted by FMA and Anthropology shot by MFA students, compiled under Rod Coover's supervision, and distributed by D.E.R.); Voyage into the Unknown exhibited on the web; Outside/Inside an Independence Park installation (commissioned); and The Theory of Time Here a DVD deposited with Video Data Bank. He has had eight exhibitions at conferences or festivals over the past year including an Honorable Mention from MIT's Comparative Media Studies Media Spectacle for a collaborative earlier work. He published an article on anthropological filmmaker Robert Gardner in American Anthropologist and two essays as chapters in books Decode Myths and The Films of Robert Gardner.
Associate Professor Fabienne Darling-Wolf participated all semester in a Global Learning Circle organized by the Teaching and Learning Center. The circle developed a project that was presented as a poster at the Shared Futures, Global Learning Forum on March 19-21, 2009. Darling-Wolf conducted a program review for SUNY Geneseo. She was awarded a research leave for next year and Grantin-Aid to write a book. She published a book chapter titled "World citizens ‘à la française': Star Ac' and the negotiation of ‘French' identities," in Real Worlds: Global perspectives and the politics of reality television. She also published the article, with Associate Professor Andrew Mendelson, "Seeing themselves through the lens of the other: An analysis of Japanese readers' negotiations of National Geographic's The Samurai Way story," in Journalism and Communication Monographs.
Associate Professor Carolyn Kitch has an invited essay, titled "The Afterlife of Print," that will appear in the 10th-anniversary issue of the international journal Journalism: Theory, Practice and Criticism.
Assistant Professor George Miller received multiple awards for his journalism from the PA Press Association and the Society of Professional Journalists' Keystone State Pro Chapter.
Department of Strategic and Organizational Communication
Jason Del Gandio was much sought after nationwide for radio interviews on his book, Rhetoric for Radicals: A Handbook for Twenty-First Century Activists (Gabriola Island, British Columbia: New Society Press, 2008). The book tied for first place for the Independent Publishers Industry’s Gold Award in the social-activism category. Because the book "is written for a general audience, helping activists and organizers to become better communicators and rhetoricians," Del Gandio offered his views on key social and political issues. And he gave public workshops on communication skills, rhetorical strategies, and social and political theory.
Gregg Feistman was interviewed on the 5:30 p.m. newscast of Philadelphia’s Fox 29. The subject: communicating in a crisis. Feistman’s much-anticipated novel, The War Merchants, has been published by Strategic Book Publishing, a division of Ingram Publishing. It is a corporate thriller, set primarily in Philadelphia; it features a corporate public relations professional as the heroine.
Tracey Weiss served as Guest Leader Speaker in Temple’s Student Leadership Challenge, a Provost Office-backed activity of the university’s Leadership Living Learning Community, which provides opportunities to students to develop as thoughtful citizens and as transformational leaders. Weiss and Elizabeth Housholder, of the leadership program, submitted a proposal for a GenEd course titled “Emotional Intelligence and Leadership.” Weiss is developing a minor in organizational leadership. She continuesd her pro bono work in strategic planning and coaching for non–profit organizations, including the Philadelphia Theater Company and the Cosmopolitan Club.
Marie Anne Chiment won Best Costume Design from Philadelphia Weekly for her work on Mauckingbird Theatre Co.'s smash hit production of The Misanthrope. As Resident Designer for Mauckingbird, she also designed sets and costumes for Shakespeare's R&J and costumes for Hedda Gabler. Recently, she was invited to exhibit both her set and costume designs as part of the exhibit "Curtain Call: Celebrating a Century of Women Designing for Live Performance" at Lincoln Center in New York City. This honor represents 100 female theatrical designers chosen for this retrospective. For Temple Theaters, this year Marie designed the costumes for the main stage productions Damn Yankees and The Seven.
Dan Kern won the Barrymore Award this year for Best Director for his work on Lantern Theatre Co.'s acclaimed production of Skylight, also winning the Best Director prize from Philadelphia Weekly. As an actor, he played James Tyrone in Long Day's Journey Into Night at Villanova; and performed opposite Oscar-nominated actor David Strathairn in a staged reading of the new play The Human Equation for the national new play festival PlayPenn.
Douglas C. Wager directed In Conflict, which originated at Temple Theaters in October 2007. This past year, the show made its international premiere at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland, UK where it won the festival's top prize, the Fringe First Award. After a success run in the UK, In Conflict opened Off-Broadway in New York City as the opening show of The Culture Project's 2008-09 Season, at the Barrow Street Theater in the West Village. It received rave reviews from Ben Brantley of The New York Times and other outlets such as the Associated Press and Philadelphia Inquirer. The show closed November 16, 2008 after a successful three-month engagement.
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