Description
Emerson College is pleased to announce a major faculty hiring initiative in civic media. Building on the College’s strengths in communication and the arts and supporting the College’s strategic initiatives in civic and global engagement, we seek to develop a distinguished faculty that addresses connections among media innovation, technologies, social networks and global citizenship. There is a need to consider how the changes brought by digital media are shaping political and social life, along with definitions of governance and citizenship. How people make and use media (whether it’s a film or a tweet) to engage with the world, to make change, to be informed, or to connect across national borders, are topic areas that span the arts, sciences, humanities and social sciences.
The new faculty hires in Journalism, Visual and Media Arts, Communication Studies, and the Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies will form a distinctive interdisciplinary faculty cohort that intersects with students from across the College. While faculty members will have their primary appointments within one of the four participating units, they will share teaching responsibilities with the new College-wide minor in Digital Media and Culture, and have a research affiliation with the Emerson Engagement Labs (EEL). All the new faculty hires will begin September 1, 2014.
The minor in Digital Media and Culture offers students the opportunity to acquire a deeper understanding of how digital technologies are transforming society and culture. Participatory cultures are emerging through games and social media; whole new modes of interaction are being crafted online. From the disruption of established industrial models of production and consumption to the creation of new social norms, this minor asks students to create and analyze digital media that directly engages in this transforming and transformative culture.
The Emerson Engagement Labs (EEL) is a cluster of research labs focused on technologies and media innovation in global civic life. The Engagement Game Lab (http://engagementgamelab.org) is the currently existing unit that focuses on the design and research of games and play within civic and public processes. Incoming faculty can affiliate with the Engagement Game Lab or the new Global Engagement Lab, which will focus specifically on the analysis of global communication flows and the production of global media initiatives.
The Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies seeks a new tenure-track faculty member at the Assistant Professor level with a focus on digital media and culture. The ideal candidate will have expertise in digital technologies (such as mobile technologies and social software) and questions of digital citizenship, the networked public sphere, and/or online communities. He or she will anchor a new and exciting interdisciplinary Minor that offers students a critical lens on how digital technologies and practices inform and reinvent civic cultures and social processes. A PhD in media/cultural/technology studies or related social science field is required.
Ideal candidates will have a demonstrated capacity for research in their areas, teaching experience, a willingness to help build curriculum, and the ability to work effectively with faculty, students, and staff from diverse backgrounds. Faculty will be encouraged to receive grants to support their research in the EEL and work with its dynamic staff to develop innovative research programs and find ways to meaningfully engage undergraduates in active research.
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