EVENTS CALENDAR, PAGE 65 In Medias Res cmsw.mit.edu fall 2017 IN MEDIAS RES The Magazine of MIT Comparative Media Studies/Writing Building 14E, Room 303 Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA 02139 617.253.3599 / [email protected] / cmsw.mit.edu cmsw.mit.edu/magazine Head Edward Schiappa Group Directors Federico Casalegno, Design Lab Ian Condry and T.L. Taylor, Creative Communities Initiative Rik Eberhardt, MIT Game Lab Kurt Fendt, HyperStudio Fox Harrell, Imagination, Computation, and Expression Lab FALL 2017 Suzanne Lane, Writing, Rhetoric, and Professional Communication 3 LETTER FROM THE HEAD 41 ANGLES Nick Montfort, The Trope Tank Growth and Vibrancy The Figure on the Hillside Scot Osterweil, The Education Arcade Edward Schiappa Kathryn Mohr, ’20 Lisa Parks, Global Media Technologies and Cultures Lab 4 NEW FACULTY 47 ILONA KARMEL WRITING PRIZES Justin Reich, Teaching Systems Lab Parks, Reich, and Klopfer The Green Chiles Elise Chen Kishore Patra, ’18 Stephen Strang, Writing and Communication Center 7 WELCOME 50 NERD PRIDE Sarah Wolozin, Open Documentary Lab The New Graduate Classes MIT’s Lilly Chin Wins “Jeopardy” Ethan Zuckerman, Center for Civic Media College Championship DENIZ TORTUM 11 Elizabeth Durant VR Through a Long Lens Administrative Staff Sharon Lacey 52 UPDATES Michael Gravito Research and Personal Updates Systems Administrator SOCIAL IDENTITY 14 Gabriella Horvath Reimagining the Avatar Dream 64 UPDATES Financial Assistant Fox Harrell and Chong-U Lim 2017 Theses Shannon Larkin Academic Administrator 27 RECRUITMENT 65 EVENTS Closing the Gender Gap in Becky Shepardson Calendar and Podcasts/Videos Undergraduate Academic Administrator Mechanical Engineering Sarah Smith Mary Beth O’Leary 68 PORTFOLIO #TheEndlessCommute Administrative Officer 29 PORTFOLIO B.D. Colen Steven Strang MIT Public Art Director, Writing and Communication Center Jessica Tatlock 40 SCIENCE WRITING Cover image by Elise Chen and Andrew Assistant to the Head Crafting a Community of Writers Whitacre, based on mural panel by Lia Coleman, Andrew Whitacre Katherine J. Igoe ’17, and The Borderline Team: arts.mit.edu/ Communications Director artists/the-borderline. cmsw.mit.edu/people LETTER FROM THE HEAD GROWTH AND VIBRANCY By Edward Schiappa, John E. Burchard Professor of Humanities Reich looks at large-scale learning systems propose a theoretical framework for artificial rather than just online education content. intelligence to help game designers overcome Or as Reich himself puts it, he “looks at the the biases embedded in how their games future of learning in a networked world.” generate virtual identities. Speaking of firsts, this past year we became Of course biases don’t just exist in virtual the first academic unit at MIT to offer a worlds. In other new research, lecturer for-credit class on virtual reality, “Hacking Andrea Wirth worked with MIT colleagues VR: Exploring Oculus and Immersive this year to study how the Department of Media Production,” taught by Professor Mechanical Engineering was so successful in William Uricchio and visiting scholar Sandra achieving gender parity amongst majors. (For Rodriguez. Uricchio will often describe context: 13.2% of all U.S. mechanical engi- himself as a history scholar; that’s true but neering bachelor degrees went to women, perhaps undersells the impact his work with while MIT’s number was 49.5%.) Their big Sarah Wolozin and the Open Documentary lesson? Prove to female undergraduates that Lab has had on using the history of media there’s a career waiting for them in mechani- reetings as we enter the change to separate the brilliance of some VR cal engineering, and do that by foreground- 2017-2018 academic year with projects from the hype of others. ing MIT’s own MechE women. Like most some great news around the Becoming a home for faculty VR research good research, they discovered something growth and vibrancy of Com- has inevitably supported breakthrough work counter-intuitive: would-be female mechan- Gparative Media Studies/Writing: we have by students. Ainsley Sutherland, ’15, wrote ical engineering majors at MIT largely aren’t welcomed three new faculty members into her thesis on how VR can (or fails to) evoke looking for role models to guide them into the fold, bringing a new breadth of research empathy, and filmmaker Deniz Tortum, ’16, the major—instead, they simply want to see and educational opportunities at graduate and an interview with whom you’ll see in this the “existence proof” that women get jobs in undergraduate levels. You’ll learn more about issue, explored the advantages of getting past the field and that their studies won’t be for them on the next pages, but a brief introduc- VR as simply a way to reproduce reality— naught. tion is in order here. instead, the materiality of VR provides film- Meanwhile, you’ll see in this issue that Professor Lisa Parks has joined us by makers with all sorts of new creative op- MIT undergraduates keep writing incredible way of the University of California, Santa portunities. (Uricchio was Tortum’s thesis fiction and nonfiction; our research groups, Barbara, and is best known for her work on advisor; Sutherland’s advisor was Professor faculty, students, and alums keep racking media infrastructure, notably in the context Fox Harrell, whose VR project with Karim up achievements, including a “Jeopardy!” of satellites and surveillance. We’re pleased Ben-Khelifa, “The Enemy,” was the cover college tournament championship by CMS to have her teaching two core CMS subjects story in the last issue of In Medias Res.) minor Lilly Chin; and CMS/W keeps hosting this fall—CMS.701 “Current Debates in It’s worth mentioning too that our VR incredible speakers and other public events. Media” and CMS.796 “Major Media Texts.” work builds in part on the augmented reality We should highlight one event in par- Assistant Professor Justin Reich and Professor work produced by CMS students more than a ticular: This year’s Julius Schwartz Lecture Eric Klopfer both join us after time formally decade ago, when computing power couldn’t features Marvel Comics writer and five-time based in another MIT unit but with deep in- yet generate today’s immersive experiences. Eisner Award winner Brian Michael Bendis. tellectual and professional ties to CMS/W You’ll have a chance to learn more about that Previous Schwartz Lecture honorees include through their work in education. Klopfer, history on November 16 at 5pm, just after our major fantasy/sci-fi figures Neil Gaiman and in fact, has been a principal investigator in graduate program information session, when J. Michael Straczynski. That’s on November our Education Arcade research group since we host our annual alumni panel: one panelist 9 at 5:30pm. Don’t miss it! its inception in 2003 and a long-time teacher this year is Dr. Karen Schrier, ’05, who at Last, we want to thank those of you who of subjects cross-listed with CMS and the MIT studied how augmented reality could be have already donated to MIT’s Campaign for Department of Urban Studies and Planning, incorporated into history education and has a Better World, which just announced it has such as “Design and Development of Games taken that work into her career as an associate raised $589 million in new gifts and pledges for Learning.” Reich meanwhile is the first in professor in games and interactive media. in just the past year. Consider supporting CMS/W to incorporate research into massive Elsewhere in this year’s magazine, you’ll our research labs and student fellowships by open online courses; over the years, our find recent writing from Professor Harrell, visiting cmsw.mit.edu/giving. faculty and researchers have taught MOOCs who with recent MIT computer science and contributed over a 140 subjects’ worth Ph.D. graduate Chong-U Lim published of materials to MIT OpenCourseWare, but “Reimagining the Avatar Dream.” They fall 2017 3 NEW FACULTY INTRODUCING LISA PARKS JUSTIN REICH, AND ERIC KLOPFER Elise Chen Over the past ten years, Comparative Media Studies/Writing “It’s not just a video game war,” Parks, who joined Comparative has grown from what, in effect, was a program of just two faculty Media Studies/Writing as a professor in 2017, says. “There are also members—co-founders Henry Jenkins and William Uricchio—to one very physical, material things happening affecting the people living in of more than twenty. The big jump came in 2013, when the Com- these different parts of the world. The drone war has changed people’s parative Media Studies program merged with Writing and Humanis- relationship to the sky.” tic Studies, bringing science writers like Tom Levenson and Marcia To Parks, the air itself has become a medium controlled by this kind Bartusiak, and creative writers like Helen Lee and Junot Diaz, of warfare. together with exemplary media scholars like Uricchio, new hires like While much of the field talks about the impacts and implications T.L. Taylor, and appointments shared with other parts of the School of the media we consume in the form of television, movies, or social of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences—making professors like Ian media, Parks takes a different approach—she prefers to study the in- Condry and Jing Wang an essential part of CMS/W life. This year, frastructures that make this media possible and how an infrastructure we’ve grown again. We’re thrilled to introduce Professor Lisa Parks, itself affects the people around it. new to MIT via the University of California, Santa Barbara, and, “A lot of people in our field know narrative structure and how shifting to us from other parts of MIT, Associate Professor Justin to read images and sounds and glean information from those media Reich and Professor Eric Klopfer. formats,” she says.