Image copyright Tommy Lau.
Experiential Learning and
Documentary Filmmaking
I combine experiential learning with documentary filmmaking in my career as a filmmaker and academic. The first part of my career was taken up by getting a Ph.D. in linguistics from Vienna University, studying semiotics in Italy at the DAMS with Umberto Eco, film theory and practice at Stanford University , and feminist philosophy with Liz Grosz at the University of Buffalo.
My main passion from my early linguistic formation was and remains studying languages. I know 8 major European and indigenous languages and recently added Yiddish to my repertoire. Next is Hebrew and Arabic. Since 2012 I am a professor of media studies and the director of the Center for Advanced Media Study at Johns Hopkins University, where I organize public humanities events such as the Brazil meets Baltimore: Global Ballroom.
I teach experiential learning classes about feminist filmmaking, emerging Latin American films including study abroad initiatives at CASA Havana, and on the digital media revolution and its effects on storytelling. I feel happy in academia because I am surrounded by curious students and the pure idea of learning.
Some years ago I realized that writing about film and media just couldn't sustain my passion for the subjects. I wanted to know how media was made, how people could be transformed when they were filmed, and, most importantly, I wanted to learn documentary storytelling focusing on conveying emotions rather than ideas.
So I started making my first documentary film about the Reality Makeover Show “The Swan” asking the question why women underwent radical transformations for public television consumption.
While my first films were more academic and ethnographic, my current work tends toward the celebration of visuality and a more conceptional cinematic approach including animation. I also started developing my first narrative feature. I like to change genres and give each film its own form based on the unique content. The core of my film work is located in understanding and conveying difficult phenomena such as violence and resulting trans-generational trauma, the human experience of exclusion from the norm, or the effects of marginalization, and big historical topics such as genocide.
In my work as an academic I write books about iconic filmmakers such as Jane Campion, or the anthology about Radical Equalities and Global Feminist Filmmaking; in my most recent articles I have written about the history of beauty in the modern age, the body in social media performances, and body modification in the age of gender anarchy.
Let's Get in Touch
Mailing
Johns Hopkins University
3400 N. Charles St. Baltimore, MD 21218
Gilman Hall 461
Department of Modern
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Office Hours & Phone
Tuesday, 1:00–3:00pm | +1 (410) 516-7511
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