Ithaca College

Patricia Zimmermann, professor of screen studies and codirector of the Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival, was an invited speaker to discuss new media, social media and conflict zones with graduate students in journalism and mass communication at the University of Oregon-Portland on November 2, 2013.

Her interactive presentation was done via Skype. She analyzed and discussed transmedia projects that engage conflict through non-confrontational design to engender dialogue, exploration, and user-generated participation. The projects analyzed included Lunch Love Community, Triangle Fire Archive, Engage Media, and works by new media artists Stephanie Rothenberg and Brooke Singer. Graduate students worked with these projects before the session, and then participated in a dialogue analyzing the ethics, politics, affordances, and implications of these new forms of documentary.