The summer started early for us, aka right as the spring semester ended.
- The Arden Effect
- Anthony Defends Ph.D.
- Leo Interns at the Institute of Data Science as a Media Specialist
- The Media Lab Goes Social Media Media Lab
- Capirotada Collective – Group & Meet Up
- Latinx Critical Creative Consortium Planning
- Lab Upgrades
- Lab Collaborations (UHDT & TAMU SA Latinx Oral Histories)
The Arden Effect
Arden Duffield is a Media Lab enigma, someone who professor joey met at a coffee shop in downtown Bryan when he was shooting a student film in high school. Professor joey loved seeing a hungry film maker out doing the work, along with Professor Jonathan Guajardo, they let Arden know if he was ever interested in working with the lab in the future to feel free to reach out.
Fast forward to late April 2022 and professor joey was surprised to receive an email from Arden inquiring about summer plans for the lab and any possible projects. Arden had just finished up his Freshman year at the School of Visual Arts in New York city and spoke of a film he was finishing up and wanted to show us. Next thing the lab knew, Arden became a pillar at the lab working for weeks straight on color correcting his short film and then working on the scoring and sound. His presence brought so much to the lab, everyone who came through he interacted with such enthusiasm and empathy, it was simply amazing having him in the lab.
Throughout the summer Arden would end collaborating with multiple lab members, like Anthony Ramirez, Leo, Kali, joey, Johnny (they played a lot of chess), Rick. He even guest lectured at professor joey’s class which was amazing!
Arden embodies the spirit of the Media Lab, a place where students can come from all over and learn, collaborate and ideate.
Dr. Anthony Ramirez Defends His Dissertation
Dr. Anthony Ramirez defended his dissertation on August 10th, 2022. The title of his dissertation is Historias de la Frontera: Using Critical Latinx Border – Cultural Studies Theory To Explore The Latinx Identity of The U.S.-Mexico Border in Comic Books. His defense committee consisted of:
- Dr. Srividya Ramasubramanian – Co-Advisor
- Dr. Antonio La Pastina – Co-Advisor
- Dr. Robin Means Coleman – Committee Member
- Dr. Juan Alonzo – Committee Member
Anthony spent four years at Texas A&M as a fully funded Ph.D. student where he performed 2 years of course work and 2 years of dissertation research and publishing. In addition to being an amazing scholar, Anthony proved himself as an amazing teaching, being awarded the Texas A&M University Association Distinguished Graduate Student Award for Teaching. In addition to his preparing for his dissertation defense this summer, he also fielded a number of job offers and we are proud to say he accepted a Assistant Professorship, tenure track position at the University of Houston Downtown in the Department of Art & Communication, go Gators! He plans to start a lab there and we cannot wait to be co-hosting events and experiential learning opportunities.
Leo Interns at Institute of Data Science as a Media Specialist
Through our collaboration with Annie Ortiz and her “Painting Praxis: Artistry, Identity and Decolonial Sensibilities,” we had last spring, Media Lab member Leo Garza ended up meeting Diego Rodriguez, TAMU’s Assistant Director for Education Programs. Leo became the Institute of Data Science Media Specialist and through a collaboration we provided production equipment for his internship to create documentation of the Institute of Data Science’s summer initiatives. You can see a video he worked on below:
The Media Lab Goes Social Media
We are proud to announce we have developed and now maintain a social media presence on Instagram and TikTok. Please like and subscribe!
@tamumediagaminglab
Capirotada Collective – Group and Meet Up
The Capirotada Collective was founded by then graduate students Samantha Ceballos Sosa, Ana Gutierrez, Hector Garza, and Dr. Anthony Ramirez. It has since grown to include many others such as professor joey, Dr. Corina Zavala, James Yu, and Valentina Auden.
The collective is planning on various projects, but for now, you can follow them here:
Latinx Critical Creative Consortium Planning
Taking place in the Fall of 2022, the Latinx Critical Consortium is a continuation of the 1st Latinx CCC held in the Fall of 2021 at UT Austin. Durning the summer, joey lopez, Regina Mills, Anthony Ramirez began collaborating with professors from all over Texas to ideate the Consortium and it’s themes. Latinxccc.org was established and the framework of the consortium has been developed there since.
Lab Upgrades
The lab saw many upgrades over the summer with a full podcasting setup developed. We also had professor Jonathan Guajardo provide additional equipment with a new Sony A6400, 70-200 G series lens, Black Magic Atom video switcher and other production equipment to help us further develop multi-modal media production capabilities.