Student Research Blogs & Starter Kits for English 238 (F 2024): Critical Infrastructure Studies
As one of the assignments for English 238, “Critical Infrastructure Studies,” graduate students in the course had the option to write a short series of research blog posts. Posts from those who chose this option are linked below. (Other students chose to write essays, which are not posted online.) In addition, all students created “starter kits” (links provided below) of readings, exhibits, and other materials for thinking about infrastructure in relation to a particular field or topic.
Sophia Abbey (Film & Media Studies, UC Santa Barbara)
- “LED Walls and Critical Infrastructure Studies” (Nov. 27, 2024)
Jake W. Dean (Anthropology, UC Santa Barbara)
Mei Flory (English, UC Santa Barbara)
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- My (U)niverse to (We)verse
- “An Analysis of Intimacy in Social Media Infrastructure” (Oct. 22, 2024)
- “South Korea’s Media Infrastructure & Cultural Development” (Dec. 9, 2024)
- My (U)niverse to (We)verse
- “Structuring Intimacy within Social Media Infrastructure” (Nov. 22, 2024)
Alyssa Hare (English, UC Santa Barbara)
Carrie Jiang (Film & Media Studies, UC Santa Barbara)
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- “Deodorizing Shanghai: Sewerage and Social Progress” (Nov. 10, 2024)
- “Perfuming Shanghai: The Commercialization of Aroma” (Dec. 7, 2024)
- “Smell the City” (Dec. 2, 2024)
Owen Leonard (English, UC Santa Barbara)
- “‘Object-Subject Terms’: Reading Robert Morris After the New Materialism” (2024)
- “G2C: A Gallery of AI Infrastructure” (2024)
Katya Lopatko (Comparative Literature, UC Santa Barbara)
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- “Infrastructures of Soviet Thaw cinema: 1953-1960” (Nov. 12, 2024)
- “Infrastructures of Czechoslovak Cinema: Postwar to New Wave” (Dec. 8, 2024)
- “The International Film Festival in Postwar Europe: Infrastructure of Exchange” (Dec. 9, 2024)
Mingyi Xiao (Comparative Literature, UC Santa Barbara)
- “Listening to the Distant Echo — Exploring the Narratives of Africa in Chinese Podcasts” (2024)
- “Narratives and Imaginations of Infrastructures in Africa-China Dynamics” (2024)
