Laura is an advanced doctoral candidate in Media Studies at the University of Oregon’s School of Journalism and Communication. Her education includes a BA in Cultural Studies (Columbia College Chicago), and an MS in Media Studies (Univ. of Oregon). Her research interests broadly include technology and gaming, social movements in the digital age, and race and gender issues on social media. She has presented on virtual communities and social media at major conferences, and has a forthcoming co-authored book chapter in the Palgrave-Macmillan series on gender and gaming. Her dissertation traces the genealogy of pro-life feminism, its contemporary relationship to liberal feminism, and the varied forms of technologies employed by both groups to build and reinforce issue communities.
Laura joined the New Media and Culture Certificate program in 2015 after learning of the certificate from colleagues and her previous advisor, Carol Stabile. She belongs to the Fembot Collective as well as the Digital Scholarship Affiliates Group, both of which have coordinated with NMCC in the past – so you could say she has been entangled in NMCC affairs for years now!
Laura’s dissertation work falls more into the genre of women’s and gender studies and critical historiographies, while the rest of her research interests tend to be more digital. Much of her past and future work looks at new configurations and constitutions of social and issue communities. She is very much interested in the role new media play in the sedimentation and definition of social groups formed through ideological linkages. In what ways do social media and GIS apps affect the nature of community and identity formation, the speed at which it occurs, and the physical impact IRL?
Laura’s New Media Recommendations:
Journals and Blogs:
ada: A Journal of Gender, Media, and Technology
Books:
A Prehistory of the Cloud – Tung-Hui Hu
Ethnography and Virtual Worlds – A Handbook of Method
Techniques of the Observer – Jonathan Crary
Entertaining Webstuff: