I just sent in the proofs and index to the 2nd ed. of The Media Studies Toolkit, coming soon. Added index entries for 2e include: Beyoncé, Carpenter, S., The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Spielberg, S., Swift, T., Wednesday, X (social media).

Shorewood, WI #NoKings

Walter Bernstein, Inside Out: A Memoir of the Blacklist (172). Where do we find ourselves now? (This is from next week's course readings in my Media and Society class.)

New Toolkit edition coming in February 2026 www.routledge.com/The-Media-St...

New Toolkit edition coming in February 2026 www.routledge.com/The-Media-St...

Book recs: all four of Alison Bechdel's memoir/essay/novels (Fun Home, Are You My Mother?, The Secret to Superhuman Strength, and Spent) which I read over the past few weeks. I would take your recs of more books like these but I guess there will be none until Alison writes another.

RIP Cleo Laine, very special guest star of The Muppet Show ep 219 with an Irving Berlin/salad prep Swedish Chef duet www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIuo...

The banality of wrongness when using Google seeking basic information -- of course there isn't a BFI classics book on this film even though the AI says there is. You know you're talking to a bullshit engine.

RIP Loretta Swit, very special guest star of Muppet Show episode 502 (Muppets+Sondheim!) www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVkl...

New cluster!! post45.org/contemporari... ❣️ 📺 ⌨️ 🥰 Edited by @dfmorgan.bsky.social ! "My So-Called Life at 30" features essays on intimacy, literacy, fan studies, mobility, migration, dance, beauty culture, teen dramas, Winnie Holzman, diaspora and fandom, narratology, over-analysis, & more!

Such a thrill to write about My So-Called Life and Winnie Holzman for @atpost45.bsky.social!

Binge convergence

[Bracket City] May 11, 2025 www.theatlantic.com/games/bracke... Rank: 🔮 (Puppet Master) 🎹 Total Keystrokes: 70 🎯 Minimum Required: 70 Total Score: 100.0 🟪🟪🟪🟪🟪🟪🟪🟪🟪🟪

Strong final episode (before a bonus ep!) of Making: Stories Without End. So happy I got to explain my beef with the "OJ killed the soaps" narrative, one of my pet peeves www.wbez.org/making/2025/...

What a 🧵

Longtime Fresh Air listeners, if you have tears prepare to shed them.

Harold and Maude (1971)

RIP Ruth Buzzi, very special guest star of Muppet Show episode 104 www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Zdu...

Several Wisconsin universities are represented here including Madison, but I see no other UW System school.

Dr. Newman explores the use of camera looks in sitcoms like Abbott Elementary as a comedic device. Establishing direct connection with the audience, blending traditions of comedic performance that invite viewer participation & emotional response. Read it here: tinyurl.com/4vp8uakv

Two hypothetical higher ed AI uses I learned about today: tracking students' locations and cross-referencing with course schedules to identify frequent absentees and direct advising interventions to them; and feeding course contents into an AI to produce a custom chatbot to answer student Qs 24/7.

Three's Company (1977)

🥳New Flow?! With Michael Z. Newman, @geraldsim.bsky.social , @matthewcrain.bsky.social , Roderik Smits, & Andrew Stubbs-Lacy! Topics include: camera looks in sitcoms, advertising’s integration of AI, Big Tech’s lobbying efforts, "fair pay” in media industries, & Welcome to Wrexham! flowjournal.org

For Flow, I wrote this essay about the camera looks in Abbott Elementary and other comedies, and camera looks more generally going back to film comedian comedies and musicals. I connect these looks to the sitcom laugh track. www.flowjournal.org/2025/04/came...

Great FLOW piece quoted below… reinvigorates my desire to think more/write about the Once & Again confessionals (rarity in drama) where they also use shorter cutaways and looks (though in confessional) to achieve winks and humor.

hey-ooooooo, some writing about #AbbottElementary by a fellow from #Milwaukee! :)

For Flow, I wrote this essay about the camera looks in Abbott Elementary and other comedies, and camera looks more generally going back to film comedian comedies and musicals. I connect these looks to the sitcom laugh track. www.flowjournal.org/2025/04/came...

This is me in conversation with Myles about The Pitt and TV storytelling.

The internet’s effort to capture the throwback qualities of #ThePitt was a bat signal for media scholars invested in the semantics of TV narrative, so here’s me and @mznewman.bsky.social parsing whether the show is really a procedural. (cc: @tvmojoe.bsky.social).

I didn't anticipate when putting Carrie (1976) on the syllabus for April 22-24 (intro to film studies) that it would be such a great Easter/prom season twofer.

Podcast rec, happy to learn from this episode that pandemic podcast fave (weird to have that bundle of feelings) Home Cooking is coming back with these two. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/k...

This is a really good TV history podcast with a critical edge and lots of great audio clips.

First episode out today for Making: Stories without End podcast from @wbez.org! This one is mostly about the "mother" of daytime soap opera, Irna Phillips. If you like Chicago, broadcast history, soap opera, or listening to me you will enjoy it! www.wbez.org/making/2025/...

Midwestern media studies folks, check out this exciting event coming up later this month featuring Neil Verma as keynote speaker. April 18-19 at UW-Milwaukee. Neil's talk is April 18 at 7 pm in Mitchell 195 (where all conference events will be held).

As #scms25 approaches (first of the post-twitter era!), feel free to follow this conference feed in Bluesky to track the discourse:

The great champion of independent, speak-truth-to-power journalism, and of the democracy that can only survive if the press is free, Robert W. McChesney, has died at age 72. He fought the media oligarchs and the politicians who served them — and often won. Now, we must carry the fight forward.

Boo

I knew Jonathan a little and once had the privilege of being edited by him, amazed by the generosity of his feedback. I learned so much from his writing, the scholarly work but for me especially his blogging and advice about academia. sterneworks.org/academe/ Such a huge loss.

1/7 It is with deep sadness that we mourn the passing of Linda Williams, a pioneering scholar whose fearless work transformed film and media studies. Over her remarkable career, Williams challenged scholars to take seriously popular and often marginalized genres,

RIP Linda Williams. This is from her essay on "body genres," a great and influential concept for film/media criticism. faculty.las.illinois.edu/rrushing/470...

Everything is terrible but it's also the 25th anniversary of the return of Steely Dan. Thanks to @ihavethatonvinyl.com for publishing this!

Not sure it's a good idea to joke about radicalizing college students, but if I can convince even a small number of them to revere Wikipedia and shun ChatGPT I will be pretty satisfied.

Price of an egg update.

No holding back in this interview about AI hype.

Midwest friends, I'm co-organizing this regional film and media studies graduate symposium this April, feat. keynote presentation from Prof. Neil Verma! Abstracts due February 16th. Please recirculate and forward to anyone you know who might be interested!

Midwestern US film/media folks, please share and circulate this CFP for the Midwest Graduate Film and Media Studies Symposium "Drawing (In)Attention" in Milwaukee on April 18-19. Keynote by Neil Verma. Apply by Feb 16 via the QR code or this link docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

The TikTok ban represents the most significant and widespread deplatforming of creators in American internet history. It far surpasses Vine's closure in 2017 in both scale and impact, and stands to permanently reshape the ideological tilt of the online creator landscape.

David Lynch movies were a gateway into film and media studies for so many people. Also a staple of repertory cinemas when they were a key entry point to cinephilia and underground and alternative cultural spaces. And of course he was a notable primetime soap opera creator. RIP

Nice to see that UWM alum Susan Kerns will be leading MKE Film