Category: News

Groundbreaking Documentary ENO at 41 North Film Festival

Eno and director Gary Hustwit at the 41 North Film Festival

The 41 North Film Festival celebrates its 10th anniversary, November 7-10, at the Rozsa Center for the Performing Arts. Headlining this year on Saturday, November 9th, is the groundbreaking generative documentary Eno about visionary musician and artist Brian Eno, directed by Gary Hustwit (Helvetica, Rams, Objectified) who will be in attendance at the festival.

A pioneer at the intersection of technology and art and a self-proclaimed “sonic landscaper,” Brian Eno has been an innovative and highly influential figure, shaping the sounds of artists such as David Bowie, U2, Talking Heads, and Coldplay. Drawing inspiration from its subject, the film Eno also blends art and technology through its use of a bespoke generative software developed by Hustwit and creative technologist Brendan Dawes. The software uniquely sequences scenes from Hustwit’s interviews and footage, along with Eno’s own archive of hundreds of hours of never-before-seen footage and unreleased music. No two screenings are alike, each one offering different scenes, order, transitions, and music.

Hustwit has been presenting the film live around the country and the world since its premiere at the 2024 Sundance film festival and will present two unique iterations of the film at 3:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. The 3:30 p.m. screening will include a Q&A with Hustwit and Brendan Dawes (via Zoom) following the film. This event is co-sponsored by the College of Computing and the Institute of Computing and Cybersystems. Look for announcements about other featured events and the full festival program in the coming days. 

The 41 North Film Festival is sponsored by the Department of Humanities, the Department of Visual and Performing Arts, and the College of Sciences and Arts.

Richard Canevez Awarded 2024 REF Seed Grant

Richard Canevez and Kette Thomas, Humanities, participate in a panel at the 2023 41 North Film Festival.
Richard Canevez, assistant professor of communication, culture, and media, has been awarded a 2024 REF Seed Grant.

Richard Canevez, assistant professor of communication, culture, and media in humanities, has been awarded a 2023 seed grant from the Vice President for Research Office Research Excellence Fund.

In its evaluation of the proposal the committee wrote: “The project will use narrative inquiry to gather and analyze information on the experiences of Ukrainian refugees, and thus is both timely and supportive of strategic goals of Michigan Tech related to global issues and those of the Humanities department.”

From the VPR web page, “REF-RS grants are designed to provide research faculty (including research scientists, engineers, and research assistant professors) and untenured, tenure-track academic faculty who have been in their current position with Michigan Tech for less than six years with additional resources to develop an externally supported research program.”

Canevez joined the humanities roster in spring 2023. His research focuses on social informatics, peace and conflict, social justice, and social movements and resistance, with a current focus on the war in Ukraine. He also teaches in communication, culture, and media, and will be teaching a course specifically in Power, Activism, & Technology next fall.

Congratulations, Dr. Canevez!

Hernandez-Ramos Inducted into STC Student Honorary Society

Scientific and Technical Communication major Aracely Hernandez-Ramos was inducted into the Society for Technical Communication’s student honorary society Sigma Tau Chi.

Aracely Hernandez-Ramos was inducted into the Society for Technical Communication’s student honorary society Sigma Tau Chi in a ceremony at the society’s annual conference on May 18th. Membership into the society is an honor awarded to students enrolled in a technical communication program who “[…] have a cumulative grade point average of 3.5 or above, are exemplary in participation in STC, and demonstrate a potential for significant contribution to the profession. In 2024, only two STC student members were awarded this distinction.”

Hernandez-Ramos is an undergraduate in humanities’ scientific and technical communication program, as well as the president of MTU’s student chapter of the Society for Technical Communication. She is also a coach at the Michigan Tech writing center, and can commonly be seen around the department.

Our heartfelt congratulations to Aracely!

Congratulations to Humanities 2024 Graduates!

Humanities undergraduates posed with department head Scott Maratto at spring commencement on Saturday. Back row: Scott Maratto, Michael Bunker (CCM), Daniel Ryan (STC), Austin McFarlane (STC), Elsie Burton (STC). Front Row: Charlotte Haanela (English), Karissa Sanders (English), Kara Laramore (English), Cameron Gorelick (English), Aspen Stampfler (English), Maddie Nass (STC), Grace Parsekian (STC), Mindy Pierre (STC).

A total of 21 graduate and undergraduate students crossed the stage on Friday and Saturday at Michigan Tech’s annual spring commencement ceremonies.

18 Undergraduates, one masters, and two PhD students were honored over the weekend for having completed, or nearly completed, their degrees across four humanities programs.

Our 2024 graduates will go on to a wide variety of pursuits, from careers in communications, media, and academia; to graduate study in fields like law & policy, and archival studies; to traveling and studying abroad. We are so proud to see our students representing the diversity a humanities degree has to offer!

The department would like to offer our heartfelt congratulations to the following students:

Communication, Culture, and Media: Melissa Dowler, Lyndsay Lagreid, Elijah Poirier, Cole Risko, Ashton Verduin.

English: Cameron Gorelick, Charlotte Haanela, Kara Laramore, Karissa Sanders, Aspen Stampfler.

Scientific and Technical Communication: Michael Bunker, Elsie Burton, Joshua Jongema, Austin McFarlane, Maddie Nass, Grace Parsekian, Mindy Pierre, Daniel Ryan.

Rhetoric, Theory & Culture: Genevieve Delali Antonio (MS), Samantha Quade (PhD), Tori Reeder (PhD).

2024 Commencement Photos

Jennifer Nish Awarded Honorable Mention for Winifred Bryan Horner Outstanding Book Award

Humanities faculty Jennifer Nish has been awarded an honorable mention for the Winifred Bryan Horner Outstanding Book Award by the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition for her 2022 book, Activist Literacies: Transnational Feminisms and Social Media Rhetorics.

From the CFSHRC web site, “The Winifred Bryan Horner Outstanding Book Award is presented biennially in even years for work in the field of composition and rhetoric to recognize outstanding scholarship and research in the areas of feminist pedagogy, practice, history, and theory.”

Dr. Nish joined the humanities department at Michigan Tech last fall (2023) as an associate professor of rhetoric and composition, and was quickly nominated for the Distinguished Teaching Award. She was inducted into the Academy of Teaching Excellence this spring. Her research topics include transnational feminism, activist rhetoric, disability studies, and digital media.

Activist Literacies

“What does it mean when we call a movement “global”? How can we engage with digital activism without being “slacktivists”? In Activist Literacies, Jennifer Nish responds to these questions and a larger problem in contemporary public discourse: many discussions and analyses of digital and transnational activism rely on inaccurate language and inadequate frameworks. Drawing on transnational feminist theory and rhetorical analysis, Nish formulates a robust set of tools for nuanced engagement with activist rhetorics.”

Find Activist Literacies on Amazon.

Stephanie Carpenter Awarded Summit Series Annual Prize for Moral Treatment

English faculty Stephanie Carpenter has been awarded the 2024 Summit Series annual prize for her recent novel, Moral Treatment, from publisher Central Michigan University Press.

The 2024 submission guidelines called for previously unpublished, manuscript-length works, such as novels, novellas, or anthologies, written by current or former residents of Michigan. Included in the prize is publication of the completed work.

Moral Treatment takes place in a psychiatric hospital inspired by the State Hospital in Traverse City, MI, where Stephanie grew up. It follows the parallel stories of Amy Underwood, a troubled 17-year-old patient at the hospital, and “the doctor,” the 65-year old superintendent whose grip on the institution is starting to slip.

Says the Summit Series award page, “Both a coming-of-age story and a story about the challenges of aging, Moral Treatment vividly imagines an era of idealism, crisis, and transition in mental health care in the United States.”

Stephanie Carpenter is an assistant professor of creative writing at Michigan Tech. She teaches courses in reading, writing, and literature in the humanities department.

Distinguished Speaker Lisa Guenther Presents on Social Justice, Prison Work

Dr. Guenther led a seminar that centered around the concept of “Wiindigo Infrastructure,” or the idea that certain infrastructures can be harmful to disadvantaged groups.

Distinguished speaker Lisa Guenther was on campus Tuesday and Wednesday, where she led a social justice seminar based on the article “Beyond Wiindigo Infrastructure” by Winona LaDuke and Deborah Cowen, and gave a public lecture on her work with the P4W Memorial Collective titled “Collective Memory at Canada’s Prison for Women.”

Dr. Guenther is Queen’s National Scholar in Political Philosophy and Critical Prison Studies at Queen’s University in Canada, and has worked and written extensively in the field of prison studies. We thank her so much for joining us and sharing her work!

CinOptic Media Enterprise Competes at Design Expo

Cole Risko (CCM ’24) and Charlotte Haanela (English ’24) in front of the multimedia display of their work with the Cinoptic Media Enterprise Team

The CinOptic communication and media enterprise team presented their work on Tuesday at Michigan Tech’s 24th annual Design Expo. The team, which develops film and multimedia projects for a range of clients, developed a video discussing their work on two recent projects, one for the National Park Service, and the Enterprise Podcast.

The video, presented in a podcast-like format, featured host Lyndsay Lagreid (CCM ’24) interviewing team leads Cole Risko (CCM ’24) and Vanessa Dulong (Sound Design ’25) about their respective projects.

The Isle Royal National Park project, commissioned by the National Park Service, includes a flagship promotional video, as well as orientation materials all written, filmed, and edited by CinOptic team members. The footage for these videos was taken by team members on a trip to Isle Royal in 2021.

The Enterprise Podcast develops episodes centered around interviewing and presenting the work of other Michigan Tech enterprise teams, and is available to listen to on Spotify.

In addition to presenting their work, the team won an award for their image submission, which featured the process of filming their video.

See below to watch the video in full, and don’t forget to checkout the Enterprise Podcast on Spotify! If you’d like to read more about the CinOptic enterprise team and the work that they’ve done, check out their web site!

Play 106: CinOptic Enterprise video
Preview image for 106:  CinOptic Enterprise video

106: CinOptic Enterprise

Brilynn Janckila Awarded Finishing Fellowship

A hearty congratulations to RTC PhD candidate Brilynn Janckila, who has been awarded a finishing fellowship for the summer of 2024!

Finishing fellowships are awarded by the graduate school to outstanding PhD students in their final semester. During that time, the student’s work is fully funded as they finish and defend their dissertation.

Brilynn’s research topics include girlhood studies, Barbie and Barbie media, feminist research methods, fan culture, writing studies, and writing program/writing center administration, usability and social justice in technical communication.

Great work, Brilynn!