Happy New Year!

Welcome back for the spring semester. We hope everyone had a restful break and a happy new year. Here is hoping that many of you will be able to join us for meetings this coming semester.

The following is a list of our upcoming events. Please join us in the 4th floor conference room of Sutardja Dai Hall Thursday, Jan 26 at 1pm for our first meeting.

Discussion of Henry Jenkins

26 January 2012, 1pm

4th Floor Conference Room, Sutardja Dai Hall UC Berkeley

Chris Goetz will present on works by Henry Jenkins. We will also remember back to Jenkins' November talk and include our reactions in the discussion.

"Break/ing Ground" Multi-field Working Group
13 March 2012, 5 - 7 pm
126 Dwinelle Annex

The TDPS annual Speaker Series invites working groups across multiple disciplines (Dance Studies, New Media Studies, Sound Studies, African American Literature Studies, and Critical Theory) to discuss key readings by our featured scholar-performers, Drs. Thomas Defrantz and Fred Moten, in preparation for their lecture-performance on Thursday, March 15.

Drs. Thomas DeFrantz and Fred Moten
15 March 2012, 4-7pm
Banatao Auditorium, Sutardja Dai Hall UC Berkeley

Stelarc
2 April 2012, 7:30pm
Banatao Auditorium, Sutardja Dai Hall, UC Berkeley

Professor Rita Raley on Tactical Media
26 April 2012, 5pm
370 Dwinelle Hall, UC Berkeley

End of the year NMWG party! For our last meeting, we will join up with Berkeley Center For New Media Designated Emphasis students for an end of the year celebration.

Bring On The Lumiere -- Ticket Requests!

Hi everyone,

Please send me an email -- aferromurray (at) berkeley (dot) edu -- by noon tomorrow (Tuesday) if you would like me to purchase a ticket for you to see Bring On The Lumiere. I will reserve tickets for the Saturday showing, November 12 at 8pm. Working group will pay for these tickets, but only if you let me know by noon tomorrow. It would be great to get a sizable group together to support local choreographer Katherine Galasso who came to working group last year to present on this piece.

Thanks and hope to hear from you.

Henry Jenkins: ROOM CORRECTIONS

Dear NMWG followers,

I apologize that original Jenkins lecture announcement had the wrong location. The following information is correct:

5-6pm on Thursday, November 3
Geballe Room, Townsend Center, 220 Stephens Hall, UC Berkeley
Henry Jenkins (USC) speaks on Transmedia. This event is sponsored by the Berkeley Center for New Media as a part of their History and Theory of New Media series and is open to the public. If you would like to attend this talk please arrive early as seating is limited and BCNM expects to fill up. The event is free, but a box office will open at 4pm to reserve seats. Doors open at 4:30pm.

New Media in November!

We have several exciting events planned for November, and two of them happen to be this week.

1-3pm on Tuesday, November 1
BCNM Commons, 340 Moffitt
Robert Alford will discuss Chapter 4, "Grainy Days and Mondays: Superstar and Bootleg Aesthetics," from Lucas Hilderbrand's book Inherent Vice: Bootleg Histories of Videotape and Copyright. Email aferromurray@berkeley.edu for the pdf.

5-6pm on Thursday, November 3
Geballe Room, Townsend Center, 220 Stephens Hall, UC Berkeley
Henry Jenkins (USC) speaks on Transmedia. This event is sponsored by the Berkeley Center for New Media as a part of their History and Theory of New Media series and is open to the public. If you would like to attend this talk please arrive early as seating is limited and BCNM expects to fill up. The event is free, but a box office will open at 4pm to reserve seats. Doors open at 4:30pm.

8pm on Friday, November 11
ODC Theater, San Francisco
We will purchase a block of tickets to attend local choreographer Catherine Galasso's new work, "Bring on the Lumiere." Galasso spoke to the working group last year, so we are excited to see the practical product of her historical and theoretical media research. Please email aferromurray@berkeley.edu if you are interested in attending.

More information at: http://odcdance.org/performance.php?param=78

1-3pm on Tuesday, November 29
BCNM Commons, 340 Moffitt
Chris Goetz will discuss scholarship by Henry Jenkins and will focus on the following article: “Complete Freedom of Movement: Videogames as Gendered Play Spaces"

http://web.mit.edu/cms/People/henry3/complete.html

Lars Jan & Paul Abacus Visit

We had an excellent time hosting artist Lars Jan and collaborator Paul Abacus last week. Thanks to those who came out for Lars' talk last week! Here's Lars' abstract, belated...

Lars Jan, the artistic director of LA’s transmedia art lab Early Morning Opera (EMO) and Paul Abacus, the progressive thinker on national borders and the namesake of ABACUS — slated for 2012’s Sundance Film Festival — will be presenting their thoughts on presentations, the lingua franca of the world today. The pair will also discuss and share video excerpts from their diverse body of performance work, influenced by mega-church media design, aquariums, dance cinema, TED talks, suicide bombing and Japanese traditional puppetry.

EMO has recently received commissions from, and premiered new media-driven performance works at, the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (Troy, NY) and the Whitney Museum of American Art (NYC).

Sept. 13 - Reggie Royston on "The Tethered Self, Authenticity and Identity in Sherry Turkle's Work"

I hope some of you were able to join for Sherry Turkle's lecture this evening.

Please join us for the next NMWG to discuss the talk and Turkle's work. Reggie Royston, Ph.D. candidate in the Department of African American Studies, will lead our discussion with his presentation, The Tethered Self, Authenticity and Identity in Sherry Turkle's Work. We will meet in room 340 Moffitt (BCNM Commons) at 1pm on Tuesday, September 13. Please read the attached article and come prepared to discuss! If you don't have time to prepare we would still love for you to join in the discussion.

NMWG-2011 Fall Schedule!

Dear New Media Working Groupers,

Please mark your calendars for the following dates with the New Media Working Group.

Tentative Fall 2011 Schedule:

Tuesday, September 6, 2011, 5pm
Sherry Turkle (MIT) on "Technology and Intimacy"
Banatao Auditorium, Sutardja Dai Hall

Tuesday, September 13, 2011, 1pm
Reggie Royston leads a discussion on Sherry Turkle
BCNM Commons, 340 Moffitt

Tuesday, September 27, 2011, 1pm
Talk by artist-in-residence Lars Jan
BCNM Commons, 340 Moffitt

Tuesday, October TBD, 2011, 1pm
Robert Alford leads a discussion
BCNM Commons, 340 Moffitt

Tuesday, November 1, 2011, 1pm
TBD
BCNM Commons, 340 Moffitt

Friday, November 11, 2011, 8pm
Trip to performance by new media choreographer Catherine Galasso
"Bring on the Lumiere"
ODC Theater, San Francisco