Dr. Karma R. Chávez (Bobby and Sherri Patton Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis) speaks on her latest research. 

LEARN MORE about Dr. Chávez and her research.

Will take place in DMC 5.102

A screening in honor of the 50th anniversary of the release of “Please, Don’t Bury Me Alive!” / “¡Por favor, no me entierren vivo!” (1976) the first Chicano feature film, followed by a Q&A with the filmmaker. 

The first Chicano feature, “Please, Don’t Bury Me Alive!”/ “¡Por favor, no me entierren vivo!” (1976), celebrates its 50th anniversary this year! Made by San Antonio filmmaker Efraín Gutiérrez, the film follows Alejandro (played by Gutiérrez), as he makes difficult life choices from the limited options that are available to him during the era of the Vietnam War. Independently produced and distributed, “Please, Don't Bury Me Alive!” was a regional success and commanded lines around the block at the time of its release. In 2014, the Library of Congress recognized the film as an important part of American film heritage when it added the title to the National Film Registry, a list of “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" films selected for preservation. “Please, Don't Bury Me Alive!” is a rare exploration of South Texas Chicano culture during the 1970s, and it continues to inspire and resonate with audiences, to this day. Don't miss the opportunity to see this historic film and filmmaker Efraín Gutiérrez, who will be present for a Q&A that will follow this special 50th anniversary screening.

CLICK HERE to view the first five minutes of the film.

About Efraín Gutiérrez

Efraín Gutiérrez is a Mexican-American filmmaker from the Westside of San Antonio, Texas. Inspired by the Chicano Movement of the 1960s and 70s, Gutiérrez directed, produced, co-wrote, acted in, and self-distributed the first Chicano feature film, “Please, Don’t Bury Me Alive!”/ “¡Por favor, no me entierren vivo!” (1976). The film celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, and in 2014, it was included in the National Film Registry, the National Film Preservation Board’s list of “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” films selected for preservation by the Library of Congress. Along with Gutiérrez’s next two features, “Amor Chicano Es Para Siempre” / “Chicano Love is Forever” (1977) and “Run, Tecato, Run” (1979), Please, Don’t Bury Me Alive! explores the struggles and experiences of Chicanos living in Texas in ways that had not been done before. Gutiérrez has continued to make films, including more recent works, such as “A Lowrider Spring Break in San Quilmas” (2001) and “Barrio Tales: Tops, Kites and Marbles” (2008).

Presented as part of the Latino Media Arts and Studies Speaker Series (LMAS).

The Latino Media Arts and Studies (L-MAS) Speaker Series is coordinated by faculty in Radio-Television-Film, with support from RTF, the Moody College, and other campus partners. It has a three-fold mission: to support the growth of Latina/o/x film, television, and media, to inspire student media makers and scholars, and to foster Latina/o/x media studies scholarship. 

The L-MAS Speaker Series shares a mission with the Latino Media Arts & Studies undergraduate minor, which enables students to take a range of courses of Latina/o/x cultures, media production, and scholarship. With an overlapping focus, the series hosts a range of media makers, screenwriters and scholars who share their work and personal stories of working in and studying Latinx media storytelling.

RSVP HERE

Followed by a light reception in the 5th floor DMC Lobby

Essential Film History: The Evolution of Movie Storytelling - by Charles Ramírez Berg and John Bruns

A guide to the fundamentals of understanding film history, filmmaking, and film appreciation.

Film is not just a medium; it is also a language—and a global one at that. Essential Film History describes how this language emerged and how it has matured over the course of more than 125 years. Beginning with the experiments of the late nineteenth century, and tracking the development of cinematic storytelling, commercial distribution, and audience reception into the era of digital recording, Charles Ramírez Berg and John Bruns offer a comprehensive course in both the history and artistry of film.

Essential Film History breaks cinematic language into three core components: image, sound, and narrative. Between the 1890s and 1940s, this audiovisual language both consolidated and spread, becoming comprehensible worldwide. Since then, filmmakers have adapted and extended the language of cinema to suit an ever-growing range of aesthetic and narrative projects, from documentaries and full-length animation to avant-garde and made-for-TV movies. Covering major figures, studios, and events as well as key technological and sociopolitical developments, Essential Film History is an indispensable guide to the evolution of cinematic style.

About Charles Ramírez Berg
Joe M. Dealey, Sr. Professor in Media Studies
Board of Regents' Outstanding Teacher
Top Ten Great Professor at the University of Texas at Austin

Charles Ramírez Berg is the Joe M. Dealey, Sr. Professor in Media Studies and is the author of Latino Images in Film: Stereotypes, Subversion, and Resistance (2002), Cinema of Solitude: A Critical Study of Mexican Film, 1967-1983, Posters from the Golden Age of Mexican Cinema (Mexico City: The Mexican Film Institute and the U. of Guadalajara Press), reprinted as Cine Mexicano: Posters from the Golden Age, 1936-1956 (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2001). In addition, he has written The Classical Mexican Cinema: The Poetics of the Exceptional Golden Age Films (2015, University of Texas Press), which was the Grand Prize winner of the 2016 University Co-Op Robert W. Hamilton Book Awards and was named an Outstanding Academic Title by the American Library Association. His most recent book is Essential Film History: The Evolution of Movie Storytelling (University of Texas Press, 2026), co-authored with John Bruns.

In addition, he has written many articles and book chapters on Latinos in U.S. films, film history and narratology, Mexican cinema, as well as entries for the World Film Encyclopedia, The International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, and The Oxford Encyclopedia of Latinos and Latinas in the United States. He has also consulted on several documentaries on Latinos in film, been interviewed for several others, and authored essays for three Criterion DVDs.

He has published fiction, poetry, and co-authored a children's book, The Gift of the Poinsettia, with Chicana poet Pat Mora (Houston: Arte Público Press/U. of Houston, 1995). From 1991-1994, he served on the Executive Council of the Society for Cinema Studies (now the Society for Cinema and Media Studies). One of the co-founders of the Austin Film Society, Ramírez Berg is a charter member of its Board of Directors, served as its president from 2001-2003, and continues to be an active member of the Board.

He has served on the National Film Preservation Board of the Library of Congress since 2010, and was a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow, 1997-1998. In August 2022, he was invited to vote in the British Film Institute and Sight and Sound’s Greatest Films of All Time Poll, 2022.

Ramírez Berg is a member of the Academy of Distinguished Teachers (1996) and has won every major teaching award at The University of Texas. Among them are the Friar Centennial Teaching Fellowship (1999-2000), the Piper Professor Award (2003), awarded by the Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation "for outstanding academic and scholarly achievement and for dedication to the teaching profession," and the Chancellor's Council Outstanding Teaching Award (2004). More recently, he was the recipient of the Board of Regents' Outstanding Teacher Award (2009), was named one of The University of Texas’ Top Ten Great Professors in the June 2011 issue of the UT alumni magazine, The Alcalde, and received the Distinguished University Lecturer Award from the School of Undergraduate Studies in 2018.

Charles has been honored to serve as the University Grand Marshal at commencement ceremonies since 2010 and as the Grand Marshal for Moody College of Communication for over 10 years. He was an extra in Robert Rodriguez’s Spy Kids and Richard Linklater’s Slacker, and his last name was a visual plot point in The Dark Knight.

About Nick Marx

Nick Marx is Professor of film and media studies and founding co-director of The Center for Democracy, Art, & Popular Culture at Colorado State University. He specializes in media studies, media industries, digital media, and American politics and culture. He is author or co-editor of several books, including Sketch Comedy: Identity, Reflexivity, and American Television, The Comedy Studies Reader, and Saturday Night Live and American TV. His peer-reviewed research has appeared in The Journal of Cinema and Media Studies, Communication, Culture & Critique, Television and New Media, Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies, and in the anthologies The Oxford Handbook of Screen Comedy, From Networks to Netflix  and How to Watch Television.

Nick's most recent book is That's Not Funny: How the Right Makes Comedy Work For Them, which analyzes the cultural influence and economic clout of libertarian and conservative comedians like Joe Rogan, Greg Gutfeld, Theo Von, and Tim Allen. You can read an excerpt of the book at New York magazine. His current book project, Are Men OK? Masculinity and Millenial Comedy, examines performers like Tim Robinson, Nathan Fielder, Danny McBride, and The Lonely Island.

Nick is on sabbatical for the fall 2026 semester as a research fellow at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin, working with the collection of Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels.

About Yen-Jen Chen

Yen-Jen Chen is a Ph.D. Candidate in Media Studies at UT Austin. He aims to critically investigate the cultural and political implications of contemporary queer discourse to place media studies in conversation with diverse fields, including East Asia studies, critical theories, postcolonial studies, and oceanic discourse.

Media archives: Digital Forensics, Preservation, Analysis

About Thorsten Ries

Dr Ries joined the Department of Germanic Studies in 2021 as Assistant Professor with specialism in German literature from the 18th to the 21st century, digital learning and digital humanities. His primary research focus is the foreign language curriculum in the context of digital humanities, (digital) scholarly editing, born-digital archives and digital forensics.

Dr Ries is initiator and director of the Digital Humanities Lab at the Department of Germanic Studies at UT (DHLab@GS). DHLab@GS acts as a DH hub at Department of Germanic Studies, based on UT Austin‘s campus (BUR 326). DHLab@GS is also the platform on which Ries is organizing the DHLunch@GS online talk series.

Dr Ries has worked on a historical range of authors, including Friedrich Hölderlin, Gottfried Benn, Thomas Kling, Michael Speier, and others, and is specifically interested in writing processes, scholarly editing, born-digital archives, digital literature and the vast spectrum of digital humanities methods in general. He works on multimodal digital learning concepts focusing on remodeling the language and cultural studies curriculum with digital literacy, digital skills and a digital-first perspective in mind.

Dr Ries is also a Visiting Professor (5%, 06/2021-08/2024) at the Department of Literary Studies, Ghent University, Belgium. Before coming to Austin, he has been teaching at Regensburg University, Antwerp University, Ghent University, Hamburg University, and conducted research at projects at Ghent University and the University of Sussex, UK.

About Ryan Briggs 

Ryan David Briggs is a PhD candidate in Media Studies. His research and teaching focus on media industry studies, Hollywood film and television history, and contemporary independent cinema. His dissertation project, “The Canary in the Hollywood Coal Mine: Mid-Range Movie Death and the Decline of the Film Business,” provides a recent periodization and historicization of Hollywood from 2005 to 2020. It highlights the significant negative impacts that industrial transformations had on non-blockbuster filmmaking in this period. This study explains how the film industry found itself in an unsustainably lopsided situation almost a full decade before the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked further havoc and argues that Hollywood’s transformation during the late 2000s and 2010s resulted in less originality, fewer films reflective of audience’s lived realities, and a less stable industry overall for filmmakers and film workers. Ryan's original research can be found in the South Central Review and The Velvet Light Trap.