Undergraduate Courses
Summer 2024
FOR CLASS DETAILS, INCLUDING TIMES, CLICK ON "FIND COURSES NOW" ON THE REGISTRAR'S COURSE SECHEDULE PAGE.
Note: For more information on summer internships, which are managed through University Extension (UEX), see the section on summer internships on the Moody College internships site.
Summer courses are offered in four terms. The letter preceding the course number describes the course dates:
| f | first term | June 6–July 11 |
| n | nine-week term | June 6–July 30 |
| w | whole summer | June 6–August 16 |
| s | second term | July 15–August 16 |
NINE-WEEK TERM
WHOLE SUMMER
RTF w331P VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY – Web-Based • MARINA FONTOLAN
May count toward the Media Studies Minor and the Media & Entertainment Industries Minor.
Trade press and business experts love to hype the profitability of the global video game industry, measuring its success in units sold and revenues earned. And while it is certainly a juggernaut within the media industries, there has been much less focus on what it is like to actually work in the industry. From game designers to games journalists, QA testers to Twitch streamers, this course will explore the material realities, working conditions, and business models of the games industry and their impact on its workers: the good, the bad, and the ugly. Instead of focusing on specific games, genres, systems, or mechanics, this course will trace the impact of digitization, casualization, and globalization on the industry’s production cultures, employment models, commodity forms, profit centers, promotional logics, and more. We will explore historical and contemporary concerns shaping the industry, such as government regulations and rating systems, outsourcing and offshoring, labor casualization and unionization, precarious employment and crunch periods, loot boxes and revenue models, live streams and gambling laws, mods and skins, user-generated content and end-user license agreements, identity politics and systemic inequalities, promotional work and emotional labor, etc. In addition to a thorough consideration of what it means to work in the games industry (past, present, and future), we will also hear from guest speakers about their experiences working in a variety of games companies and positions. From crash to crunch, this course will give you a better sense of how to anticipate and navigate the changing nature of work in these increasingly digital and global media industries.
FIRST TERM
RTF f328C GENDER AND MEDIA CULTURE– Web-Based • JENNIFER McCLEAREN
Open to both RTF majors and non-majors.
This course provides an introduction to the critical and theoretical analysis of gender (femininities and masculinities) in media (film, television, new and emerging media). Students will engage dominant and oppositional practices of media production, representation, and reception to investigate the sociocultural mechanisms that shape individual and collective notions of gender in our media-saturated environment. Paying particular attention to wider questions of power, politics, and identity, students will read key texts in cultural, media, and communication studies, as well as influential theories within gender, feminist, and transgender studies. Although primarily focused on the mediated construction of gender, this course insists on an intersectional approach that examines gender in conjunction with race, class, sexuality, nation, and generation.
RTF f329C DIGITAL MEDIA PRODUCTION – Web-Based • BEN BAYS
Animation, Visual Effects, Digital Painting and CGI are used to produce digital content for a variety of media including films, animation and interactive formats like video games and VR/AR. This course is an interactive, online experience designed to teach you the foundational Digital Media Production tools: Photoshop, After Effects, Adobe Animate thoFlash) and Maya. Through creative hands-on challenges, you will apply digital media tools and techniques to a variety of tasks in the pipeline of production from concept, storyboard, layout to compositor, VFX, CG and interactive design. In the end, you must choose: Will you become a generalist across all digital media production, will you specialize in one discipline or will you define a new role in digital media production? This course offers both access to instructor guidance and the ability to complete assignments at your own pace. OPEN TO BOTH RTF MAJORS & NON-RTF MAJORS.
RTF f344M CGI FOR FILM AND GAMES – Web-Based • BEN BAYS
CGI for Film and Games explores the history, principles and methods of 3D Modeling, Surfacing, Animation and Simulation using CGI. This course is self-paced and non-linear: students customize the course according to their area of interest. Topics to choose from include (but are not limited to) creating concept art for CGI, modeling and sculpting hard surfaces and organic characters, designing virtual sets and game levels, procedurally generating flora, hair, fur and terrain, painting (and photographing) textures, simulating effects, lighting and virtual cinematography, real-time (game engine) implementation and advanced rendering techniques (and much more). Additionally, there are "combo" projects which allow students to combine their skills into larger ideas like making a cartoon, integrating CGI into live action and creating interactive games. Choose your own path and the instructor collaborates with you to achieve your vision. No prior knowledge of CGI is required. Mac or PC. No software purchase required.
SECOND TERM
RTF s308 DEVELOPMENT OF FILM & MEDIA– Web-Based • ASH KINNEY d'HARCOURT
This course examines the historical development of media industries—film, radio, television and digital. Through lecture, section discussions, readings and screenings, we will investigate historical contexts (cultural, industrial, technological) in which media have been produced and consumed in the US and globally.
RTF s352 GLOBAL CULT CINEMA – Web-Based • BABAK TABARRAEE
This course carries the Global Cultures Flag (GC) and the Writing Flag (Wr).
With their dedicated fans and enduring presence in the public sphere, cult films unfold important crossovers between media and culture in different regional contexts. This course will analyze global configurations of cult cinema, especially in the Middle East. From various scholarly viewpoints, we will ask how and why certain movies have generated emotional attachments in different sociocultural environments. Reviewing the foundational texts on the concept of cult in cinema studies, we will examine several approaches to studying the applications and functions of cult films and film cults. We will specifically examine case studies from and through the Middle East to understand the resonance of cult media texts around the world. Moreover, we will investigate the communal identities displayed through the cultural expressions of cult fans in order to better understand people’s complex relationship with the political order and cultural power. As such, “Global Cult Cinema” will explore less examined but significant areas of international film canons and fandoms. The interdisciplinary nature of this course further enables us to investigate important constituents of audience reactions to the global and local media through the purposeful use of the theories on popular culture, fandom, stardom, and politics of national and transnational film reception.