Bachelor of Science
Written Portfolio
Senior Seminar
The Senior Seminar class is required for all Mass Communications and Communications Studies students. Building off our Research Methods class, we learned different techniques to conduct research and prove or disprove our thesis. We spent the semester researching and conducting our own research on a topic of our choosing as it related to the world of media. The paper had to be at least 20 pages and we also had to give a presentation of our findings to the class. For my project, I conducted a textual analysis of Marvel's Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Below is the abstract, feel free to click through to the full paper!
“Freedom vs Fear: Captain America The Winter Soldier and the Superhero Genre’s changing perceptions of Good and Evil”
One medium that is extremely important to our culture is the comic book, which gave birth to superheros. Superheroes are often a source of comfort and security, standing up for what is right. Today, the superhero genre has become an integral part of the film industry with more and more movies released every year, making billions of dollars. Therefore, these movies deserve to be taken seriously, as they have a huge influence, especially on young people. The superhero's world mirrors our own; the price of security is high, we make sacrifices to our privacy, and our freedom everyday, and we have to decide what is right for ourselves, and what we’re going to do if it’s not. To examine what these movies say about our society, I conducted a textual analysis of Marvel’s Captain America The Winter Soldier (2014), comparing and contrasting to the historical values of superheros and how they have changed to reflect our modern world. Since the superhero genre isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, what it says about society will influence millions of people, primarily young people, who have the capacity to shape and change this country, which these movies encourage them to do, suggesting that if we only stand up for what is right, we can all be a hero.
One medium that is extremely important to our culture is the comic book, which gave birth to superheros. Superheroes are often a source of comfort and security, standing up for what is right. Today, the superhero genre has become an integral part of the film industry with more and more movies released every year, making billions of dollars. Therefore, these movies deserve to be taken seriously, as they have a huge influence, especially on young people. The superhero's world mirrors our own; the price of security is high, we make sacrifices to our privacy, and our freedom everyday, and we have to decide what is right for ourselves, and what we’re going to do if it’s not. To examine what these movies say about our society, I conducted a textual analysis of Marvel’s Captain America The Winter Soldier (2014), comparing and contrasting to the historical values of superheros and how they have changed to reflect our modern world. Since the superhero genre isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, what it says about society will influence millions of people, primarily young people, who have the capacity to shape and change this country, which these movies encourage them to do, suggesting that if we only stand up for what is right, we can all be a hero.
Research Methods
One of the main projects for our Research Methods class was to conduct and analyze a survey. For my survey I wanted to find out how people prefer to watch movies. This is an important question to me because I still love to go watch movies in the theatre, but I know many people my age would rather just wait to watch a movie on Netflix or stream it online illegally. Click below to see my findings.
Great Films of Great Directors
This was definitely one of my favorite classes. Every week we watched a different movie and spent the week analyzing what exactly made it a "great" movie. One of my favorite topics we discussed were the ways men and women are portrayed in film and how this effects our ideologies. The two papers I wrote for the class just happened to be about masculinity and femininity. The first one focused on The Good, The Bad and the Ugly, and the second, my final paper, compared and contrasted the female lead characters in Nights of Cabiria and A Woman Under the Influence.
Documentary Tradition
Similar to Great Films of Great Directors, we watched a different documentary each week, examining different storytelling techniques and styles throughout film history. Here are two of my favorite papers, an analysis of the music and cinematography in Godfrey Reggio’s Koyaanisqatsi, and my final paper, a reflection on the documentary tradition through the lens of Borat.
Mass Media and Celebrity
This was another one of my favorite classes, an in-depth study of celebrity culture in the United States. The main project for the class involved "tracking" a celebrity throughout the semester, including keeping a journal about them, relating them to concepts we learned in class, and we finished out the year with a paper on everything we learned and a presentation. For my celebrity I chose Darren Criss, arguably one of my favorite people in the world. To learn more about Darren and why he's such an important celebrity, click below!
Play Analysis for the Stage & Directing
Play Analysis was a Theatre class that was required for my film minor. I love theatre and was involved in plays and musicals from 8th grade til senior year of high school, so I was excited to get back into the world of theatre. It ended up being a very difficult but rewarding class. We had to read several plays and create play maps for each one, which involved plotting the exposition, rising action, climax, and falling action, along with assigning each character a specific concept. It was a very interesting process that I had never thought about a stage director going through.
Directing was another class that I got to take my last semester. It wasn't required but I'm definitely glad I got to take it. Again it was very challenging but rewarding. Along with learning about the process of directing a stage show, we got to direct our own scenes. For my final project, I directed a highly... abridged version of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged. After hours working outside of class with three actors, they were able to perform it and make my audience laugh, which was one of the most rewarding experiences.
Directing was another class that I got to take my last semester. It wasn't required but I'm definitely glad I got to take it. Again it was very challenging but rewarding. Along with learning about the process of directing a stage show, we got to direct our own scenes. For my final project, I directed a highly... abridged version of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged. After hours working outside of class with three actors, they were able to perform it and make my audience laugh, which was one of the most rewarding experiences.