GRADUATE PROGRAM IN VISUAL STUDIES

(949) 824-8059
Julia Bryan-Wilson, Director

Faculty

Eyal Amiran, Ph.D. University of Virginia, Associate Professor of Comparative Literature and of Film and Media Studies (digital media theory, twentieth-century literature, narrative and textual theory, psychoanalysis, modern and postmodern intellectual history)

George Bauer, Ph.D. Princeton University, Professor Emeritus of Art History (Renaissance and Baroque)

Linda Freeman Bauer, Ph.D. Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, Professor Emerita of Art History (Renaissance and Baroque)

Catherine L. Benamou, Ph.D. New York University, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies (Latin American and Latina/Latino film and television; inter-American representation; Orson Welles and off-Hollywood cinema, 1940s-1970s; film historiography; transnational media theory, and community practice)

Julia Bryan-Wilson, Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, Director of the Graduate Program in Visual Studies and Assistant Professor of Art History (contemporary art and visual culture, feminist and queer theory, performance, and video)

Bridget R. Cooks, Ph.D. University of Rochester, Assistant Professor of African American Studies and Art History (African American art and culture, Black visual culture, museum criticism, film, feminist theory and postcolonial theory)

Sohail Daulatzai, Ph.D. University of Southern California, Assistant Professor of African American Studies and of Film and Media Studies (cultural studies, postcolonial theory, race, internationalism, cultural politics of hip-hop, sports, cinema)

Edward Dimendberg, Ph.D. University of California, Santa Cruz, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies (film history, audio-visual media and the built environment, contemporary architecture and urbanism, avant-garde cinema, modernism and modernity)

Anna Gonosová, Ph.D. Harvard University, Associate Professor of Art History (Byzantine and Medieval art and architecture)

Kristen Hatch, Ph.D. University of California, Los Angeles, Assistant Professor of Film and Media Studies (American film history, histories of gender and sexuality, childhood studies, censorship, and reception studies)

James D. Herbert, Ph.D. Yale University, Professor of Art History (Modern European art)

Lucas Hilderbrand, Ph.D. New York University, Assistant Professor of Film and Media Studies (histories of technology, copyright, documentary, queer cultures and media, obscenity, and video art)

Judy C. Ho, Ph.D. Yale University, Professor Emerita of Art History (Chinese art, archaeology, common religion, Buddhist art)

Victoria E. Johnson, Ph.D. University of Southern California, Assistant Professor of Film and Media Studies and of African American Studies (history and critical theory of U.S. television, popular film, and media; politics of geography, race, gender, and sexuality in popular culture; cultural studies)

Peter Krapp, Ph.D. University of California, Santa Barbara, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies (digital culture, media history, cultural memory, history and theory of artificial worlds)

Felicidad "Bliss" Cua Lim, Ph.D. New York University, Assistant Professor of Film and Media Studies (Philippine and Hong Kong cinema; cinema and temporality; Third World and postcolonial studies, horror, Fantastic cinema, and the politics of genre)

Catherine Liu, Ph.D. City University of New York Graduate School and Center, Director of the Humanities Center, Co-Director of the Humanities and Arts Major, and Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies and of Comparative Literature (critical theory, visual and literary culture, psychoanalysis, narrative theory and melodrama in film and literature, New Waves, cultural revolutions)

Margaret M. Miles, Ph.D. Princeton University, Professor of Art History and Classics (Greek and Roman art, archaeology)

Glen Mimura, Ph.D. University of California, Santa Cruz, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies (minority, diasporic, and third cinemas; cultural studies of media, nationalism and globalization, queer theory and racialized sexuality)

Alka Patel, Ph.D. Harvard University, Assistant Professor of Art History (Asian art, South Asian architecture)

Mark S. Poster, Ph.D. New York University, Department Chair and Professor of Film and Media Studies and Professor of History and Comparative Literature (modern European intellectual history, media studies)

Fatimah Tobing Rony, Ph.D. Yale University, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies (documentary and ethnographic film, race and representation, postcolonial studies, film history and theory, film production)

Sally A. Stein, Ph.D. Yale University, Associate Professor of Art History (American art, photography and mass media, feminist theory)

Dickran Tashjian, Ph.D. Brown University, Professor Emeritus of Art History (American art and literature, American and European avant-garde, art and technology)

Cécile Whiting, Ph.D. Stanford University, Department Chair and Professor of Art History (American art and culture, feminist theory)

Bert Winther-Tamaki, Ph.D. Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, Associate Professor of Art History (Modern Japanese art, Asian American art, art and nationalism)

Roberta Wue, Ph.D. Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, Assistant Professor of Art History (modern Chinese visual culture)

Affiliated Faculty

Ackbar Abbas, M. Phil. University of Hong Kong, Department Chair and Professor of Comparative Literature and Professor of Film and Media Studies (globalization, Hong Kong and Chinese culture, postcoloniality, critical theory)

David Carroll, Ph.D. The Johns Hopkins University, Professor of French (literary theory and twentieth-century French literature)

Jonathan M. Hall, Ph.D. University of California, Santa Cruz, Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature and of Film and Media Studies (Japanese film, East Asian Cinemas, queer and psychoanalytic theory, experimental and avant-garde film)

Laura H. Y. Kang, Ph.D. University of California, Santa Cruz, Associate Professor of Women's Studies, Comparative Literature, and English (feminist epistemologies and theories, cultural studies, ethnic studies)

Susan B. Klein, Ph.D. Cornell University, Associate Professor of Japanese (premodern and modern theatre and dance, Japanese religions, feminist critical theory)

Kyung Hyun Kim, Ph.D. University of Southern California, Associate Professor of East Asian Languages and Literatures and of Film and Media Studies (East Asian cinema, modern Korea, cultural theory)

Catherine Lord, M.F.A. State University of New York, Buffalo (Visual Studies Workshop), Professor of Studio Art (critical theory, feminism, photography)

Julia Reinhard Lupton, Ph.D. Yale University, UCI Chancellor's Fellow and Professor of English, Comparative Literature, and Education (Renaissance literature, literature and psychology)

William M. Maurer, Ph.D. Stanford University, Department Chair and Professor of Anthropology (anthropology of law, globalization, transnationalism, citizenship and nationalism, finance capital, identity, Caribbean)

Alejandro Morales, Ph.D. Rutgers University, Professor of Spanish and Chicano/Latino Studies (Latin American and Chicano literature, film studies, creative writing)

Gonzalo Navajas, Ph.D. University of California, Los Angeles, Professor of Spanish (eighteenth- through twentieth-century Spanish literature; film and visual arts; aesthetics and contemporary culture)

Robert F. Nideffer, Ph.D. University of California, Santa Barbara, Associate Professor of Studio Art and Informatics (virtual environments and behavior, interface theory and design, technology and culture, contemporary social history, gaming studies)

Nancy Lee Ruyter, Ph.D. Claremont Graduate School, Professor of Dance (dance history, Spanish dance, choreography, and research methods)

Jared Sexton, Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, Assistant Professor of African American Studies and of Film and Media Studies (race and sexuality, policing and imprisonment, contemporary U.S. cinema and political culture, multiracial coalition, critical theory)

Jonathan M. Wiener, Ph.D. Harvard University, Professor of History (recent American history, theory and history)

Graduate Program

The graduate program in Visual Studies, administered jointly by the faculties of the Department of Art History and the Department of Film and Media Studies, offers students the opportunity to pursue a doctorate in the cultural analysis of visual artifacts and experiences. Visual Studies synthe

sizes methodological insights from both component disciplines in order to examine the social practices of visual representation and visuality itself. The program leads to a Ph.D. degree in Visual Studies. While the program (in certain instances) grants an M.A. to students on route to their Ph.D., it admits only those students intending to complete their doctorate at UCI.

In addition, an emphasis in Visual Studies, described later in this section, is available to Ph.D. and M.F.A. students in all departments at UCI.

ADMISSION

The program is open to students applying with either a bachelor's or a master's degree, and applicants must meet the general requirements for admission to graduate study at UCI. A recent sample of academic writing—such as a representative undergraduate paper, or the master's thesis or a major research paper written at the master's level—should be submitted with the application packet.

The deadline for application is January 15, and the program accepts applicants for admission during the fall quarter only. Additional information is available from the Director of the Visual Studies program.

LANGUAGE REQUIREMENTS

All students are required to demonstrate a reading knowledge of at least one foreign language and are strongly encouraged to develop competence in a second. Students consult with the Director and/or their principal advisor(s) to determine the appropriate language to be tested, based on their interests and program of study. Advisors, moreover, may require the demonstration of reading knowledge in additional languages according to the scholarly demands of the student's specific field. All language requirements must be satisfied before students are awarded a master's degree or, if they enter with an M.A., before they are advanced to candidacy for the Ph.D. degree.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

Beyond the core series (Visual Studies 291, 292, 293A), students admitted with a B.A. are required to complete an additional 11 courses for a total of 14 courses. Out of this total, at least 10 courses (including the core series) must be within the program in Visual Studies and at least two courses are to be from outside the Visual Studies discipline. In order to establish a level of expertise in one conventionally defined discipline, students entering with a B.A. must take (among their 10 courses noted above), at least three courses that have a strong component of art history or at least three courses that have a strong component of film studies.

Students admitted with an M.A. must complete an additional five courses beyond the core series, for a total of eight courses. While students may accrue units both for University Teaching (Art History 399 or Film and Media Studies 399) and Reading for the Qualifying Examination (Visual Studies 298), these do not count toward the required number of courses.

QUALIFYING EXAMINATION

By the end of the second year for students entering with a B.A., or the end of the first year for those entering with an M.A., students must reach agreement with one of the program's professors to serve as principal advisor. During the fall quarter of the following year—in most cases, the final quarter of standard course work—the student will work informally with the principal advisor who will supervise one examination field; two additional faculty members supervising examination fields, at least one of whom must be a member of the Visual Studies faculty; a fourth member from the Visual Studies faculty who will not supervise an examination field but will participate in the oral examination; and a designated "outside" member who must be a member of the UCI faculty but cannot hold either a primary or joint appointment in Visual Studies, Art History, or Film and Media Studies. Except in extraordinary circumstances (to be adjudicated by the program's Graduate Committee), students are required to include at least one member from Art History and one from Film and Media Studies among the three faculty members supervising the examination fields.

The student and principal advisor define three fields to be examined by the faculty. The fields should combine historical breadth and some variety in media. Over the course of the following two quarters, students normally enroll in eight to twelve units per quarter of Reading for the Qualifying Examination (Visual Studies 298) during which time they prepare reading lists in close consultation with their principal advisor and field supervisors, and complete the reading of those lists. The examination takes place near the end of those two quarters of study, normatively at the end of the academic year.

The first part of the examination consists of a written component, in which the student is called upon to respond to questions posed in the three examination fields. The student's written responses are circulated to all committee members. An oral examination follows, normally within two weeks, and consists of questions prompted both by the student's reading lists and by the written examinations. Based on the student's written and oral performance, the committee will determine whether the student has successfully passed the examination; if so (and provided all language requirements have been satisfied), the student is then advanced to candidacy for the Ph.D. degree. The normative time for advancement to candidacy is three years. If the committee is not satisfied with the student's performance, it may also decide to reexamine the student on one or more fields after a specific interval. Except in extraordinary circumstances, no student will be given more than two chances to pass any given section of the examination.

DISSERTATION

Within six months of advancement to candidacy, each student must submit a prospectus that defines the scope, approach, and rationale for a proposed dissertation. The student and the principal advisor consult to determine the composition of a doctoral committee of three members including the principal advisor, which then must unanimously approve the prospectus before the student proceeds with the dissertation. The doctoral committee, on the basis of the candidate's past academic performance and proposed dissertation topic, may require additional course work or other forms of preparation for the dissertation. The doctoral committee, under the direction of the principal advisor, supervises the student's research program and ultimately approves the dissertation. The normative time for completion of the Ph.D. program is six years, and the maximum permitted is eight years.

GRADUATE EMPHASIS IN VISUAL STUDIES

In addition to the doctoral program in Visual Studies described above, the Program in Visual Studies also offers an emphasis in Visual Studies available to Ph.D. and M.F.A. students in all departments at UCI. Satisfactory completion of the emphasis is certified by the Director of Visual Studies and is noted in the student's dossier.

Admission to the Program

Students must first be admitted to, or currently enrolled in, a Ph.D. or M.F.A. program at UCI. Applicants must submit to the Director of Visual Studies a summary of prior undergraduate and graduate course work related to Visual Studies, institutions attended, and major(s), together with a brief statement of purpose, including career objectives, areas of interest and research, record of research, teaching, professional accomplishments, and/or creative work. Lack of prior course work does not preclude admission, so long as a compelling statement of research interests congruent with the emphasis makes the case. Admission to the emphasis is on a rolling basis. The Director tracks students' progress toward fulfillment of the emphasis requirements and meets with students to advise them on a program of study, as required.

Emphasis Requirements

Minimum course work for the graduate emphasis in Visual Studies consists of four courses: Visual Studies 291 and three additional elective Visual Studies seminars.

For doctoral students, the qualifying examination and dissertation topic should incorporate Visual Studies as a central concern. One area of the Ph.D. qualifying examination should be on a Visual Studies topic, and one member of the candidate's qualifying examination committee and dissertation committee is normally a member of the Visual Studies faculty. There are no requirements concerning qualifying examinations or theses for M.F.A. students.

Graduate Courses in Visual Studies

Graduate students may also enroll concurrently in any upper-division lecture course with the approval of the instructor.

291 Theories of Vision and Visuality (4). Introductory seminar surveys the key theories of vision and visuality. Examines the theoretical texts that have, over the past several decades, enabled the emergence of the hybrid discipline of Visual Studies and addresses the recent polemics written in support of and opposition to this new disciplinary practice.

292 Visual Studies and Historiography (4). History of art history and film studies to 1980. Examines the ways in which the visual has been constructed and places these constructions in their institutional and cultural contexts. Examines historiographic questions by interrogating the evidentiary power of visual artifacts.

293A Visual Studies Practicum (4). Visual Studies combines competencies from several fields and therefore requires a different kind of writing. This seminar is designed to apply theoretical and methodological insights (explored in Visual Studies 291 and 292) to a research paper on a specific topic in Visual Studies. Prerequisite: Visual Studies 291 or 292.

294 Getty Consortium Seminar (4). Special graduate seminar offered at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, involving faculty and graduate students from the five graduate programs in Art History or Visual Studies located in southern California (UCI, UCLA, UCR, UCSB, and USC). May be repeated for credit as topics vary.

295 Graduate Seminar in Visual Studies (4). May be repeated for credit as topics vary.

296 Directed Reading (4). Directed reading on a specific topic agreed upon by student and instructor. Prerequisite: consent of instructor. May be repeated for credit as topics vary.

298 Reading for the Comprehensive Examination (4 to 12). Directed reading in preparation for the qualifying examination. Satisfactory/ Unsatisfactory only. Prerequisite: consent of instructor. May be repeated for credit.

299 Dissertation Research (4 to 12). Research and writing of the dissertation. Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory only. Prerequisite: consent of instructor. May be repeated for credit.