CCM Major
Critical and Creative Media Major
Media Studies has a long history at Wake Forest University, beginning in the Department of Speech Communication and Theatre Arts dating back to 1958 when Julian Burroughs introduced Broadcasting courses to Wake Forest students. Film Studies courses were added to the curriculum ten years later. In 1992, the Department of Communication separated from Theatre Arts, and the question of “Radio-TV-Film” was resolved at the time by moving the faculty and curriculum with Communication into the Social Science division. The Critical and Creative Media major was approved by a vote of the full College factory during the 2021-2022 academic year. The positioning of this major within the Department of Communication is mutually beneficial in that both entities are focused on the study of stories, how we communicate them, and how they shape the human experience.
The Critical and Creative Media major coheres around the history, theory, and practice of media in a way that has integrity and offers students a path toward working in the industry or continuing their studies at the graduate level. Our focus is on the history, ethics, analysis, theory, and production of media are very much tied to transnational and transmedia approaches to production and curriculum. Current classes are already beginning to incorporate projects using cell phones, the web, and social media. We embrace opportunities to develop these areas further (without sacrificing our commitment to traditional forms, which still constitute the “gold standard” of our field) and to expand our global reach. This is not just about democratizing technology but also about curating diverse texts that will broaden the intellectual horizons of our students. Doing both well is essential to the future of Critical and Creative Media.
Our model of intellectual pursuit informing creative pursuit and creative pursuit informing intellectual pursuit is wholly in line with the University’s strategic plans. This model is tied to the idea of the applied liberal arts and helps students connect their liberal arts education in storytelling and media to various pathways leading to careers or to invaluable career assets. As an important component of this pathway, faculty have included students in their creative and scholarly work, a collaboration between faculty and students that builds exceptional engagement. Text, media, creative practices, and pedagogy are consistently interrogated for their effectiveness in teaching the material and also in their promotion of diversity, equity, and inclusion.
We maintain a robust network of Wake Forest graduates working in varying regions of media. Internships are a core practice in the major thanks to this network and the ingenuity of our students and faculty.
CCM FACULTY
Mary Dalton
Professor of Communication
University of North Carolina at Greensboro Ph.D.
Wake Forest University
108 Carswell Hall
336.758.5405
dalton@wfu.edu
Mary M. Dalton is Professor of Communication at Wake Forest University where she teaches courses focusing on critical media studies and screenwriting. Her scholarly publications include articles, book chapters, and the books The Hollywood Curriculum: Teachers in the Movies (third revised edition), Teacher TV: Seventy Years of Teachers on Television (second edition), and the co-edited volume The Sitcom Reader: America Re-viewed, Still Skewed (revised edition). Her documentaries have been screened at various festivals, museums, galleries, libraries, and on public television.
Cagney Gentry
Assistant Professor of Practice
Wake Forest University
University of North Carolina – Greensboro- M.F.A.
125 Carswell Hall
336.391.4361
gentrysc@wfu.edu
Cagney Gentry is a teacher of film and filmmaking in the Department of Communication at Wake Forest. He has made a variety of short films, feature films, documentary and narrative that have played at juried festivals around the country and won many awards. His most recent work includes Fort Maria, which won the Jury Prize and Best Cinematography award at the Ashland Independent Film Festival and the Best Director award from the BendFilm Festival in 2018. His ongoing work in the Boston Thurmond Documentary Film Project has resulted in three different film projects, all in progress, but that have been funded by a North Carolina Humanities Grant and the Cucalorus Filmed in NC Fund. His most recently completed film, a short film, Half Sisters, has premiered at Mammoth Lakes Film Festival in California and will have streaming distribution on the indie film platform NoBudge in November 2023.
Woodrow Hood
Director of Critical and Creative Media, Director of Film and Media Studies
University Missouri-Columbia PhD
127 Carswell Hall
336.758.2237
hoodwb@wfu.edu
Director, Sound Designer, and Composer, Dr. Hood creates content for Adobe Stock and FilmMusic, and distributes work via Apple Music, Spotify, YouTube, and many other streaming services. Recent publications include work for Brill Publishing (Amsterdam), Interdisciplinary Publishing (Oxford), and London Film and Media. He regularly presents work in the U.S., the U.K., Amsterdam, and Prague often focused on the use of artificial intelligence in film and media, horror cinema, and interdisciplinary, multimedia creative practice.
Ernest Jarrett
Director of Media Facilities
UNC-Greensboro M.A.
UNC-Chapel Hill
04-D Carswell Hall
336.758.5075
jarretes@wfu.edu
Jarrett was born and raised in North Carolina. He has taught cinema studies at UNC-Greensboro, High Point College, Piedmont Community College, the North Carolina School of the Arts School of Filmmaking, and Wake Forest University.
Thomas Southerland
Assistant Professor of the Practice
American Film Institute MFA
University of Kentucky
125 Carswell Hall
336.758.5405
southetg@wfu.edu
Thomas Southerland is a practicing filmmaker who has taught at Wake Forest since 2018. His first narrative feature, PROUD CITIZEN won the Jury Prize at the New Orleans Film Festival in 2014 and eight other Jury and Audience awards at film festivals around the country. His second narrative feature, FORT MARIA, won the Jury Prize and Best Cinematography award at the Ashland Independent Film Festival and the Best Director award from the BendFilm Festival in 2018. His three short documentaries, LAMP (A GHOST STORY), LONELY KINGDOM, and APRIL EIGHTY-NINE have screened at numerous festivals. LONELY KINGDOM won the Best Documentary Short Jury Prize at the Charlotte Film Festival. He recently completed two short films, the documentary I’M THE GIRL (THE STORY OF A PHOTOGRAPH), and the narrative short BOOMSHADOW.