Annenberg Research Seminar: Opening art and TV and scaling data through intersectional R&D

How should we develop culture in the era of big data? As large social media platforms face scrutiny over sharing large user data sets and spend billions on original TV programming, scholars should experiment with alternative methods for creating value in the creative markets. Using OTV | Open Television, a platform for intersectional art and television out of Chicago, Professor Aymar Jean Christian shows how developing local, short-form video can generate enormous value to both communities historically marginalized by race, gender and sexuality and also global media distributors. Using case studies of Brujos, a fantasy series about gay Latino witches reviewed by the likes of New York Times to Vice, and the Emmy-nominated Brown Girls, now in development at HBO, he connects local and online social media data, qualitative with quantitative data, and conversations with indie artists and Hollywood development executives to show how rich, deep, or small data can both critique and create systems of value creation in the era of big data. 

Dr. Christian is an Assistant Professor at Northwestern University.

No RSVP needed. Lunch will be served.