Intercollegiate Media Studies Majors
Media Studies is an intercollegiate major offered jointly by Claremont McKenna, Harvey Mudd, Pitzer, Pomona and Scripps Colleges. The major requires the completion of 11 courses, with a concentration in Film/Video, Digital/Electronic Media, or Critical Studies.
All Media Studies majors will complete courses in the following areas.
Courses listed as fulfilling each requirement are subject to change, and other courses may be counted toward those requirements with the consent of the Media Studies curriculum committee.
1. One introductory critical/theoretical course
MS 49 PZ, PO, SC: Introduction to Media Studies
MS 50 HM, PZ, PO or LIT 130 CM: Intro to Film
MS 51 PO: Introduction to Digital Media Studies
2. One introductory production course
ART 20 PO: Photography I
ART 21 PO: Foundations of 2D Design
ART 141 SC: Introduction to Digital Art
ART 145 SC: Beginning Photography
ART 148 SC: Intro to Video Art
LIT 30 CM: Intro to Video Art
MS 53 SC: Intro to Computational Media
MS 59 SC: Alt Comp Sci: Analogs/Algorithms / “Hello World!” Intro Python Programming
MS 159 SC: Computational Photography I
MS 82 PZ: Intro to Video Art
MS 182 HM: Intro to Video Art
3. One course in media history
LIT 131 CM: Film History I (1925-1965)
LIT 132 CM: Film History II (1965-Present)
LIT 134 CM: Special Studies in Film
LIT 137 CM: Gay and Lesbian Cinema in the U.S.
MS 42 PZ: Transnational Crime Cinema
MS 45 PZ: Documentary Media
PZ MS 53: Science Fiction Film
MS 55 PZ: Shooting the Truth: The Rise of Political Documentary
MS 61 PZ: Pan-American Vanguards
MS 79 PZ: Silent Film
MS 83 PZ: Contemporary Practices in Media
MS 86 PZ: History of Ethnographic Film
MS 88 PZ: Mexican Visual Cultures
MS 89 PZ: Mexican Film History
MS 91 PZ: History of American Broadcasting
MS 91 PO: History of American Broadcasting
MS 94 PO: Transnational Asian Cinema
MS 100 PZ: Asian Americans in Media
MS 111 PZ: Perspectives on Photography
MS 116 PZ: Screen Culture
MS 118 PZ: Visual Culture & Politics in the African Diaspora
MS 135 PZ: Learning from YouTube
MS 137 PZ: Media Archives
MS 151 PZ: Television Genres
MS 152 PO: TV Authorship
MS 153 PO: The Original Television Series
MS 160 PO: Japanese Film: Canon to Fringe
ENGL 189A SC: American Film: John Ford, Frank Capra, Alfred Hitchcock
ENGL 189B SC: American Film: Orson Welles, Preston Sturges, Fritz Lang
ENGL 189C SC: Fifties Film: Pop Culture and Society
ENGL 189D SC: Genre: The Art Film
Art 181 SC, Theory Seminar in Studio Art and Media Studies
ART 181G SC: From Beauty to the Abject: Race, Whiteness and Modernism
ART 183 SC: Feminist Concepts & Practices in Studio Art and Media Studies
ARHI 141A PO: (Re)presenting Africa: Art, History, and Film
ARHI 141B PO: Africana Cinema: Through the Documentary Lens
ARHI 144B PO: (Re)presenting Africa: Art, History, and Film
ARHI 178 PO: Black Aesthetics and the Politics of (Re)presentation
ARHI 186T PO: Art and Time
ARHI 186Y PO: WMDs: Cinema Against War, Imperialism, & Corporate Power
ENGL 118 PO: Nature of Narrative in Fiction and Film
ENGL 147 PO: Contemporary Critical Theory
LIT 103 HM: Third Cinema
LIT 136 CM: American Film Genres
LIT 138 CM: Film & Mass Culture
LIT 139 CM: Film Theory
MS 46 PZ: Feminist Documentary Production and Theory
MS 48 PZ: Media Ethnography/Autobiography
MS 70 PZ: Media and Social Change
MS 105 PZ: Transnational Media Theory
MS 106 PZ: Power/Knowledge
MS 110 PZ: Media & Sexuality
MS 112 PZ: Anthropology of Media
MS 113 PZ: African Masculinities in Film
MS 114 PZ: Film Sound
MS 118 PZ: Visual Culture & Politics in the African Diaspora
MS 136 PZ: Online Feminist Spaces
MS 147B PO: Topics in Media Theory: Body, Representation, Desire
MS 147C PO: Topics in Media Theory: Constructing/Dismantling the Body
MS 147E PO: Topics in Media Theory: Politics of Representation
MS 147G PO: Topics in Media Theory: Virtuality & the Body
MS 147H PO: Topics in Media Theory: Reality, Realism, & the Real
MS 148B PO: Drone Theory
MS 148C PO: Media/Space
MS 149 PO: Topics in Media Theory 2
MS 149E PO: Topics in Media Theory: A Brief History of Film Theory
MS 149F PO: Topics in Media Theory: Queer Visions, Queer Theory
MS 149H PO: Topics in Media Theory: Games, Theory, and Narrative Structures
MS 149Q PO: Topics in Media Theory: Freud, Film, Fantasy
5. Two courses in a concentration
Students must take two courses in their chosen area of concentration. Media Studies offers concentrations in the following 3 areas:
Film/Video
Digital/Electronic Media
Critical Studies
Major Declaration Form -Film & Video
One intermediate or advanced film/video production class.
One additional course in media history, as listed above.
DIGITAL / ELECTRONIC MEDIA Concentration
Major Declaration Form-Digital:Electronic Media
An intermediate or advanced digital production course.
One course in twentieth or twenty-first century art history:
ARHI 181 SC: Art Since 1945
ARHI 184 PO: Modernism, Antimodernism & Postmodernism: A Social History of North American Art
ARHI 185 PO: History of Photography
ARHI 185T PO, Art and Time
CRITICAL STUDIES Concentration
Major Declaration Form – Critical Studies
One additional media theory course, as listed above. One of the two required media theory courses must be MS 147 PO, MS 148 PO, or MS 149 PO.
One additional course in media history, as listed above.
Four appropriate electives, drawn from the list of all approved courses that follows (note that Pitzer MS majors must select MS 194 PZ, Media Arts for Social Justice, or MS 196 PZ, Media Internship, as one of their electives).
Critical Studies students also have the option of a sub-focus in Film Studies:
Students desiring an emphasis in Film Studies should follow the Critical Studies track, tailoring their major by selecting the following courses:
MS 50 PZ or LIT 130 CM, Language of Film
MS 82 PZ or ART 148 SC or MS 182s HM, Introduction to Video Art
MS 147 PO, MS 148 PO, or MS 149 PO
One course in film theory such as: LIT 103 HMC, Third Cinema; LIT 138 CMC, Film and Mass Culture; LIT 139 CM, Film Theory; MS 46 PZ, Feminist Documentary Production and Theory; MS 72 PZ, Women and Film; or MS 76 PZ, Gender and Genre; MS 48 PZ, Media Ethnography/Autobiography; MS 74 PZ, Sound Theory, Sound Practice; MS 110 PZ, Media and Sexuality; MS 197 PZ, Media Praxis in Ontario; or ARHI 141B PO, Africana Cinema: Through the Doc Lens
LIT 131 CM, Film History I (1925-1965) and LIT 132 CM, Film History II (1965-Present)
MS 190 PO, Senior Seminar
MS 190 JT
The senior exercise consists of a topical senior seminar jointly taught during the fall semester by faculty from each of the concentrations. This seminar asks students to bring together the various aspects of their course of study, producing an appropriate culminating seminar project that demonstrates their command of the fields and the forms of critical and creative practice that they have studied. During this seminar, all senior Media Studies majors will be given the option to develop a proposal for a second-semester Senior Project. These proposals will be reviewed by the Media Studies faculty, and selected students will go on to complete an independent project under the supervision of two members of the Media Studies faculty or appropriate affiliated faculty members from the Claremont Colleges. The Senior Project course will count toward the four electives required for the major.
All students must take four appropriate electives, drawn from the list of all approved courses listed on the Courses page.
Note: Pitzer MS majors must select MS 194 PZ: Media Arts for Social Justice or MS 196 PZ: Media Internship, as one of their electives.
