Jenny Oyallon-Koloski

Carleton FTW!

Collage image of film screenshots from a variety of traditions, centered around Purple Rain (1984)

I’ve finalized my list of films students can work with for our video essay exercises this semester. Purple Rain is joining the ranks this term for some Minnesota solidarity. Stay safe and strong, friends ☔️💪🖥️

Bleh that’s my bad, sorry Kevin (and thank you!!)!

So well deserved, can’t wait for this piece to be out in the world! Congrats to Veronika!!

Great list! I have a chapter on Young Girls in my book if you need any readings to pair :)

In case anyone is looking for things to stream for their toddlers today, three cheers for PBS Kids TV, which has an amazing range of fun, entertaining, educational, thoughtful shows. We’ve been esp loving Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum!

Join the Professional Development Committee’s “How to Prepare for the Job Market” virtual workshop this Friday, June 6 at 1PM EDT. Guidance on preparing materials, cover letters, and research/teaching statements. Sign up to receive the Zoom link: forms.gle/GENr6MkLGzi1....
@swapnilrai.bsky.social‬

Academia in 2025: For weeks I’ve been working through botched copy-edits of my monograph, outsourced by the publisher to a company I’d never heard of, until it finally dawned on me the terrible job might be AI. A quick search confirmed the company recently launched new AI software, which now means..

Yay, congrats!! You definitely deserve to celebrate 🎉

Whooo congrats!!

If you’ve ever sat on an NEH review panel (as many of us have), you know how difficult it is to win a grant. It’s an incredibly exacting process, with way too many excellent projects competing for funding. Awardees are scrutinized from every direction, with more rigor than DOGE can even imagine.

Luminary Cafe is supposed to be decent!

@humanitiesall.bsky.social
statement on the potential decimation of the Nat’l Endowment for the Humanities:
“The NEH connects Americans in every state with our nation’s rich history and culture.”
NEH $$ was essential in my quest to chronicle Lois Weber’s career.
nhalliance.org/nha-statemen...

ALA response to White House assault on IMLS To dismiss the mission of an agency that advances opportunity and learning is to dismiss the aspirations and everyday needs of millions of Americans. And those who will feel that loss most keenly live in rural communities.  As seedbeds of literacy and innovation, our nation’s 125,000 public, school, academic and special libraries deserve more, not less support. Libraries translate 0.003% of the federal budget into programs and services used by more than 1.2 billion people every year. Show Up for Our Libraries, ALA American Library Association, #ForOurLibraries

President Trump's executive order to eliminate the Institute of Museum & Library Services would have disastrous effects for communities nationwide. We call on all Americans who value reading & learning to reach out to their elected leaders.

Read ALA's full response: www.ala.org/news/2025/03...

Filmmakers! Musicians! Actors! Illustrators! Artists of all kinds!

Please take 5 minutes and make your voice heard

6. The policy does not just affect funding going forward. All existing NIH grants will have their indirect rates cut to 15% as of today, the date of issuance.

For a large university, this creates a sudden and catastrophic shortfall of hundreds of millions of dollars against already budgeted funds.

This is what a cap on “indirect costs” through NIH grants will do. Going from >50% of grant total to 15% will change how your local university healthcare systems function everyday.

Wait until you can get cows and then they have babies and you have more mouths to feed but you can make cheese from the milk that will earn you lots of $$$!

The best video essays of 2024 From film festivals to TikTok, our annual poll showcases 183 unique video essays nominated by 47 international voters.

!!!The best video essays of 2024!!!

Honoured to be 1 among the 47 contributors from 17 countries who together submitted a total of 256 votes, which amount to 183 unique entries.

@sightsoundmag.bsky.social | BFI www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-so...

The best video essays of 2024 From film festivals to TikTok, our annual poll showcases 183 unique video essays nominated by 47 international voters.

I co-edited the Sight and Sound poll for the best video essays of 2024! Thank you to everyone who contributed a list. We've highlighted a few notable essays, but it’s worth diving into the full list (183 unique vids!)

Thanks for having me @sightsoundmag.bsky.social 🎉
www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-so...

The best video essays of 2024 From film festivals to TikTok, our annual poll showcases 183 unique video essays nominated by 47 international voters.

The Sight and Sound video essay poll for 2024 is out! My first time voting which was a real honour (thanks to the organisers for inviting me). Something for everyone in here. Enjoy!
www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-so...

Screenshot from the video essay “Seeing Movement in Cinema” where Cyd Charisse’s movement is annotated with language from Laban Movement Analysis.

So honored to be mentioned by Oswald Iten in this year’s Best Video Essays of 2024 poll from Sight and Sound, and bursting with pride that my former student Nancy Jia also made the list!!! 🥰

www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-so...

This is what's so baffling about so many suggestions for AI in the humanities classroom: they mistake the product for the point. Writing outlines and essays is important not because you need to make outlines and essays but because that's how you learn to think with/through complex ideas.

Journal of e-Media Studies, Volume 7 Issue 1: Early Cinema Compendium: Volume 7, Issue 1: Early Cinema Compendium The Journal of e-Media Studies is a blind peer-reviewed, on-line journal dedicated to the scholarly study of the history and theory of electronic media, especially Television and New Media. ...

Happy to announce the MEP's special early cinema issue of e-Media Studies edited by Mark Williams is public today! Authors include @orphanfilm.bsky.social, @cinemajok.bsky.social, @marshagordon.bsky.social, and many others who haven't made the jump to bluesky yet.

pub.dartmouth.edu/journal-of-e...

Scholarship in Sound & Image Workshop on Videographic Criticism

Are you a film & media scholar who wants to learn how to make video essays? Applications for the two-week June 2025 workshop Scholarship in Sound & Image at Middlebury College in Vermont are now open. Come be a videocamper and spread the word!

Irani Bag / کیف ایرانی by Maryam Tafakory YouTube video by maryam tafakory

Loved being able to share this amazing video essay with my students today.
youtu.be/jz7nOzBv7eE?...

Cover of the book Storytelling in Motion: Cinematic Choreography and the Film Musical.

Hi everyone! For those new to my feed, I work a lot on film history and craft, the intersections between film and dance industries/cultures, style/aesthetics, video essays, and musicals. I wrote a book about all that, Storytelling in Motion (OUP, 2024). Happy to chat more about it!

Join us on the Zoom Events platform for the SCMS 2024 Virtual Symposium. We’re keeping things simple and accessible with the same Zoom interface, you know. Access invitations and a helpful user guide will be sent on December 4. All session times are in U.S. Central.
www.cmstudies.org/page/VSsched...

Working on primary school apps and when I asked my toddler which words he thought best described him he helpfully offered “doody, boody, and foody” 🤣 #nothelpful

Gene Kelly strikes a menacing squat in The Pirate, wearing tiny little cut-off booty shorts to accentuate his tanned, tree trunk thighs.

Lots of new followers over here, so hello! I research classical Hollywood musicals, fantasy spaces in media, and stars like John Travolta & Barbra Streisand. I’m a recovered Disney Cast Member & am currently hyperfixated on Dropout. But mostly, I wax poetic about Gene Kelly’s thighs.