Tag Archives: david parry

As of September 1, 2013 the ATEC and EMAC programs at The University of Texas at Dallas will have three new tenured associate professors: Monica Evans, Todd Fechter and David Parry.

Monica Evans

Monica Evans

As a faculty member in the Arts and Technology program, Monica Evans‘ focus is to expand the game studies curriculum, particularly at the graduate level. This year she created the Game Production Lab within the ATEC program, a series of courses in which students design, develop, and produce original games and gaming content at both the graduate and undergraduate level.

Monica Evans has recruited many industry members to donate equipment and resources to the ATEC program, offer internships to ATEC students, teach ATEC courses as adjuncts, and advise students through seminars, guest lectures, and as judges for the UT Dallas CGEC. Companies include Pixelux Entertainment, iStation, Gearbox Software, Barking Lizards, MumboJumbo, iD Software, and Texas Instruments, as well as investor Hughes Ventures.

Evans’ personal research is focused on narrative for games and other interactive systems, which she is currently publishing as articles, book chapters, and conference submissions; and on meaningful play, serious games, educational games, and simulations, for which she is both publishing articles and submitting multiple grant proposals. She is currently working on a series of proposals for new research in virtual medical simulation, and proposals have been sent to the American Heart Association, Pediatrix, Children’s Medical Center in Dallas, and the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) granting agency.

As to the significance of her work: Game studies is a brand-new, continuously evolving field, and few universities are pursuing significant academic research in the area. Evans’ long-term goal is to seed top-level game studios with our undergraduate students at higher than entry-level positions (in other words, positions where they have influence over design, content, and innovation); to seed top-level universities with our masters and doctoral students as the next generation of game studies scholars; and to provide a place for students to incubate independent game studios, research projects, or to follow other academic inclinations in the field.

Todd Fechter

Todd Fechter

Todd Fechter‘s professional background is in the field of 3D computer animation. He has experience working on both television and film productions, which he gained while employed at DNA Production, Inc from September 2002 through June of 2006. There he held the position of Head of Environment Modeling, where he led a team of eight modelers in the planning and creation of all environments and props.

After leaving DNA Productions he worked as a freelance 3D artist providing both modeling and texturing services for various companies including Jeep, Ember Studios, Reel FX Entertainment and NASA.

In October 2006 Fechter accepted a position at Element X Creative as Head of Modeling. There he worked on various projects ranging from promotions to a direct to DVD animated series.

Fechter is currently an Assistant Professor of 3D Computer Animation at UT Dallas. During this time he has been able to integrate his production experience and expertise into his teachings with the goal of better preparing students to reach their professional aspirations. This includes the creation of the first online Arts and Technology computer animation digital class material archive where students have unlimited access to course materials and examples that allow for off campus learning and review.

Fechter’s current interests are in the continued redesign and growth of the ATEC 3D animation curriculum. Two new courses will focus more on the planning and development of 3D animation rather than the actual execution. Students will then be able to fully realize production timelines and methodologies to focus skills learned in other ATEC courses and create of their own complex animations. In return these works will be submitted to festivals and other showcases.

David Parry

David Parry

David Parry has taught as an assistant professor since August 2007, and has helped to grow and shape the EMAC program. His work centers on understanding the complex cultural transformations brought about by the change from an analog archive to one whose substructure is a digital network. His current area of research is focused on understanding how the digital network produces a different type of public and alters civic practices, analyzing how power structures and relations between people and governance are altered in the digital era.

Currently he teaches courses on writing in the digital era, digital culture, and civic media. His presentations and published writing include works on digital games, web technologies, digital literacy, and the emerging networked public.

David writes for several online resources including his own blogs, Profound Heterogeneity (www.profoundheterogeneity.com), and Academhack (www.academhack.com), and has been featured in The Chronicle for his work on microblogging as pedagogical practice. He also is regularly invited by organizations to speak about digital literacy and the changing cultural landscape.

Students from the Emerging Media and Communications (EMAC) program will present projects that examine how new media and network technologies are transforming the ways we connect with each other.

Dr. David Parry helps students explore the changing world of media and communication in the EMAC program.

The presentations are Tuesday, Dec. 4, from 5:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. in CB3 1.306.

Desiree Jacob, a master’s candidate, created a website and blog that details her own journey as an adopted child, and aims to educate others about adoption. Her project is called The Quiet Struggle.

“Many adoption myths persist in our society.  Understanding details on the topic of adoption is something that all members of the triad (adoptee, birth mom and adoptive parents) should be more educated and aware of before decisions are made,” writes Jacob on her blog.

Dr. Kim Knight, assistant professor in the EMAC program, served as faculty advisor for the project.

A project by Desiree Jacob (right) seeks to educate the public about issues regarding adoption.

“One of the things that is exemplary about “The Quiet Struggle” is that Desiree has used her passion to construct a project with social benefit for an audience with very specific needs. She has a growing pool of readers and people are coming forward to share their stories on the site, both of which speak to the quality of the project,” said Knight.

Jamie Field, a senior, will present her project Roach Coach Review. The website tracks the location, and gives reviews, of various food trucks across the Metroplex.

“With an explosion in food truck popularity, the number of trucks is on the rise. Previously, only social media outlets were a resource for updates like new menu items or truck locations/schedules. We developed ‘Roach Coach Reviews’ to serve as your DFW food truck information portal,” the website states.

The faculty advisor for the project was Dr. David Parry, assistant professor.

“Jamie has combined all the skills she learned as an EMAC student with her interest in food trucks to create a high-quality website that serves as Dallas’ best food truck review site. Not only does the site contain reviews, but also schedules, videos, maps and links,” said Parry.

Other projects to be presented include graduate student Aline McKenzie’s trail media for Dogwood Canyon Audubon Center. McKenzie produced video that can be accessed via QR code along the trails at the center. The videos cover topics ranging from identifying poison ivy to the history behind a concrete basin that once housed a telecommunications tower and antenna but now has a garden and deck inside.

“Aline did a lot of really great research on the history of media use in national park settings as part of this project. She has used this knowledge as a foundation to construct educational media that taps into the growing use of mobile Internet access while being respectful of the natural setting. In addition, she is gaining valuable experience in working in partnership with a community organization,” said Knight, who oversaw the project.

The event is free and open to the public.

The following are excerpts from “Reinventing the Arts,” the cover article in the just-released edition of UT Dallas Magazine.

The piece was written by Gaile Robinson, an area art critic and arts writer. The full version of this story and other articles are available in the magazine’s online edition.

What do you get when you put an animator, a physicist and a painter together?

Don’t anticipate a punch line; there isn’t one. Not yet.

“The answer will come in the future,” said Dr. Dennis Kratz, dean of theSchool of Arts and Humanities, “in a place designed to create pathways among people, projects and ideas.”

As dean, Kratz has developed an interdisciplinary curriculum that fosters collaboration at the intersection of arts and humanities, science and engineering.

“There is a statistical correlation between Nobel Prize winners and art,” Kratz said. “It enables them to see from a different viewpoint.”

Kratz’s viewpoint, a broadminded administration, and a creative faculty eager to transform the traditions of a typical liberal arts program, have redefined how the arts and humanities are viewed and taught at UT Dallas.

“This isn’t about putting art in a science-based university. It’s about reconstructing the way we educate people to bring science, art and humanities together,” Kratz said.

“We want to suffuse everything.”

Kratz’s manifest destiny—geographically and cognitively—is recognized by way of the Arts and Technology Program, Texas’s first degree that combines computer science and engineering with arts and humanities.

ATEC is a contemporary hybrid, a joint creation of the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science and the School of Arts and Humanities.

New ATEC Building Demonstrates Commitment

“It’s right on the center of campus. This is prominent real estate. This tells you about the University’s own priorities.” said Dr. Richard Brettell, the Margaret M. McDermott Distinguished Chair of Art and Aesthetic Studies.

The 155,000-square-foot, $60 million project is scheduled for its ribbon cutting in 2013. It will provide 2,150 new classroom seats and 50 offices, as well as a lecture hall that will seat 1,200. The building was designed by Studios Architecture, the same firm that designed the Googleplex, Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, Calif.

Student Perspectives Broaden

Dr. Dave Parry, assistant professor of Arts and Technology and emerging media and communication.

“Humanities students often have no understanding why the Internet is fundamentally different from other forms of communication. The computer science students get it. But the humanities students understand the critical issues and why it matters on a cultural level. When you get them together it’s more productive,” said Dr. David Parry, assistant professor of ATEC and emerging media and communication

Parry believes there is an absolute necessity to be digitally literate. “In the future, the people who have power—power in a good way, power over their own lives—will be digitally literate,” he said. “There will be people who understand how to make, use, manipulate, critique and engage with social media in all its forms and there will be people who will just consume.” Parry sees his job as moving the consumers into the group of producers.

Recent Hires Show Emphasis

Dr. Roger Malina is a physicist, astronomer and executive editor of the Leonardo publications at MIT Press. With dual appointments as a distinguished professor of arts and technology in the School of Arts and Humanities and a professor of physics in the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, he focuses on connections among the natural sciences and arts, design and the humanities.

“In my career, I’ve had the scientific strand and the art and technology strand. This is an opportunity to combine both,” Malina said. “There are not many places in the U.S. or internationally that are doing what we’re trying to accomplish here—merge arts and humanities with science and engineering at a deep level and with the resources to support it.”

UT Dallas Magazine includes the full version of “Reinventing the Arts.” The magazine is available for viewing online.

At the dawning of the Internet age, some believed the vast digital network would put unlimited freedom at everyone’s fingertips.

But connecting the world has brought watchful eyes, as the Internet also created digital portals into the private lives of the masses.

Dr. David Parry

This unintended consequence is discussed in Ubiquitous Surveillance, a new digital publication edited by Dr. David Parry.

“Advances in technology, an increasingly regulated and monitored digital network, and a general atmosphere of securitization have yielded a world of ubiquitous, if not always visible, surveillance,” Parry, assistant professor of Emerging Media and Communication, wrote in the introduction.

The publication is a collection of interdisciplinary research that pinpoints problems with technology and developing polices, as well as privacy concerns. The publication also explores the way people view the boundaries of the public and private realms.

Parry said “surveillance” is becoming more and more pervasive, but issues raised about this trend haven’t connected with those working in the sciences and other fields.

Parry also points to the positive power of the digital medium.

Social media didn’t lead to the recent uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, but this new system of communication certainly played a role in the process of the revolt.

Protesters in Cairo's Tahrir Square had to organize without Internet communication after the Egyptian government crackdown. (Photograph by Ramy Raoof)

Dr. David Parry, assistant professor of Emerging Media and Communication at The University of Texas at Dallas, argues that anInternet-equipped public is substantially different from a non-Internet-enabled one, and that while we haven’t been deluded by the Internet’s possibilities, we ought to be careful not to overestimate them.

“What happened in Egypt and Tunisia would have looked much different, played out differently if the ‘how’ of the revolution had been different, if social media had not been one of the tools used as a means of communication,” Parry stated.

Parry homed in specifically on the Egyptian government’s decision to shut down citizen access to the Internet. The government also cut mobile phone service, forcing protesters to rely on more traditional means of communication.

“While other countries have ‘pulled the plug’ on the Internet, namely Burma in 2007 and Nepal in 2005, this is the first time that a country with such a large Internet penetration had entirely shut off access. But while the Egyptian government could shut down the hardware of the Internet, it could not shut down the social effects of the digital network.

“In the same way a public is fundamentally changed by the existence of print technology, a public is fundamentally altered by access to the digital network,” Parry said. “This is what makes the situation in Egypt different from Burma and Nepal – in the latter cases the government was shutting down access to information from the outside and controlling the flow of news; but Egypt was shutting down the way that a substantial portion of their populace was communicating.”

“In the same way a public is fundamentally changed by the existence of print technology, a public is fundamentally altered by access to the digital network,” Dr. David Parry said.

Parry also cites China as an example of an authoritarian government that can shut off access to the Internet at any time. Internet censorship in China is conducted under a wide variety of laws and administrative regulations, and is considered more extensive and more advanced than in any other country in the world, Parry said. The regime not only blocks website content but also monitors the Internet access of individuals.

However, Parry argues that the situation in China differs from that in Egypt because the Chinese people use Chinese-based Internet services, and remain largely unaffected when Western sites such as Facebook or even Google are shut down. The Egyptians were much more reliant on Western services, and therefore felt the effects and demanded change.

Parry takes issue with the belief that social media produces a revolution in and of itself, but also acknowledges that the tools we use alter our means of communication. Social media is able to give a voice to those who previously had none – dissidents, anarchists, and even the average everyman – and in the case of Egypt, that voice appears to have been heard and answered.

But Parry warns potential copycats hoping for a similar outcome: “A digitally networked public can just as easily be used for social ill as for social justice; nothing guarantees that civic engagement yields civic progress. But it does guarantee that a public with the Internet has a substantially different relation to its government than a public without the Internet.”

Go digital or go home. That was the message Dr. Dave Parry, assistant professor of Emerging Media and Communication (EMAC) at UT Dallas, told an audience of journalists at the National Conference of Editorial Writers (NCEW), held Sept. 22–25 in Dallas.

UT Dallas was a sponsor of the event, which included an appearance by Gov. Rick Perry and a keynote address by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.

Dr. Dave Parry urged the news business to make use of digital media formats. “There is a larger opportunity for journalists to do something new,” he said.

In a session titled, “Emerging Media: What Works, What Doesn’t: How You Can Get Ahead of the Curve,” Parry sat on a panel alongside Paul Burka, senior executive editor of Texas Monthly; and Mark Medici, director of audience development at The Dallas Morning News.

While each discussed their connection to and thoughts on emerging media, Parry differentiated himself right away, saying, “I am not a journalist. It is my job to look at broad cultural changes.” He went on to say that newspapers and their vertical communication business model were in decline and had no future.

“There is a larger opportunity for journalists to do something new,” Parry said. “They have an inherent value and social function. The Internet is creating a sense of horizontal communication, where readers can address other readers and form a crowd, a consensus. Now that anyone with a smartphone can be a ‘reporter,’ journalists are hosting, not driving, conversations.”

According to Parry, within five years the desktop computer will disappear, as the Internet moves into “real space” via mobile devices. He added that this shift means “online and offline aren’t separate spaces anymore.” Journalists must move with this trend, or be left behind, he said.

Parry’s co-panelists had varied opinions about his assessment. Burka, who said he was told to start blogging by his boss, at first felt it was a demotion from his magazine column. But he now feels that the power to reach an audience in the electronic world is much greater than what he experienced  in print-only media.

As a newspaper man, Medici took issue with some of Parry’s points, but acknowledged the growing importance of mobile devices and the need to re-evaluate the large core audiences of newspapers to better address their wants and needs.

When an audience member asked how journalists should best strike a balance between their newspaper columns and their online presence, the panel was split. O. Ricardo Pimentel, an editorial writer at The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, said, “The answer was elusive, but all speakers urged editorial boards to go digital as a concrete means to address the changing needs of new audiences.”

And Parry went for broke, advising, “Burn the presses. The more you try to have one foot in each, the more you’ll fail at both.”

Mona Kasra has combined her Iranian culture with her graduate studies in emerging media and communication (EMAC) to organize an interactive panel for the upcoming South by Southwest (SXSW) Conference and Festival in Austin.

The annual South by Southwest Interactive Conference is one of the most popular events of its type.

The panel, “2009 Iran Election: Women’s Revolution? Twitter Revolution?,” will address how Iranian women surprised onlookers with their participation in the events surrounding the contested vote last year.

Panel members will discuss what led to the sudden appearance of women in dissent, a previously invisible part of Iranian society, and what role emerging media played.

“Having a panel selected for SXSW is a tremendous achievement,” said Dr. David Parry, assistant professor of EMAC at UT Dallas.

“This is one of the largest and most popular conferences of the year — I think they had over 2,000 submissions,” Parry said. “The fact that Mona’s panel was selected speaks to the strength and importance of her work.”

Besides Kasra, panelists include Dr. Parry; Shireen Mitchell, a self-proclaimed “digitalsista” and advocate for women in technology, media and politics; and Roja Bandari, an Iranian-born women’s rights activist. The panel is scheduled for Sunday, March 14, at 11 a.m. at the Austin Convention Center.

Lecture by Digital Culture Expert to Discuss Ramifications for Universities

Are academic libraries as we know them relics of the past?

The rapidly changing structure of information flow has brought into question the relevancy of certain academic institutions, says Dr. David Parry, an assistant professor at UT Dallas.

“Scholars estimate that every 15 minutes the amount of information produced online equals that housed in the 200-year history of the Library of Congress,” says Dr. David Parry, an assistant professor of emerging media.

Parry, who specializes in emerging media, digital culture and literary theory in the School of Arts and Humanities, will discuss his viewpoints in a free public presentation titled, “The University and the Future of Knowledge,” at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 9.

The event, part of the McDermott Library Lecture Series, and will be held in the McDermott Suite located on the fourth floor of the library. The presentation is also part of the 40th Anniversary Celebration of the establishment of UT Dallas.

“Scholars estimate that every 15 minutes, the amount of information produced online equals that housed in the 200-year history of the Library of Congress,” he says. “What were once powerful intellectual institutions are now being made irrelevant by the new structure of information flow. Wikipedia replaces Britannica, newspapers are crumbling, and students admit that they complete a college education without stepping foot in the library.

“In this rapidly changing knowledge, what is the role of the university? And perhaps more importantly, what is the future of knowledge production, dissemination, and archivization?”

Project Documents History Prof’s Use of Popular Service as a Teaching Tool

An Arts and Technology student’s video account of a professor’s classroom experiment with Twitter is making waves on the World Wide Web, capturing thousands of viewers on YouTube and prompting an article in U.S. News & World Report.

“I have gotten several direct messages from people saying that they were more ‘traditional’ and would not have considered using the social networking and micro-blogging tools in this way, but opened their minds after seeing the video.” Kim Smith, creator of "The Twitter Experiment"

UT Dallas graduate student Kim Smith’s video, “The Twitter Experiment,” shows how Dr. Monica Rankin, assistant professor of history in the School of Arts and Humanities, uses Twitter to engage her 90-student history class in discussion.  The communication application helps overcome the logistical issues involved in having scores of students interact in a short time span and encourages shy students to participate in the course.

“The video is a living example of what my Content Creation and Collaboration course with Dan Langendorf was all about: using emerging media technologies as a tool for education, collaboration with other fields, and documenting the experience for everyone to have access to,” said Smith.

Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that lets users send and read each others’ updates, known as tweets, in short posts of 140 characters or less.   The Twitter video was a course project for Smith’s digital video class.

The video, which took roughly 20 hours to record and edit, was shot during two class periods, one at the beginning of the semester and one at the end. Classmate Joe Chuang helped with the video and editing.

The collaboration of Smith and Rankin began when Smith documented a class trip to Guanajuato, Mexico, in 2008. They kept in touch via Facebook, and developed the idea of using Twitter in the classroom at the beginning of the Spring 2009 semester.

Smith worked out details on Twitter with Emerging Media and Communication (EMAC) faculty members Dr. Dave Parry and Dean Terry, who referred her to individuals who had done similar experiments.  To get students comfortable with using Twitter in a classroom setting, Smith created a simple how-to video and attended class to help Rankin introduce the idea to her students.

The video was first released on Facebook; Terry and Parry both tweeted about it on Twitter and it went global within 48 hours.  New-media icon Howard Rheingold tweeted about it, which helped it further circulate in the “Twitterverse.”

“I have gotten several direct messages from people saying that they were more ‘traditional’ and would not have considered using the social networking and micro-blogging tools in this way, but opened their minds after seeing the video,” said Smith.

A few weeks later Smith posted the video on YouTube, and an entirely different wave of viewers picked up on it.  On Monday, June 1, “The Twitter Experiment” registered 500 views in a few hours. Read Write Web and other popular blogs had picked up the video, causing views to skyrocket.

“I love my classes and experience at UT Dallas and want to master how to use what I learn in EMAC to help professors like Dr. Rankin, who are willing to consider new technologies intelligently and experiment with what they offer,” said Smith.