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Ph.D. & M.A. Students

Tawny Andersen is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Art History and Communication Studies working under the supervision of Prof. Amelia Jones. Her dissertation research, which she frames methodologically within the interdisciplinary field of Performance Philosophy, draws on the history and theory of the concept of “performativity” in order to examine how a group of contemporary female philosophers enact modes of critical, performative praxis. Tawny holds an M.A. degree in Performance Studies from the Université Libre de Bruxelles. Her research is supported by a SSHRC doctoral award, Media@McGill and the AHCS Department. 

Farah has completed an M.A. in Media Studies at Concordia University and is currently pursuing a PhD. in Communication Studies at McGill University. Prior to that she held senior positions at the Sharjah Art Foundation and Art Dubai, two leading cultural institutions based in the United Arab Emirates. Her proposed research will examine the recent UAE’s state-sponsored museum boom -- which includes the upcoming Louvre Abu Dhabi, Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, and the Zayed National Museum -- as a point of entry for critically investigating the cultural politics of the UAE as a young modernizing Arab nation and emerging economy, and studying how the increasingly globalized and transnational institution of the museum mediates complex questions of nationhood and identity. 

After receiving a Master of Arts in art history at Temple University, Shana Cooperstein began pursuing a doctorate in art history at McGill University. Her academic interests include theories of representation, standardization, and the intersection of art and science. Bridging these areas of inquiry, her dissertation situates nineteenth-century French drawing pedagogy at the nexus of art, industrial design and the visualization of knowledge. In the past, Cooperstein has had the opportunity to intern at various institutions, such as The Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia, The Museum of Modern Art, and The Carnegie Museum of Art.

Frances Cullen is a PhD candidate in Art History at McGill University’s Department of Art History and Communication Studies and a specialist in the theory and historiography of photography, cinema, and media. Related research interests include the cultural and institutional histories of these media and discourses surrounding them; media art history; and critical theories of time, history, and obsolescence. In her dissertation she will critically examine the status of analogue photography in practice, theory, and the cultural imaginary in the digital age. Previous research projects include a consideration of cinematic time as a theme in contemporary art and an object study of film stills from the Warner Brothers-First National Keybook Collection at the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film.

 

Prior to joining the department at McGill, she developed these research areas by studying art history at the University of Alberta; the material history of photography and photography collections at Ryerson University; and cinema studies at the University of Toronto. She has also worked with photography and film collections, most notably during two years spent as a student and staff member at George Eastman House.

Ayanna Dozier is a doctoral student in the department of Art History and Communication Studies at McGill University, under the supevision of Carrie Rentschler. Her research centers on topics concerning embodiment, Blackness, sexuality, and performance within sound and visual art, comics, and cinema. Prior to beginning her doctoral studies at McGill, she obtained her graduate degree at New York University in the department of Media, Culture, and Communication. She currently resides in Montréal.

Kyrstin Felts is a Master's Student in Communication Studies, as well as in the Graduate Option in Gender and Women's Studies. She received her bachelor's degree from York University in 2013, graduating summa cum laude. Her thesis focuses on feminist activist communities created by teenagers online. Her other research interests include media coverage of politics and elections, fandom communities online, and the historical impacts of television on everyday life.

Paul Fontaine is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Art History and Communication Studies.  His research centres on diasporic communication networks in Canada.  He has previously written on the role of Punjabi-Canadian print journalism outlets in the process of negotiating identity and maintaining transnational economic, political and social ties.  Paul’s doctoral dissertation will extend his previous work to include university centres and institutes dedicated to Indo-Canadian and South Asian-Canadian Studies. 

Deborah Galante has always been interested in traveling and in art history; she combined these two passions by studying and working in the cultural sphere in various parts of the globe. After having obtained a Bachelor`s Degree in Art Markets in Milan, Italy, she moved to Sydney in Australia to pursue a Master in Art Curatorship and subsequently went to Paris to finish her studies in contemporary art. She has now begun her PhD in Art History at McGill University supervised by Dr. Charmaine Nelson.

I am currently a PhD student in art history. My dissertation focuses on cross-cultural exchange and interaction throughout medieval Europe and the Mediterranean, with a particular emphasis on the role of portable objects (jewelry, coins, textiles, and other liturgical and luxury items) in mediating diplomatic relationships and constructing images of imperium. Methodologically, my work is rooted in, and informed by, sociological, cultural, and anthropological theories of gift-giving, agency, portability, and exchange.

Sofia Misenheimer is a Communication Studies M.A. student with a concentration in Gender and Women's Studies.  Her research focuses on female street artists and graffiti writers in Montreal who use public space to assert feminist identity and promote gender equality. Sofia has a graduate diploma in Journalism from Concordia University and a B.A. in French Language/Literature and Cultural Anthropology from The University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Molly Sauter is a doctoral student and Vanier Scholar in AHCS. Her research focuses on digital activism and the political philosophy of technology. She holds a masters degree in Comparative Media Studies from MIT, and is an affiliate researcher at the Center for Civic Media at the MIT Media Lab and the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. She is the author of The Coming Swarm, on the use of DDoS as a tactic of activism, published by Bloomsbury in 2014.

Celina Van Dembroucke is a PhD candidate in Communication Studies (graduate option at The Institute for Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies) at McGill University. She received a Master’s degree in Latin American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, in the United States, where she worked extensively on issues of representation on photographs of people kidnapped by the Argentinean military dictatorship in the 1970s. Prior to coming to North America, she studied communication studies at the Universidad Nacional de Entre Ríos, in Argentina, and worked several years in human rights NGOs. Her current research deals with media, photography, temporalities of the digital, and the impact of mobile technology in photographic practice, particularly in the Latin American region.

Abi Shapiro is a PhD candidate in contemporary art history supervised by Professor Amelia Jones. Her dissertation examines the history of women making installation art in North America in the 1960s and 1970s, focusing particularly on the career of Ree Morton. Abi has been a course instructor twice in the AHCS department, and is currently based in London (UK) working as a lecturer at an art school alongside her studies.

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