Awards Recognize Excellence in
Humanistic Scholarship
The Department of Cinema and Media Studies is proud to announce that Mal Ahern has been awarded a 2023 ACLS Fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS). The ACLS Fellowship Program supports exceptional scholarship in the humanities and interpretive social sciences that has the potential to make significant contributions within and beyond the awardees’ fields.
Ahern has been recognized as one of 60 early-career scholars selected through a multi-stage peer review from a pool of nearly 1,200 applicants. ACLS Fellowships provide between $30,000 and $60,000 to support scholars during six to 12 months of sustained research and writing. Awardees who do not hold tenure-track faculty appointments – half of the 2023 cohort – also receive an additional $7,500 stipend for research or other personal costs incurred during their award term.
Ahern’s research challenges the idea that technological progress always leads to better image quality by exploring an earlier moment of technological enthusiasm: the wave of industrial automation in the decades after World War II. As new technologies displaced the craft techniques of printers, projectionists, and other technicians, a burst of visible errors appeared in print and on screens. Misprints and distortions revealed the image’s formal infrastructure in disjointed layers, swarms of dots, and hallucinogenic flicker; this patterns, in turn, introduced new motifs into fine art and popular imagery.
“With higher education under sustained attack around the country, ACLS is proud to support this diverse cohort of emerging scholars as they work to increase understanding of our connected human histories, cultures, and experiences,” said ACLS President Joy Connolly. “ACLS Fellowships are investments in an inclusive future where scholars are free to pursue rigorous, unflinching humanistic research.”
Stay updated with information about this and other ACLS fellowship and grant competitions.