Feature Channels: Arts and Entertainment

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

If you think the Hunger Games novels are too violent for their intended young readers, try re-reading classic children’s books from the past, according to the author of a new book. From Snow White to Tarzan of the Apes to Harry Potter, literature for children and teens has always been awash in violence and murder,

• share
• favorite_border

On Oct. 30, 1938, a radio adaption of H.G. Wells’ “The War of the Worlds” sent many Americans in a panic over a potential Martian invasion. On Oct. 30, 2013, Binghamton University will be at the national forefront of a day of events designed to not only bring “The War of the Worlds” back to the public consciousness, but also to discuss the lessons learned from the production and live media, in general.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

A Connecticut College senior asked 100 fellow students – all men – why vaginas are important to them. The resulting video, posted to YouTube, is a powerful, provocative and sometimes awkward 8-minute piece that has sparked conversations about vaginas, women, sex and consent on college campuses across the country and even across oceans.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Benjamin Hafensteiner, a professor of chemistry at the University of Rochester, didn’t plan on starting the fall semester as a star in a viral video, but that’s exactly what happened. And in true fashion, Hafensteiner turned it into a teaching moment.

• share
• favorite_border

A University of Iowa law professor researches freedom suits, legal actions largely lost to history that were brought by slaves against their masters in hopes of gaining their freedom.

• share
• favorite_border

Breaking Bad is wrapping up this week and with Walter White's life collapsing around him, it begs the question: Is "Heisenberg’s" science up to snuff? We put that question to some of Dalhousie's scientific experts.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

The popularity of the undead has led to a new, creative teaching platform in UA’s department of telecommunication and film.

• share
• favorite_border

A Kansas State University professor is using 'The Office' to help students understand economic concepts.

• share
• favorite_border

A new TV season starts in a few weeks, and a business that uses prediction market methodology pioneered at the University of Iowa can offer some insight as to which shows will survive to a second season.

• share
• favorite_border

Edgerton says Breaking Bad is great, but nowhere near as influential as The Sopranos was.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

A new University of Cincinnati-Blue Ash College study explores the evolution of hip-hop from party music into a political platform.

• share
• favorite_border

Chicago emergency medical experts are preparing for an increase in anticipated substance-abuse cases this weekend due to the Lollapalooza festival. “Ecstasy as well as heroin use are on the rise in the Chicago area, and people coming from out of state will bring their preferred choice of recreational poison,” said Christina Hantsch, MD, FACEP, FACMT, toxicologist at Loyola University Health System.

• share
• favorite_border

Will Newman, a rising senior at Hamilton College, is working with Burke Library’s Special Collections to organize the manuscripts and other writings of poet Agha Shahid Ali so that they are accessible to scholars, ensuring that Shahid’s legacy at Hamilton lives on.

• share
• favorite_border

Spotify. Pandora. iTunes. YouTube. We are constantly bombarded with a seemingly limitless amount of new music in our daily lives. But why do we keep coming back to that one song or album we couldn’t get enough of in college? New research from Washington University’s Olin Business School shows that although consumers say they prefer to listen to unfamiliar music, their choices actually belie that preference.

• share
• favorite_border

Movie-goers are gearing up for “The Wolverine.” The movie about the X-men comic book hero confronting his demons hits theaters July 26. IUPUI instructor Mark Harper offers insight into the character and psyche of Wolverine.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

St. Lawrence University's Dr. Robert Thacker, professor of Canadian Studies, wrote the 2011 biography of literary great Alice Munro. For almost 30 years, Dr. Thacker researched this biography, steeping himself in Munro’s life and work, working with her co-operation to make it complete.

• share
• favorite_border

Stonehill College student's prize-winning senior thesis explores how America's recent disasters, natural and man-made, influenced Bruce Springsteen's songwriting.

• share
• favorite_border

It seems “the old cut-and-paste” is even older than we thought. Student researchers at Wheaton College have uncovered a 1,200-year-old secret about an Old English poem: The author created the work not out of whole cloth, as previously believed, but by dividing an older poem into two pieces and inserting new material in the middle.

• share
• favorite_border

The first major exhibition in the United States to explore the private lives, power struggles, and collecting practices of Spain’s New World elite brings together approximately 160 exceptional works in a wide range of media that illuminate conspicuous consumption and domestic display in the colonial era. Behind Closed Doors: Art in the Spanish American Home, 1492–1898 will debut at the Brooklyn Museum, where it will be on view September 20, 2013, through January 12, 2014, before traveling to three other venues, to be announced.

• share
• favorite_border

Public servants have long been portrayed in popular culture as bumbling or corrupt. But a few films — including the "Dark Knight" Batman trilogy – present more nuanced characters that challenge Americans' dim view of government workers, says a UIC researcher.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

The very people Superman could not save were his own creators—Jerry Siegel, the writer, and Joe Shuster, the comic artist.

• share
• favorite_border

A University of Adelaide expert says that while the war against smoking in Hollywood movies has been largely won, Asian cinema represents the next major battleground for anti-smoking and anti-cancer groups.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

In advance of the May 10 release of director Baz Luhrmann's film adaptation of author F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic novel, "The Great Gatsby," Indiana University has several faculty experts who can provide insights on various aspects of the author, the book's themes and other details.

• share
• favorite_border

Romantic-comedy films are not a major source for developing unrealistic expectations about relationships among young adults, finds a new study to be published online this week in the National Communication Association’s journal Communication Monographs.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Contemporary scholarship has conceptualized modern fame as an open system in which people continually move in and out of celebrity status. However, according to new research, “Only 15 Minutes? The Social Stratification of Fame in Printed Media,” published in the April issue of the American Sociological Review, researchers led by Arnout van de Rijt, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Stony Brook University, reveal that most fame isn’t fleeting after all.

• share
• favorite_border

For many years, some musical experts have wondered if the sound of the Stradivari and Guarneri violins might incorporate such elements of speech as vowels and consonants. A Texas A&M University researcher has now provided the first evidence that the Italian violin masters tried to impart specific vowel sounds to their violins.

• share
• favorite_border

Tom Reigstad publishes biography of Mark Twain focusing on the author's often overlooked time in Buffalo, New York, when he served as editor of the Buffalo Express.

• share
• favorite_border

Anthony “Chip” Valleriano was 7 years old when a 3-by-4-inch black and white photo from the early 1900s of the elaborate interior of Mother of Sorrows Catholic Church in Ashtabula, Ohio first captured his fascination.It was a mystery that took Valleriano 30 years to solve. And his quest for answers also produced a book about the church’s unsung regional architect—William P. Ginther (1858-1933).

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Georgia Tech student Rebecca Rolfe analyzed 60 years of Academy Awards acceptance speeches as part of a research project that focused on gratitude. She has outlined the trends and patterns on an interactive website.

• share
• favorite_border

While digitizing letters of immortal lovers/Victorian poets Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, a graduate student discovered a connection between the real-world Robert Browning and the immensely popular TV show "Downton Abbey."

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Luxury hotels are ditching the passé in favor of innovative and fresh offerings to keep guests coming back in 2013.

• share
• favorite_border

When World War I hero Matthew Crawley dropped to one knee in the swirling snow and finally proposed to Lady Mary Crawley in the season two finale of the popular PBS drama “Downton Abbey,” it was the culmination of a romance ensconced in an elegant and nostalgic lifestyle that has captured the imaginations of American viewers.