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.
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).
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.
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."
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.
Building on the success of his previous books about Italian-American identity in the New World, George Guida has released his new fiction collection, The Pope Stories and Other Tales of Troubled Times (Bordighera Press, 2012).
Not only is TV not endangered, but it also has a unifying social impact on the nuclear family across the country. This is the main conclusion of a cross-Canada study—Are the Kids All Right?—on the television viewing habits of families with at least one child aged between 9 and 12 years.
With the alleged Mayan apocalypse looming on Dec. 21, Barry Vacker, an associate professor of media studies and production at Temple University’s School of Media and Communication, has decided to spend what might be our last few months of existence examining why end-of-world storylines run rampant in Hollywood and pop culture.
A design Derek Koch created in his apartment at Rowan University has garnered worldwide attention—and helped raise more than $300,000, so far, for Hurricane Sandy relief initiatives.
“Anna Karenina,” directed by Joe Wright and starring Keira Knightley and Jude Law, opens Nov. 16 in U.S. theaters. Andrew Kaufman, an internationally recognized Leo Tolstoy expert who teaches Russian literature at the University of Virginia, is available to comment on Tolstoy and the characters and times about which he wrote.
Perhaps one of the most ambitious book-to-movie translations to date, Warner Brothers’ "Cloud Atlas," based on British author David Mitchell’s 2004 award-winning novel of the same name, opens on Oct.26. Narrative theory and time expert Jo Alyson Parker, Ph.D., professor of English at Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia, has done an in-depth study of the book, and is available to comment on the challenges the filmmakers faced, given the novel's complex structure.
"Consuming Reality" examines how the now-dominant media form of reality television has altered conceptions of entertainment, privacy, and commercialization.
Keuka College students recently executed a UFO hoax, not with the intent to create hysteria on campus but to enhance their Photoshop skills. The assignment came from Instructor John Locke, who teaches the Computer Visual Design class. Locke often hands out non-traditional assignments to enhance his students' knowledge.
In a post-Potter world, J.K. Rowling will try to cast a spell on grown-up readers with her upcoming adult fiction novel, "The Casual Vacancy." Two Kansas State University children's literature experts said that Rowling's strength as a writer can help her successfully jump from children's literature to adult fiction.
The weekly, hour-long radio program, Rock School, which airs on Southeastern Louisiana University's radio station KSLU-90.9 FM, has been awarded an International Communicator Award for Excellence.
A new paper that describes two studies by Jaye Derrick, PhD, research scientist at the University at Buffalo’s Research Institute on Addictions, found that watching a rerun of a favorite TV show may help restore the drive to get things done in people who have used up their reserves of willpower or self-control.
University of Utah violinist Hasse Borup found, and will premiere, a lost sonata of American composer Vincent Persichetti. The "Sonata No. 1 for Violin and Piano" was composed in 1941 and has not been performed in public.
Matthew Jockers combines programming with text-mining to compare 18th- and 19th century authors’ works with one another based on their stylistic and thematic connections. He crunches massive amounts of text to map how books are connected to one another -- from each's word frequency and choice to its overarching subject matter.
Fifty years after his death, novelist William Faulkner is finally getting his wish for “The Sound and the Fury,” the 1929 novel widely considered his most difficult reading experience.
A team of Georgia Tech researchers has converted data from two stars in our galaxy to create sounds for a national recording artist. The binary starts were observed by the Kepler telescope.
Analysis of best-selling teen novels shows that readers come across seven instances of profanity per hour spent reading, and the characters who cuss are usually rich, beautiful and popular.
Baltimore and Milwaukee are two cities UWM Professor Marc Levine has lived in and researched. So it’s no surprise that Levine’s course based on the HBO series “The Wire” began the university trend of using it to teach urban studies. This semester, the fourth year of Levine’s course, former cast member Sonja Sohn, who played police detective Kima Greggs, made an appearance.
With Mother's Day coming up May 13, two Kansas State University experts say literary characters can inspire families as they celebrate the maternal figures in their lives.
Few dispute Dick Clark’s prominence in American music and entertainment during the second half of the 20th century. But for the history of rock music, the early years of Clark’s career are the most significant, says John Covach, professor of music at the University of Rochester and its Eastman School of Music.
Florida State University kicks off its 50th Anniversary of Integration celebration on Thursday with a human chain designed to represent the legacy of the pioneering individuals who paved the way for the rich culture, diversity and opportunity that exist at the university today.
A network of brain regions which is activated during intense aesthetic experience overlaps with the brain network associated with inward contemplation and self-assessment, New York University researchers have found. Their study sheds new light on the nature of the aesthetic experience, which appears to integrate sensory and emotional reactions in a manner linked with their personal relevance.
The new documentary “Bully” starts a valuable conversation about bullying, but illustrates how many schools lack adequate training to cope with this all-too-common problem, according to the director of the University at Buffalo’s Jean M. Alberti Center for the Prevention of Bullying Abuse and School Violence.
People enjoy watching tragedy movies like “Titanic” because they deliver what may seem to be an unlikely benefit: tragedies actually make people happier in the short-term.
With the premiere of "The Hunger Games" movie on Friday, March 23, Indiana University has several faculty experts who can provide insights on various aspects of the film, based on the first book in IU alumna Suzanne Collins' best-selling trilogy.