Grant Wiedenfeld, PhD, MFA

Dr. Wiedenfeld studies esthetics and culture with one focus on U.S. cinema and another on modernist literature. His book Hollywood Sports Movies and the American Dream (Oxford University Press, 2022) demonstrates a current of progressive politics that runs from Rocky to White Men Can't Jump and Ali, guided by an Arendtian approach to the politics of popular culture. In parallel with his research on sports he has written on professional women's soccer as a reporter. Elsewhere, his article "Up-to-Speed Cinema" asserts that D.W. Griffith's singular contribution to cinema was faster editing, propelled by deficient studio facilities. Dr. Wiedenfeld has also published work on Flaubert's style that follows his focus on punctuation and whitespace in modernist literature. Before turning to scholarship he made 16mm experimental films, video installations, and mixed-media performances. For more information visit grantwiedenfeld.org.

Experience

Dr. Wiedenfeld joined Sam Houston State University in the fall of 2015 and teaches courses at both undergraduate and graduate levels. He also coordinates the minor program in Film Studies. Before coming to Sam he worked as a lecturer in the English Department at Yale University after earning his PhD at that institution. He has also taught courses at Purchase College-SUNY and at Yale's Summer Film Institute. As a film curator he has organized programs of student films, popular classics at Hunstville's Old Town Theater, and French experimental films. His own works have been shown at the Milwaukee Underground, Media City, and London Film Festivals.

Teaching Specialties

Film Appreciation, Film Theory, Film History, Stars & Popular Culture, Film Genre

Recent publications

Hollywood Sports Movies and the American Dream, Oxford UP, 2022. Oxford Scholarship Online, doi:10.1093/oso/9780197624920.001.0001.

“A Motivation Analysis of Video Game Microstreamers: ‘Finding My People and Myself’ on YouTube and Twitch.” By Andrew Young and Grant Wiedenfeld. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, vol. 66, no. 2, 2022, pp. 381–399. Taylor & Francis Online, doi:10.1080/08838151.2022.2086549.

“Multicultural American Heroes: Reading Obama-era Biopics of Jackie Robinson and Jesse Owens through the Lens of American Civil Religion.” Sport, Film and National Culture. Ed. Sean Crosson. Routledge, 2020, ch. 3. Taylor and Francis, https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429327018-5.

“Up to Speed Cinema: The Twin Evolution of Montage and Production Economy, 1907– 1910, Gauged by the Ratio of Shots to Camera Setups.” Canadian Journal of Film Studies, vol. 28, no. 1, Spring 2019, pp. 93–122. Published 26 August 2019, https://doi.org/10.3138/cjfs.28.1.2018-0021.

“Le Paysage, le style, et la modernisation agricole: la vallée de l’Orne dans Bouvard et Pécuchet.” Flaubert: revue critique et génétique, Style/Poétique/Histoire littéraire, 4 January 2018, journals.openedition.org/flaubert/2830.

Education

Yale University, PhD in Film & Media Studies and Comparative Literature, 2014

University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, MFA in Performing Arts(Film), 2007

University of Paris 3—New Sorbonne, L in Cinema and Audiovisual Studies, 2005

University of Colorado, BFA in Film Studies, BA in French, 2002

Memberships

Society for Cinema and Media Studies

Domitor: The International Society for the Study of Early Cinema

NECS: The European Network for Cinema and Media Studies

NWSL Media Association

Recent Awards

Sam Houston State University $750 OER Course Redesign Grant, Reimagining the First Year (RFY) Project, 2019

Sam Houston State University $15,000 Enhanced Research Grant, 2018–19

American Association of State Colleges and Universities $1,500 EURECA Center program to integrate research in undergraduate courses, 2018

Curriculum Vitae