Research Network

In addition to the team of core researchers, a growing number of individual contributors have participated in TVRI events and conducted background research.

Riya Mary Al’sanah

Kira Allmann Kira Allmann is a DPhil candidate in the Faculty of Oriental Studies at the University of Oxford, where she is a Rhodes Scholar. Her research on the Arab Spring focuses on how digital geographies for communication, coordination, and mobilization are created in the dialectic between online and offline spaces. Her thesis focuses on the relationship between media and politics in Egypt before, during, and after the 2011 revolution. Kira holds a BA in Government and Linguistics from the College of William and Mary and an MPhil with Distinction in Modern Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Oxford. She is a published author and has presented at conferences, workshops, and universities worldwide on issues related to media, political resistance, protest, and the Middle East.

Jamal Bahmad is a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Leeds. Completed at the University of Stirling in 2014, his doctoral dissertation examined the politics of neoliberalism, everyday life and postcolonial subjectivity in Moroccan urban cinema since the 1990s. Bahmad specialises and has published widely in Francophone and North African cultural studies with a focus on cinema, literature, cities, memory and youth subcultures.

Ergin Bulut is an assistant professor at the Department of Media and Visual Arts at Koc University. His research interests cover political economy of media and media labor, critical/cultural studies, international communication, and philosophy of technology. His writings have appeared in TV and New Media; Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies; Globalization, Societies and Education; and Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies. He is the co-editor of Cognitive Capitalism, Education, and Digital Labor (Peter Lang, 2011).

Padma Chirumamilla is a Doctoral Candidate in the School of Information at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. Her research focuses on the role of media and communication technologies in the affective and material creation of everyday and ordinary experience. She is currently conducting field research in south India.

Dennis K.K. Leung is a doctoral candidate at the School of Journalism and Communication, The Chinese University of Hong Kong. His research interests lie on alternative media and media activism.

Steven Schrag is a doctoral student in the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. He is pursuing research interests at the intersection of digital culture, critical theory, sound studies, and game studies. He has completed a bachelor’s degree in communication from the University of Tulsa, and has previously worked as a professional jazz pianist.