Seonah Kim, PhD (she/her), studies global discourses about racial and gender identity in media that are shaped by historical and socioeconomic structures of inequality, such as militarization, imperialism, neoliberalism, and whiteness. Through research and teaching, she challenges representational inequality, particularly constructed around Asian identity, by finding new or other ways of thinking about Asian identity through a transnational and decolonial lens.
keywords
Asian digital culture, Relative-racializaton, Cross-cultural embodiement, Transnationalism.
MDST 1002 - Introduction to Social Media
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2025 / Spring 2026
Introduces students to network structures and principles, the technology and infrastructures that allow them to flourish, and the cultures that grow up through and around them. Explores how social media enables community, how it assembles and empowers agents of change and how design informs individual and group behavior.
MDST 1003 - Critical Media Literacies
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2025
Learn to strategically access, analyze, evaluate, and produce communication in a variety of forms. This course explores the expanding nature of literacy in a digital world. Students will use applied research practices and communication tools to expand their existing media literacy skills and to design innovative presentations and projects that take advantage of new media. Meets Practice Course Requirement.
MDST 3002 - Digital Culture and Politics
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2026
Examines issues at the intersection of digital media, culture and politics, such as regulation and network architecture, piracy and hacking, and grassroots activism. Engage with a range of theories about cultural politics, democracy, liberalism and neo-liberalism in relation to digital information and communication technologies.
MDST 3201 - Media, Culture and Globalization
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2026
Surveys the political and economic structures of media system in developed and developing countries and discusses the impact of privatization, ownership consolidation, and globalization on the flow of information across national borders. Also looks at how global media flows and counter-flows affect conceptions of nationhood and cultural identity.
MDST 4211 - Asian Media and Culture
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2025
Offers an understanding of the various people, cultures and nations of East Asia through their media systems. Provides a critical overview of the historical, cultural, social, political and economic dimensions of East Asian communication systems in today's digitally connected/disconnected world. Same as MDST 5211.
