This fall, the Communication Arts Partners (CAPS) were thrilled to welcome Kathy Brown, who brings to our alumni advisory board expertise in communication, persuasion, and relationship building. As a Director of Broker Alliances at Origami …
News
“The Most Challenging Argument to Make”: Feelings of Safety in Dark Sky Advocacy
This essay presents dark sky advocacy as an ideal subject for communication scholars, and it also extends research on the role of feeling in the practice and study of environmental communication.
Meeting the Demand for More Horror
What is horror, and why do we like it? This is the central question of a newer Communication Arts course, “Horror Films,” led by Ph.D. candidate Sarah Mae Fleming. Whether it’s a classic jump scare, …
Nikki Schiefelbein Joins the CAPS Board and Brings Her Writing Flare and Mentorship to Communication Arts Students
The Communication Arts Partners (CAPS) board was honored to welcome Nikki Schiefelbein this fall. CAPS members are essential assets to Communication Arts as they volunteer their time and contribute knowledge to department initiatives, teaching, and …
A Successful Film Festival Run for “The Forest of Dreams”
Since the premiere of Kristyn Dallmann’s 2024 narrative short, “The Forest of Dreams,” at the Communication Arts showcase, she has taken her work to several film festivals and has even secured some awards. Not every …
Why is she green?
Depictions of the Wicked Witch of the West have evolved over the years. The most notable change: She wasn’t always green.
Darshana Mini Receives Honorable Mention for MLA’s Scaglione Prize for South Asian Studies
Darshana Sreedhar Mini, associate professor of film at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, is receiving an honorable mention for Rated A: Soft-Porn Cinema and Mediations of Desire in India, published by the University of California Press.
Strengthening Our Alumni Relations
With over 14,000 living alumni who earned degrees in Communication Arts since our program was founded over 100 years ago, it has become a massive responsibility to maintain connections with our graduates. Our 2025-2029 Strategic Plan committed to strengthening the shared affinities among that ever-growing community. As part of that initiative, Jamie Prey joined our program as our Alumni Relations Officer this spring. In this role, Prey works to reconnect with these 14,000 alumni and learn about their excitement to support Communication Arts.
Social Media as Literature
For a long time, people assumed that reading great literature, like the works of Shakespeare, made people better, strengthened their character, and gave them culture. These days, however, few people find themselves engrossed in the monologues of Hamlet and are instead entrenched in a sub-thread on Reddit or the comments section of a viral TikTok video. Can social media make us better people in the same way it was once thought that reading Shakespeare could? Students in a new Communication Arts and Digital Studies course are working to find out.
Tool or Teammate?
Imagine it was your job to plan an event to let students get their first taste of UW–Madison. You might propose a cheese carving contest. Or maybe they get to make homemade ice cream and have their first scoop looking out at Lake Mendota. The process by which you might generate these ideas is the focus of a new Communication Arts research project. By isolating different conditions, this study is discovering the optimal way to use artificial intelligence (AI) during the brainstorming process.