UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — A media historian and classically trained ballerina will discuss her academic work, which focuses on the aesthetics and politics of dance in relation to film, television and new media, during a free public lecture on the University Park campus.
Pamela Krayenbuhl’s talk, scheduled at 4:30 p.m. Sept. 11 in Kern Auditorium (112 Kern Building), will build off her recent monograph, “White Screens, Black Dance: Race and Masculinity in the United States at Midcentury” (Oxford University Press, 2025).
The work reveals the models of masculinity constructed via Black/Africanist dance by mid-20th-century film and television stars. Her current projects examine the stakes of dance in more contemporary contexts — from Fortnite video game avatars to deepfake dancing politicians.
Krayenbuhl is an assistant professor of film and media studies in the Department of Culture, Arts and Communication at the University of Washington Tacoma. She earned both her master's and doctoral degrees in communication, both focused on screen cultures, from Northwestern University.
Krayenbuhl has other recent and forthcoming work on dance and media in the New Review of Film and Television Studies, the Journal of Film and Video, Jump Cut, and the International Journal of Screendance.
The Sept. 11 session is sponsored by the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications.