The Cinema & Media Studies Division offers foundational education in the cultural, artistic, political and commercial contexts of media creation, production, circulation and consumption. Students of this pioneering program develop a deep understanding of how technology, business, art, politics and history shape and respond to media at regional, national and global scales. Training at this historic department has taken its graduates to key positions at leading studios, universities, and media organizations in the US and around the world.

Our Cinema and Media Studies BA, MA and PhD program fall under the CIP code: CIP code 50.0601: Film/Cinema/Media Studies.

The Division is known for the varied expertise of its faculty, the program’s interdisciplinary affiliations, and its wealth of institutional resources:

• Faculty areas of specialization include global media, Hollywood industry and practices, gender and sexuality in media, television history and theory, African American cinema, Latinx and Latin American media, Asian American media, cinemas of South Asia, East Asia and South East Asia, critical theories of race, transgender and queer media, documentary history and theory, sports media, gaming media, digital humanities, interactive media, avant garde and experimental film, postcolonial and decolonial theory, media historiography, industry studies, archival practices, media of the Global South and (post)socialist media.
• Faculty members hold affiliations across diverse departments within USC including the departments of American Studies and Ethnicity, Communication, Comparative Literature, East Asian Languages and Cultures, Gender and Sexuality, History, Media Arts + Practice, and Visual Studies, among others.
• Resources for research in film and media on campus include the Cinematic Arts Library, which holds multiple donor collections, the Warner Bros. Archives, the Hugh M. Hefner Collection, the Shoah Foundation Archive, and more. The Greater Los Angeles area is known worldwide for its media archives, theaters, museums, among other art and research centers.

Stories

Student Stories

RJ Edrolin
BA, Cinema & Media Studies '25

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Sammy Barr
BA, Cinema and Media Studies '25

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Grace Gordon
BA, Cinema & Media Studies '26

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Featured Student Work

The Pamoja Project

This is Civilization

The Evil Inside

Film Student

Degree Programs