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Anna Cooper

Assistant Professor, School of Theatre, Film and Television

Assistant Professor, Social / Cultural / Critical Theory – GIDP

Marshall Bldg, Room 243
520-621-3205

PhD Film and Television Studies, University of Warwick
MA Film and Television Studies, University of Warwick
BA Philosophy, Columbia University

Dr. Anna Cooper’s research interests include classical and contemporary Hollywood, transnational/postcolonial/neocolonial cinemas, space/place/mobilities in film, and feminist film and media studies.

Her monograph, The American Abroad: The Imperial Gaze in Postwar Hollywood Cinema (Bloomsbury, 2022), explores how postwar Hollywood cinema adopted elements of British and French imperial visual culture, transforming them to suit a new United Statesian context. Cooper argues that four visual discourses in particular–the sublime, the ethnographic, the picturesque, and glamour–became building blocks in the development of a new American visual language. Drawing on cinema and media studies, art history, American studies, and postcolonial studies, this innovative book offers a fresh way of thinking about Hollywood film aesthetics. It explores how eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Western colonial formations of vision influenced classical Hollywood film style.

Dr. Cooper has co-edited an anthology, Projecting the World: Representing the “Foreign” in Classical Hollywood, which collects current research on representations of foreign and international space in classical Hollywood cinema (Wayne State University Press, 2017).

Her latest project is on cinema and the cultures of neoliberalism. She is a co-Principal Investigator of "Neoliberalism at the Neopopulist Crossroads," a Sawyer Seminar funded by the Mellon Foundation (2020-22).

She also served as guest editor for a special issue of the New Review of Film and Television Studies, published in July 2019, on neoliberalism and cinema. Her contribution to the issue, an article-length introduction titled “Neoliberal Theory and Film Studies,” argues for more robust connections between these two fields given how often media and communications have been theorized as a powerful site for the dissemination of neoliberal modes of discipline.

From 2019 to 2022, Dr. Cooper was Co-Chair of the Classical Hollywood scholarly interest group in the Society for Cinema and Media Studies.

Other publications:

Courses taught:

  • Global Queer Cinema
  • Global Women Filmmakers
  • Theory and Representation in Film and Television
  • Deep-Dive Senior Projects in Film and Television Studies
  • Film and Television History, Beginnings to Mid-20th Century
  • Colonial/Postcolonial Cinema
  • Race, Class, and Gender in Film and Television
  • The Road Movie
  • International Film and Television Business
  • Costume and Cinema
  • Chick Flicks
  • Film and Television History, Mid-20th Century to the Present

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23 hours ago
Arizona Arts

TODAY, 2-4p ... opening reception of "Scratching the Surface" at the Lionel Rombach Gallery with student work from galen dara's ART 404 sketch class.

Plus, refreshments and drawing activities!

Repost from @montessa_the_artist IG account ...
Studies from our super-secret field trip around campus. We went to the Stewart Observatory at The University of Arizona and the Starbucks on University Blvd.

Munwar Aldawish
Olive Bingham
Bunny Uy Cue
Phoebe Dubisch
Amber Mehta
Ana Monobe
Teaya Sherman-Harris
Jeanne Stewart
Sabrina Vincent
Montessa White

University of Arizona School of Art
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2 days ago
Arizona Arts

We’re not done celebrating the Class of 2023!!! πŸŽ“πŸ₯³πŸΎπŸŽ‰

We’re gearing up for a summer of celebration with photos and quotes submitted by our graduates.

Alex Simpson
BFA, Theatre Production – Professional Actor Training Program
Magna Cum Laude
"Arizona is hot, but consent is hotter #supportsurvivors"
UA School of Theatre, Film & Television
–––––––––

Julia Hansch
BFA Dance
Summa Cum Laude
"Doing what you love is where happiness and success live."
The University of Arizona School of Dance
–––––––––

Brynne Gallup
BM, Performance Violin
Magna Cum Laude
β€œDifferent for different’s sake isn’t good enough.
- Timothy Kantor"
The University of Arizona Fred Fox School of Music
–––––––––

Ellenor Spencer
BFA, Studio Art – Illustration and Design
Summa Cum Laude
"I owe it all to Kid Pix."
University of Arizona School of Art
... See MoreSee Less

We’re not done celebrating the Class of 2023!!! πŸŽ“πŸ₯³πŸΎπŸŽ‰

We’re gearing up for a summer of celebration with photos and quotes submitted by our graduates.

Alex Simpson
BFA, Theatre Production – Professional Actor Training Program 
Magna Cum Laude
Arizona is hot, but consent is hotter #supportsurvivors
UA School of Theatre, Film & Television 
–––––––––

Julia Hansch
BFA Dance
Summa Cum Laude
Doing what you love is where happiness and success live.
The University of Arizona School of Dance 
–––––––––

Brynne Gallup 
BM, Performance Violin
Magna Cum Laude 
β€œDifferent for different’s sake isn’t good enough.
- Timothy Kantor 
The University of Arizona Fred Fox School of Music 
–––––––––

Ellenor Spencer 
BFA, Studio Art – Illustration and Design
Summa Cum Laude
I owe it all to Kid Pix.
University of Arizona School of ArtImage attachmentImage attachment+1Image attachment
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