The Velvet Light Trap, University of Texas Press

VLT is collectively edited by graduate students at the University of Wisconsin at Madison and The University of Texas at Austin, with the support of media scholars at those institutions and throughout the country. Each issue provokes debate about critical, theoretical, and historical topics relating to a particular theme.

The Velvet Light Trap is indexed and/or abstracted in Communication Abstracts, Film Literature Index, International Index to Film Periodicals, Sociological Abstracts, America: History and Life, and Historical Abstracts.

#62, Fall 2008 - Media Spaces and Architectures
#61, Spring 2008 - Remakes and Adaptations
#60, Fall 2007 - Documentary Now
#59, Spring 2007 - Pornography
#58, Fall 2006 - Narrative & Storytelling
#57, Spring 2006 - Authorship
Archives

#62, Fall 2008 - Media Spaces and Architectures

Film in Air: Airspace, In-Flight Entertainment, and NonTheatrical Distribution: Stephen Groening
Your Favorite Stars, Live On Our Screens: Media Culture, Queer Publics, and Commercial Space: Hollis Griffin
In the Flesh: Space and Embodiment in the Pornographic Peep Show Arcade: Amy Herzog
Photo Essay: Urban Iconography and the Technological Grotesque: Anna McCarthy
The Good Side of the Ghetto: Visualizing Black Brooklyn 1968–1971: Devorah Heitner
Dossier: Media Space in Perspective: The Editors
An Interview with Emily Thompson: Nick Marx and Danny Kimball

#61, Spring 2008 - Remakes and Adaptations

"Beam Me up, Omer": Transnational Media Flow and the Cultural Politics of the Turkish Star Trek Remake: Iain Robert Smith
Remaking and the Film Trilogy: Whit Stillman's Authorial Triptych: Claire Perkins
Somewhere in Time: Utopia and the Return of Superman: Matt Yockey
The Concessions of Nat Turner: by Christopher Sieving
An Interview with Richard Linklater

#60, Fall 2007 - Documentary Now

Q&A: Poetics of the Documentary Film Interview: Leger Grindon
Contemporary Documentary Film and "Archive Fever": History, the Fragment, the Joke: Jaimie Baron
Documentary Stories for Change: Viewing and Producing Immigrant Narratives as Social Documents: Alicia Kemmitt
"Gangs Gone Wild": Low-Budget Gang Documentaries and the Aesthetics of Exploitation: Colin Gunckel
Familial Pursuits, Editorial Acts: Documentaries after the Age of Home Video: Marsha Orgeron and Devin Orgeron
Comedy Verité? The Observational Documentary Meets the Televisual Sitcom: Ethan Thompson
Darfur Diaries: An Interview with Jen Marlowe and Adam Shapiro: Matt Sienkiewicz and Rachel Bicicchi
Dossier: The Role of Documentary in the Contemporary American Political Scene: edited by Dave Resha, Mark Minett, Charlie Michael, and Colin Burnett

Book Reviews

#59, Spring 2007 - Pornography

Prurient Pictures and Popular Film: The Crisis of Pornographic Representation: Catherine Zuromskis
Sound and Performance in Stephen Sayadian's Night Dreams and Café Flesh: Jacob Smith
Porn Star as Brand: Pornification and the Intermedia Career of Rakel Liekki: Kaarina Nikunen and Susanna Paasonen
Hard-core Shopping: Educating Consumption in SIR Video Production's Lesbian Porn: Ragan Rhyne
What Soft-core Can Do for Porn Studies: David Andrews
An Interview with Peter Lehman and Linda Williams

Book Reviews

#58, Fall 2006 - Narrative & Storytelling

Emotional Curves and Linear Narratives: Patrick Keating
From Beats to Arcs: Toward a Poetics of Television Narrative: Michael Z. Newman
Narrative Complexity in Contemporary American Television: Jason Mittell
Narration in the Cinema of Digital Sound: Mark Kerins
Narrative Structure in The Sixth Sense: A New Twist in "Twist Movies"?: Erlend Lavik
Contingency, Order, and the Modular Narrative: 21 Grams and Irreversible: Allan Cameron

Book Reviews

#57, Spring 2006 - Authorship

The Cinema of Affections: The Transformation of Authorship in British Cinema before 1907: Joe Kember
Studio Authorship, Warner Bros., and The Fountainhead: Jerome Christensen
"Some Kind of a Man": Orson Welles as Touch of Evil's Masculine Auteur: Brooke Rollins
A Point of Little Hope: Hippie Horror Films and the Politics of Ambivalence: Matt Becker
Marketing David Mamet: Institutionally Assigned Film Authorship in Contemporary American Cinema: Yannis Tzioumakis
Exorcizing/Exercising Treachery: Robust Subjectivity in Lourdes Portillo's The Devil Never Sleeps: Mónica F. Torres
Technology in Search of an Artist: Questions of Auteurism/Authorship and the Contemporary Cinematic Experience: Anna Notaro

Book Reviews

VLT Archives

Submission Guidelines

The Velvet Light Trap is a journal devoted to investigating historical questions that illuminate the understanding of film, television, and other media. It publishes articles and interviews written with the highest scholarly standards yet accessible to a broad range of readers. The journal draws on a variety of theoretical and historiographic approaches from the humanities and social sciences. The journal welcomes any effort that will help foster the ongoing processes of evaluation and negotiation in media history and criticism. While the Velvet Light Trap maintains its traditional commitment to the study of American film, it also expands its scope to television and other media, to adjacent institutions, and to other nations' media. The journal encourages both approaches and objects of study that have been neglected or excluded in past scholarship.

The Velvet Light Trap issues calls for papers based on specific themes. Send three copies to the university issuing the call. Essays not suitable for issues in preparation at one university will be forwarded to the other for consideration. Submissions should be printed in letter-quality type. The format should follow the 1985 edition of the MLA Style Manual. The entire essay, including block quotations and notes, should be double spaced. Quotations not in English should be accompanied by translations. Photocopies of illustrations are sufficient for initial review, but authors should be prepared to supply camera-ready photographs on request. Illustrations will be sized by the publisher. Permissions are the responsibility of the author.