Jude Ferrigno, C’25 & MA’25 and Weike Li, C’25 & MA’26 | Research Honors Thesis | $250 each
Jude Ferrigno is a double major in Cinema & Media studies and English as well as a submat student in English. He hails from the cultural mecca of the United States — Deptford, NJ. Concerning CIMS, he loves their near-limitless tea supply, the kindness of the students and faculty, and their boundless willingness to entertain even the oddest of projects he has in store.
Award Commendation:
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Weike Li is a senior studying Cinema & Media Studies and English, and a submatriculant in the English Department. He comes from Chongqing, China. He is interested in common practices like walking and sleeping, and the mediated everyday life. Regarding CIMS, he loves the dark chocolate, the coffee machine, and most of all, the kindest and the most intelligent people in the world.
Award Commendation:
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Miette Gourlay, C’25 and Sean Park, C’25 | Creative Honors Thesis | $250 each
Miette Gourlay is a senior double-majoring in Cinema & Media Studies and Health & Societies, and is originally from New York City. She is interested in exploring all aspects of the human condition through documentary film, believing stories help us learn and grow from one another. Her three favorite things about CIMS are the unique course offerings, incredible travel opportunities (going to Uganda was the highlight of her time at Penn), and professors who are all super supportive of their students' projects.)
Award Commendation:
Every documentary is a leap of faith. You start out with an intuition and hope that the world will cooperate. Even when the world is on your side, it takes a lot of work and skill to pull it off. Miette Gourlay’s documentary Ocho is a truly exemplary example of the form. Miette found a great story - always the hardest part. She gained the trust of her subject, cancer survivor Howard Aaron. And she put in the time, effort, and curiosity necessary to capture his story and show it to others in a compelling way. It was nice that Howard set a world record while Miette was filming, but it was more impressive that she was there with her camera at the right moment.
(Sean's bio)
Award Commendation:
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Ejun Hong, C’25 | Screenplay | $500
Ejun Mary Hong is a senior double-majoring in Fine Arts and Cinema & Media Studies, with a minor in Design, and is from Edmonton, Canada, and Seoul, South Korea. She is a storyteller who brings life to her dreams and the lost stories of the world with her animated films, and she has created four animated films that explore personal yet universal themes, offering connection, meaning, and the potential for healing. Her three favorite things about the Cinema & Media Studies department are the supportive and inspirational group of professors who have taught her how a love for one's passion can inspire others to continue dreaming, fellow students who hold the same love for cinema, and academically enriching cinema courses that broaden students' perspectives in the world of cinema.
Award Commendation:
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Maria della Porta, C’25 | Undergrad Essay & Creative Project | $500
Maria della Porta is an Urban Studies major from Philadelphia with a lifelong passion for film. She remains endlessly curious about the best vehicles for storytelling, exploring and experimenting across filmmaking, journalism, ethnography, fashion, and modern art. When it comes to CIMS, Maria is grateful for the wide-ranging courses she’s had the chance to take -- from Italian to Japanese cinema -- the kindness and support of the professors, and the movie posters lining the Fisher-Bennett hallways.
Award Commendation:
Maria Della Porta's essay "Unraveling Hausu : Exploring the Connections to TV Ads" is an historically and aseptically informed essay that surprises us with its insights.
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Taylor Whitehead, C’25 | Undergrad Community Leadership Award | $500
Taylor Whitehead is a CIMS major from Philadelphia Pennsylvania. His main interests are acting and writing, and he’s loved film as long as he can remember - dating back to his dad taking him out of class to go to the movie theater - and Penn CIMS has allowed him to express this passion to the furthest extent imaginable. Penn in Cannes was life-changing, his two summers spent working through the Penn CIMS internship program helped to inform his career aspirations beyond explanation, and his time spent in the CIMS office working for Nicola and the department at large has turned that Fisher-Bennett room into his happy place on Penn’s campus. He’s extremely thankful for his time here.
Award Commendation:
Taylor Whitehead managed many aspects of our CIMS office, including to be a TA for one of our production classes, and made the work of faculty and staff in our department extremely enjoyable and gratifying. In fact, it is enough to simply speculate about the possibility of a given project, and Taylor will take it from there, immediately mapping out all that needs to be done, and proceeding to go through all the steps in an organized, logical, and efficient fashion. He literally revels in any challenge that is offered to him and, no matter how chaotic and messy things get, Taylor is always a model of cheerfulness, neatness, and decorum.
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Anat Dan, PhD in Comparative Literature | Timothy Corrigan Dissertation Award | $1,000
Anat Dan studies contemporary documentary media cultures and teaches courses in film and media at the University of Pennsylvania. Her multimodal dissertation explores contemporary tensions between humanist and posthuman aesthetics in experimental documentaries within the film festival circuit. For the past six years, CIMS has been her second home. A community of cinephiles and theory buffs who care deeply about both Philadelphia and the world we live in, CIMS taught her the value of asking questions, engaging in conversations, and making humble contributions.
Award Commendation:
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Janneane Blevins, PhD Candidate in Cinema & Media Studies | Grad Essay & Creative Project | $500
Janneane Blevins is interested in environmental and energy media — and the imaginaries used to represent, separate, embody, and metabolize nature. Her background in design and her work on various cultural projects informs her research approach through text, image, and sound. What she appreciates most about CIMS is the people - joy and welcome radiate throughout the department. She’s grateful for their embrace of interdisciplinary interests and multimodal methods. And she finds herself simultaneously in awe of and challenged to contribute to the department’s brilliant mix of rigor, work, and care.
Award Commendation:
Janneane Blevins' designed syllabus “Violence and Care: Reimagining How We Relate to Nature” grabs students’ attention with the urgency of its topics: “The destruction of Hurricane Helene, orcas ramming boats, recurring wildfires, COVID-19, deepening drought, wartime ecocide – these catastrophes of climate change are juxtaposed against calls for river rights, personhood for forests, discovery of plant intelligence, and AI conversation with whales. How do we make sense of these narratives of nature? How are we relating? Can nature be violent? Are humans violent against nature? What about the role of care?” The syllabus provides students with critical and imaginative tools designed to help students begin to make sense of the moment in which we live. The course is structured around three main questions: 1) How did we get here? 2) What could our relationship with nature be instead? And 3) What now? The committee was impressed by the creative assignments, which include a self-ecology map, a photo essay, and a group zine; by the sense of hope and collective responsibility this course inspires; and by the rigor of Blevins’ brilliant pedagogical imagination.
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Lynette Shen, PhD Candidate in Cinema & Media Studies | Grad Teaching/Community Leadership Award | $ 500
Lynette Shen was born and raised in Shanghai, China, and is a graduate student from the Cinema and Media Studies department at the University of Pennsylvania. In her research, she is obsessed with images of bad quality and failure and pays attention to how such moving images shape Sinophone women and queer subjects in diaspora. Her three favorite things about Penn CIMS are: the supportive environment for students' wild ideas, the department's embrace of interdisciplinary conversations, and the strong sense of community and mutual care. (Bonus points for the chocolates at the CIMS office.)
Award Commendation:
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