Joel A. Devine

Current research focuses on the role of mass entertainment and the construction of "place"; my concern being commercial cinematic representation and cities, particularly as it relates to the inter-connected processes of place-making and place-identity. Using New Orleans as a case study, my students and I are exploring how the city and culture of New Orleans figure prominently as both a character and context in commercial entertainment film by examining the production, reproduction, and transformation of the city's culture and its cinematic expression across numerous film genres and a body of about 150 extant films produced since the 1930s.