Volume II

2020-2021

Tess Gellert

This piece explores media’s role in the future of terrorism, and how media theoretical concepts like Debord’s “spectacle” and McLuhan’s “global village” can inform the way we understand terrorist groups’ use of technology and digital media.

Sampriti Mana

The Apple Is Rotting, I am Not is a conceptual work that documents the artist’s first heartbreak in an honest manner while exploring folds in time and space. 

Emily Van Ryn

The way we store, share, and listen to music is becoming increasingly digital – what does this mean for music’s sentimental value?

Hui Wong

This essay draws a connection between the 1998 film The Truman Show and the workings of surveillance capitalism in our digitally mediated world, arguing that the film, made the year Google was founded, anticipates both how we understand our relationship to data, privacy, and capitalism, and how we may resist an unwelcome future.

Ayusha Mahajan

Dichotomous Messaging: In this short memoir, text and image tango in the coming-of-age revelations of an indrawn teenager, and an image sharing app becomes worth a thousand text messages.

Matthew Asuncion

The confluence of media production and distribution has been a boon to everyday consumers. But for comics trying to make a name for themselves, it’s easier than ever to enter the running, yet harder than ever to outrun the pack.

Tatiana Povoroznyuk

This essay looks at the work of Esther Paradaa pioneer of digital photomontagein today’s context of endless algorithmically-curated montages which surround the average social media user.

Yasmine Semeniuk

This piece examines Emily Carr’s settler colonialist perspective through three watercolours from 1906-1910 which illustrate her differing perceptions of Indigenous and Chinese culture—a view that highlights an ongoing dichotomy permeating Western views of the other: who gets to belong, and who gets excluded. 

Copyright and Publishing Information

As an open access journal, Beacon: Journal of Media Studies applies, unless otherwise noted:

Creative Commons License CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 to all creative works published on our site. 

Creative Commons License CC-BY-NC 4.0 to all academic essay works published on our site.

Our journal is passionate about being a platform to showcase the works of undergraduate students in the field of media studies to a greater audience. We believe in the ideas and wonders of students, and support their journey to achieving their biggest aspirations. As such, creators retain control of their works and are free to publish their work on other platforms, even when it has been published on our site. 

Please note that the opinions expressed herein are solely those of the individual creators and are intended to invoke dialogue and build community.