Virginia Kuhn, PhD is a critical media activist, maker and teacher. She is a professor in the USC School of Cinematic Arts, Division of Media Arts + Practice.
She explores issues of social justice, specifically by examining how knowledge is produced and legitimized. In 2005, she set a precedent with one of the first digital dissertations in the United States. Her groundbreaking argument defended the use of images as a matter of free speech, expanding our understanding of fair use and confronting stereotypes in the media.
From 2012 to 2019, she led a team of supercomputing scientists and digital humanists, using computer vision to automatically analyze and catalog massive video collections. Her projects, such as the Large Scale Video Analytics (LSVA) and Video Analysis Tableau (VAT), were foundational and presaged the development of Generative AI. This experience informs her current work examining critical issues in AI, including the composition of the training datasets for Large Language Models (LLMs) and the ongoing debate over whether Big Tech's practice of scraping artists' creative work for training data constitutes fair use.
SELECTED KEYNOTE AND INVITED TALKS, PRESENTATIONS
The Gesture and the Archive: Sacred Poses and Computer Vision, October 6, 2022, Augmented Images Symposium, University of Liege, Belgium.
Embodied Knowledge and the Fantastical, Radical Futures Symposium, University of Connecticut, March 21, 2021
Curating Your Online Presence, The Graduate School, USC. February 28, 2020
Data Visualization, Ahmanson Center for March 12, 2018
Video Analytics: From Keywords to Keyframes, History and Theory of New Media lecture series, University of California at Berkeley, November 3, 2017
Future Texts: From Keynotes to Keyframes, Oslo School of Architecture and Design, AHO inaugural Research Day, May 10, 2016
UCLA Symposium for DH Infrastructure February 22, 2017
Your Online Scholarly Presence, March to Publication conference, USC libraries, February 13, 2017
I'll Know It When I See It: Evaluating Digital Scholarship. Indiana University, October 2014
The VAT: Video Analysis at Scale, CATAPULT Center for Digital Humanities and Computational Analysis, U of Indiana, October 2014
Video Analytics: From Keywords to Keyframes. University of Michigan, October 2013
Filmic Texts, Future Texts, Clemson University, October 2012
Digital Argument and Digital Pedagogy, Association of Pacific Rim Universities, June 2012
GRANTS AND AWARDS
Co PI: Media Ethnography and Living Archives, USC Provost’s Faculty Development and Recognition, Interdisciplinary Teaching Award, 2023 - 24
PI, Sacred Poses project, USC Zumberge award for Diversity Equity and Inclusion 2022-23
Co-PI, Project Snowflake, Google. 2017-2021
USC Faculty Mentoring Graduate Students award, 2017
Co-PI, USC Libraries Dean’s Challenge Grant for LibViz project. 2016
PI, Video Analysis Techniques: Optimization and Advanced UI | TG-HUM130005.
Allocation from the National Science Foundation’s Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment, 2015
PI, Novel Research Communities: The LSVA Gateway, allotment from the National Science Foundation’s Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment, 2014
PI, Large-Scale Interactive Media Analytics: Advancing Scholarship in the Humanities and Social Sciences, USC Office of the Provost, April 2012
PI, Real Time Querying and Cultural Analysis of Large Video Databases with Flash Memory, allotment from the national Science Foundation’s Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment, 2011-12
Data Driven pedagogy award, USC Center for Excellence in Teaching, 2013-14
Co-PI, Global Health Game Engine, funded by ABC News and the Gates Foundation, 2010-11
USC Fund for Innovative Undergraduate Teaching. May, 2011-June, 2012
USC Provost’s Prize for Teaching with Technology, 2009
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Golda Meir Library Chancellor’s Scholars’ Award for Digital Scholarship, 2004-05
SERVICE AND PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES
Editorial/Advisory Board:
+ Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology & Pedagogy
+ Pre/Text A Journal of Rhetorical Theory (print)
+ The Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy (CUNY)
+ [in[Transition: Journal of Videographic Film and Moving Image Studies
+ Digital Pedagogy in the Humanities: Concepts, Models, and Experiments (MLA)
+ REFRAME: Research in Media, Film and Music
USC Graduate School Advisory Committee, 2014 – present
Judge, USC Undergraduate Research Symposium, 2014 to 2017
Los Angeles County Arts Commission, panelist for organizational grants, 2014 – 2018
Co-chair, Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Media Literacy + Pedagogical
Outreach Scholarly Interest Group, 2011 to 2014
Instructor, Inaugural Digital Humanities Winter Institute, Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities, College Park, Maryland, January 2013
Judge: Los Angeles International Culture Film Festival, 2015
Journal and Book Reviews:
+ Parlor Press: book review, 2021
+ Kairos Journal of Rhetoricl, Technology, and Pedagogy
+ International Journal of Communication, article review, 2018
+ Journal of Artistic Research, multimodal article review, 2018
+ Nordic Journal of Digital Literacy, article review 2014 and 2013
+ MIT Press, 2013, book review
+ Syllabus, 2012, article review
+ Harlot, 2012, webtext review
+ Enculturation, 2012, multimedia anthology review
+ Computers and Composition, 2012, special issue on multimodal assessment
+ Television and New Media, SAGE, 2011, single article review
+ International Journal of Learning and Media, 2010, single article review
Judge, Conference and Grant Reviews:
+ Advancing Scholarship in the Humanities and Social Sciences, USC, 2015
+ XSEDE conference submissions, 2015, 2016, 2017
+ NEH panel review, 2015
+ USC Provost’s Teaching With Technology award, 2010 and 2012
+ HPC Catalyst Grant submissions, 2010
+ EDUCAUSE conference proposals, 2009
SCA Envisioning the Future Faculty group member, 2011- 2013
Planning Committee, Social Media Week, Los Angeles 2010
Conference Chair, Virtual Hub; HASTAC2010 Grand Innovations and Global Challenges, April, 2010
Conference Chair: Computers and Writing Online Conference, held in Second Life virtual world. February 2009