Britt Murphy

Britt Murphy’s dissertation seeks to understand the industrial and cultural mechanisms behind the creation of queer and disabled characters in recent streaming television. The current digital ecosystem has shifted representation of queerness and disability in popular television, in turn providing a forum for highly niche topics due to enhanced competition between platforms, more sophisticated utilization of algorithms to precisely target niche audiences, and increased opportunities for creators that are given more authorial control over previously underrepresented storylines. This project focuses on the entities and institutions that have a direct hand in writing, directing and producing these characters. A critical analysis of the entities and institutions that create and consume these characters is necessary because of the wide sweeping effects of their online representation via streaming platforms and social media marketing experiences which have facilitated the monetization of diversity, policy change, and feelings of identification for people that occupy these identities off-screen.

Research Interests

Television studies, disability studies, production studies, queer theory, media industry studies

Education

B.A., Humanities and World Religions, University of Central Florida
M.A., Cultural Studies, Dartmouth College

Invited Presentations

Murphy, Brittany. Vidaček-Hains, Violeta. “Accessibility Across Boarders.” International Student Research Symposium. University of Zagreb. Zagreb, Croatia (June 15, 2014).

Presentations

“That’s Inappropriate: Sustaining Labor and the Social Influencer,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Seattle, Wash., (March 13, 2019).

Latsis, Dimitrios. Murphy, Brittany. Oyallon, Jenny. Sharma, Aparna. Williams, Mark. Bret Vukoder, “The Media Ecology Project,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Chicago, Il. (March 24, 2017).

Bivins, Summer. Gonzalez, Ana. Murphy, Brittany. Neira, Alice. Sanchez, Gina. Sanford, Stephanie. “Student Empowerment and the McNair Scholars program.” Forum for Access and Continuing Education Conference, University of Salford, Manchester, United Kingdom, (July 2, 2014).

Selected Publications

Article co-author with Bryant, D; Gonzalez, A; Huizar, C; Martinez, J; Murphy, B; and Neira, A. “Reforming Continuing Education,” edited by Gina Sanchez.

“Transparent: A Closer Look at the Transgender Tipping Point.” Clamantis (Winter 2016).