about-the-department

Preparing You to Succeed in Your Media-Related Career

Learn to critically analyze the ways in which the media reflects, represents and influences the world. As a media department student, you'll explore media from a communicative, technological, social-cultural and creative-aesthetic perspective. You'll graduate as an effective, ethical and thoughtful civic communicator, storyteller or designer, strategic in your thinking and skilled in creating and using a wide variety of media and digital media platforms.

In concert with the University's mission, you'll nurture your individual talents, harness your innate creativity, inspire passion for innovation, foster analytical and critical thinking, and encourage ethical and professional leadership. Your education will reflect the interdisciplinary nature of the field and the growing synergies between journalism and media innovations while remaining grounded in Catholic values and democratic ideals.

Student Media

You can publish content on a variety of student media channels, including The Duquesne Duke (student newspaper), WDSR (student radio), DSTV (student TV), :Lexicon (literary arts journal), The D.U.Quark (scientific research journal), L'Esprit du Duc (yearbook) and Off the Bluff (Duquesne media-produced magazine).

Digital Experience & Prototyping Lab

Led by Dr.%20William%20Gibbs, our user experience lab gives any media student the opportunity to have hands-on experience with creating and designing forms of interactive media. The lab includes 3D printers, augmented reality and so much more.

"I started with an interest in graphic design and developed a passion for video production. My courses gave me skills in video shooting, editing and storytelling. I was able to use these skills to shoot a documentary titled ‘Pure Thirst, A Tanzania Story,' which is currently in postproduction."

Adam

Undergraduate Program Tracks

Digital Media Arts: Multimedia Development Concentration

The multimedia concentration within our digital media arts major will immerse you in a world of creative thinking, design, information management, development, interactive environments and visual communication through technology.

You will use what is learned in the classroom to create robust multimedia experiences in a variety of disciplines and industries.

Explore Multimedia

Digital Media Arts: Interactive Design & Media

As a student majoring in digital media arts, interactive design & media (ID&M), you will bring together design, human-technology interaction, digital media and information technology to prepare for a professional career in media after graduation. Design (a process of conceiving, planning and making of products) is central to ID&M.

Explore Interactive Design

Multiplatform Journalism

As a multiplatform journalism major, you will be prepared to work as multimedia journalists across a wide variety of platforms, from online news sites to traditional print and broadcast outlets. Explore Multiplatform Journalism

Sports Information & Media

As a sports information and media major, you will be prepared for a career in sports media and/or public relations, including tasks relating to sportswriting, sportscasting and job-rich "sports information" fields, among others.
Explore Sports Media

Strategic Public Relations & Advertising

As a strategic public relations and advertising student, you will gain a thorough understanding of the fundamental skills and practices of public relations and advertising along with a theoretical understanding of their cultural importance as the primary means of persuasion in modern life. Explore PR & Advertising

Accelerated Undergraduate Program

Undergraduate students in the Department of Media can choose to enter an accelerated path to a master of fine arts (M.F.A.) degree.

After your acceptance into the accelerated path, beginning junior year, you can take up to 12 credits of graduate-level courses that will apply to their undergraduate degrees. Once you formally move from undergraduate to graduate status, 12 credits of graduate work will apply toward the 42-credit requirement for the M.F.A. This would leave 30 credits, including a project/thesis course, to successfully complete your M.F.A. degree.

Graduate Program Tracks

Further Study of the Art of Media

M.F.A.s & Certificate Program

The M.F.A. in media arts & technology is a multidisciplinary program of study that blends media arts, design, creative expression and technology to enhance communication and user experiences across all industries and disciplines. Storytellers, designers, filmmakers, photographers, artists and technologists exercise creativity through technology.

As a creative and strategic media M.F.A. student, you will learn the art of telling good stories through video, sound, text and graphic design. You will be taught which mediums work best for certain stories and will learn how to frame your messaging to capture the attention of the widest possible audience.

Our certification in media arts & technology is for professionals who want to expand their knowledge and/or skillset of current media, technology and design applications. We offer three tracks for both the MFA and the certificate.

Explore Creative & Strategic Design

Interactive Design

As a student in our interactive design program, you will will dig deeper into big questions: Why are digital products built? What are they designed to achieve? Are they built in the most efficient way possible? Students will learn more about society's interactions with products such as smartphones, automobiles, and home appliances and what goes into the creation of those media interactions. Explore Interactive Design

Photography & Film

Photography and film examines theories, practices and the history of "lens-based" media, incorporating design and technological processes used for product deployment in these areas. Explore Photography & Film