Doctoral Candidate
About
Briand “Brinni” Gentry (she/hers) is currently working on a dissertation that examines how and why Hawai‘i and Hawaiianness became a ubiquitously durable shorthand of utopian paradise in US entertainment cultures at the turn of the twentieth century. Using an approach that blends historiographic methodologies with critical argumentation and media theory, her research examines the role an imperial imaginary of otherworldly paradise played in mediating, shaping, racializing, and configuring affective fantasies of luxurious escape from the dissatisfactions and anxieties attendant to industrial imperial capitalism. Her work has appeared in Convergence and Feminist Media Histories. Brinni received her B.A. in English and Asian Studies from Rice University and her M.A. in Film Studies from Columbia University where she served as a dedicated research assistant on the Women Film Pioneers Project.
Fields of Study
Early & Silent Film History
Gender, Race, and Sexuality
Indigenous Critique
Tourism Studies
Racial Masquerade
Aesthetic Theory
Cultural Studies
