Multimedia Archive 2012

Stories from the School—
in 02139 and around the globe.

Junot Díaz | Reading at MIT 

27 Sept 2012 — The Pultizer Prize-winning author and MIT Professor of Writing spoke to a standing-room-only audience at the Stata Center, taking many questions and reading from his new book This is How You Lose Her.     Watch

Junot Díaz | 2012 MacArthur Fellow

A video from the MacArthur Foundation, about the Pulitzer Prize-winning fiction writer and MIT Professor of Writing, Junot Díaz, who was named a MacArthur Fellow for 2012. The Fellowship is a $500,000, no-strings-attached grant for individuals who have shown exceptional creativity in their work and the promise to do more. Watch

John Harbison at the 2012 Aspen Music Festival | Interview and Performance 

MIT's Pulitzer prize-winning composer John Harbison talks about his jazz roots, his opera "Great Gatsby" — and performs delicious jazz selections on piano.  Performance Today©'s Fred Child interviews Institute Professor of Music, John Harbison, at the 2012 Aspen Music Festival.  Watch

MIT health economist Jon Gruber discusses the Affordable Care Act  

An architect of both the National and Massachusetts health care plans, Gruber has been interviewed extensively by the national and international media after the Supreme Court decision. Here are a few of the informative videos.   Watch

MIT Rambax Ensemble in Senegal

MIT Musicians in Senegal
In January 2012, Rambax MIT traveled to Senegal to study sabar with the Mbaye family. Rambax student, Jess Kim '10, put together this 10-min video to document the group's tour, and to thank the sponsors who made the trip possible.   Watch

Awakening by MIT Wind Ensemble

A video of the MIT Wind Ensemble playing Jamshied Sharifi's "Awakening" in 2012. More

Robert Lepage conducts creative workshop with MIT students

Acclaimed multidisciplinary and performance artist Robert Lepage, winner of the 2012 McDermott Award, conducts a theater workshop with MIT students. Renowned as a director, filmmaker, playwright, and actor, Lepage is currently directing Der Ring des Nibelungen at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Watch

Is there a future for the euro?

Marco Mazzucchelli audits the conventional wisdom. Watch

Sherry Turkle gives a TED talk: Connected, But Alone?


As we expect more from technology, do we expect less from each other? MIT SHASS Professor Sherry Turkle studies how our devices and online personas are redefining human connection and communication—and asks us to think deeply about the new kinds of connection we want to have. Watch

MIT economist Jon Gruber clarifies U.S. health care law in a comic book 

"What he’s created makes our health care system understandable and entertaining." — From CBS Boston Watch

Celebrating Margaret L. A. MacVicar '64

Professor Margaret MacVicar (1944–1991) was a physicist and outstanding educator who founded MIT's widely emulated Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP), and served as MIT's first Dean for Undergraduate Education.  In this video members of the MIT community remember Professor MacVicar and her enduring contributions to the Institute.   Watch

Venezuela's El Sistema

New York Times classical music reporter Daniel J. Wakin discusses the Venezuelan music education program founded by José Antonio Abreu.  — New York Times Watch

Knight Fellows:  How the media tells science stories 

The MIT Energy Initiative and the Knight Science Journalism Fellowship Program convene four journalists to tell the behind-the-scenes story on how energy stories get told—and spun. Watch

Jens Hainmueller

Meet Political Scientist Jens Hainmueller

Hainmueller’s evolution as a political scientist can be seen as a long-term project to tie together qualitative and quantitative ways of thinking about politics and society. While he has always been “excited about using math tools to learn about the world,” Hainmueller has also been drawn to social and economic problems. Photocredit: Stuart Darsch Watch

landscape of Iran

Audits of Conventional Wisdom Series: Improving Iran-US relations

Abbas Maleki on Iran-US relations. In this series of videos, the MIT-SHASS Center for International Studies tours the horizon of the conventional wisdoms that animate U.S. foreign policy, and puts them to the test of data and history. Watch

Uganda landscape

Audits of Conventional Wisdom: Cutting aid to Africa won't help gay rights

Jackee Budesta Batanda "Audits the Conventional Wisdom" of Washington's response to the anti-homosexuality bill in Uganda. In this series of videos, the MIT-SHASS Center for International Studies tours the horizon of the conventional wisdoms that animate U.S. foreign policy, and puts them to the test of data and history. Watch

About Visualizing Cultures

In these videos John Dower shows the Visualizing Cultures program, launched at MIT in 2002 to explore the potential of the web for developing innovative image-driven scholarship and learning. Visualizing Cultures uses new technology and hitherto inaccessible visual materials to reconstruct the past—as people of the time visualized and imagined their own worlds.   Watch

Occupy Wall Street after Zuccotti Park
Interview with Sasha Costanza-Chock, Assistant Professor of Civic Media

Much of the reporting on the eviction of occupiers from Zuccotti Park  in December 2011, focused on what happens next: can the movement survive without a physical location? Sasha Costanza-Chock, Assistant Professor of Civid Media, in the MIT-SHASS Comparative Media Studies program, has been studying the protests. He talks to Brooke Gladstone at NPR's "On the Media," about what the future holds for the OWS movement, and about how the protestors are organizing digitally in new ways. Watch