Highlights
Student Profile: Christine Feldman
by Kaitlin Cavanaugh
When most people hear the word "mod" they are probably reminded of the Beatles, kooky mini-skirts, and Austin Powers. But Christine Feldman, a graduate student in the School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh, knows the Mod Phenomenon represents much more.
"Mod culture began in early 1960s Britain as a working-class youth culture but soon became a style and sensibility that spread to many parts of the developed world. By the mid-sixties 'Mod' became the catchword for youth culture," says Feldman.
Feldman is a PhD candidate in the Department of Communication where she focuses on youth culture and media, collective memory, and popular culture studies. She will also receive a doctoral certificate in Cultural Studies when she graduates in spring 2008. Her dissertation examines mod culture in England, Germany, the United States, and Japan, from the 1960s to the present.
As for why she has chosen this unique topic for her dissertation, Feldman says, "I think it's a story that needs to be told and that a wide swath of the public would find interesting—not just academics. It's a style and period that has rarely been examined with a keen, scholarly eye.I believe it was the first truly modern style of the twentieth century and has set the tone for all youth culture to follow—and that's why it still fascinates young people today."
Feldman is the recipient of a Fulbright through the Institute of Educational Education, a prestigious international exchange program that offers fellowships to students wishing to study and conduct research outside of their home country. The fellowship has given Feldman the opportunity to spend this year conducting research for her dissertation at the University of Hamburg in Germany.
"It's been an amazing gift to focus 100 percent on my dissertation research and be able to take the project to a truly international level," says Feldman. "My research now will contain one-of-a-kind information that cannot be found sitting in Hillman library."
Feldman received her BA in film and cultural studies through Fairhaven College at Western Washington University in 1993. After receiving her MA in Communication, Culture, and Technology from Georgetown University in 2003, she came to the University of Pittsburgh to begin working towards her doctoral degree. Ultimately, Feldman says, she would like to be a professor of Communication or American Studies, as well as a leading scholar on youth culture of the mid-1960s. She has already received inquires from publishers about her doctoral work and hopes to have her dissertation published as a book in the next few years.
