Department of English

Personal Website: www.cofc.edu/~brunsj

Profile
John received his Ph.D. in Film, Literature & Culture at the University of Southern California in 2002. In addition to teaching courses on film, he directs the Film Studies Program, for which he is the acting advisor. He recently published a book entitled Loopholes: Reading Comically (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, Rutgers--The State University of New Jersey, 2009), in which classic and contemporary theories of comedy are applied to a variety of topics in film, literature and culture. Andrew McConnell Stott (University of Buffalo, SUNY) calls it "the essential next step in the discussion and a must for humor scholars everywhere." John's next book project, Form and Feeling: Modes of Expression in Narrative Cinema, focuses on the melodrama, feminist theory, cognitive theory, and the films of Alfred Hitchcock.

Recent Publications, Presentations, Conferences, and Readings

Panel Co-Chair, “The Contemporary Multi-Plot Film." Society for Cinema and Media Studies Conference, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, March 6-9, 2008.

Presenter, “Polyphonic Film.” Society for Cinema and Media Studies Conference, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, March 6-9, 2008.

"The Polyphonic Film." New Review of Film and Television Studies. August 2008. 6:2. 189-212

"Baffling Doom: Dialogue, Laughter, and Comic Perception in Henry James." Texas Studies in Literature and Language. Spring 2005. 47:1. 1-30

"Get Out of Gaol Free, Or: How to Read A Comic Plot." Journal of Narrative Theory. Winter 2005. 35:1. 25-59