The collective for advancing multimodal research in the arts (CAMRA), a graduate student community nested at the Center for Experimental Ethnography, organizes a community-oriented practitioner festival called SSMF (Screening Scholarship Media Festival) each spring.

This year, under the theme Sound & Color, we will be unhinging from indexical representations and reorienting towards what is possible when we attune ourselves through the senses: music and sound, color and light, touch and taste. It is a call to inhabit the modality in multimodality and to embrace abstraction as we listen, learn, teach, exchange, and prototype freer conditions in the long story of life on earth.

The festival will take place during March 28th, March 29th, and April 6th, 2025, and will involve workshops and panels, and this year we are commissioning two music and poetry performances for our opening and closing nights. Please read below for more details:

Friday, March 28 - Opening Night Performance and Talk: This Time’s Duo comprised of oud player Huda Asfour and Farah Al-Barqawi introduced by Noura Erakat, followed by Opening Reception

Sunday, April 6 - Keynote Performance and Conversation: Immanuel Wilkins’ Blues Blood Jazz Ensemble featuring Sonia Sanchez preceded by conversation with Imani Perry.