<< Return to the Virtual URS Main Page

Faculty mentor: Disa Gambera

My thesis explores how five Hollywood films represent cars as central to their protagonists’ identity. Given the central role Hollywood films have played in promoting car culture, I argue that these films reveal a psychological dependence on cars. I combine Marxist theories of commodity fetishism with William Forster Lloyd’s theory of “the tragedy of the commons” to examine how the environmental degradation caused by cars is erased by these films’ fetishized depictions of automobile culture.

Watch my research presentation below.
Questions or comments? Contact me at: kateabutton@gmail.com

View my Presentation Slides HERE

<< Return to the Virtual URS Main Page