6 November: FYI -- PG internships, Microsoft
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Please share with your favorite graduate students! (and sorry for crossposts and/or weird typos that make their way into this note!)
http://wp.me/p1yguQ-Fk
APPLICATION DEADLINE: JANUARY 29, 2016
Microsoft Research New England (MSRNE) is looking for advanced PhD
students to join the Social Media Collective (SMC) for its 12-week
2016 Intern Program. The Social Media Collective scholars at MSRNE
bring together empirical and critical perspectives to address complex
socio-technical issues. Our research agenda draws on a social
scientific/humanistic lens to understand the social meanings and
possible futures of media and communication technologies. The ideal
candidate may be trained in any number of disciplines (including
anthropology, communication, information studies, media studies,
sociology, science and technology studies, or a related field), but
should have a strong social scientific or humanistic methodological,
analytical, and theoretical foundation, be interested in questions
related to media or communication technologies and society or culture,
and be interested in working in a highly interdisciplinary environment
that includes computer scientists, mathematicians, and economists.
MSRNE internships are 12-week paid internships in Cambridge,
Massachusetts. PhD interns are expected to be on-site for the duration
of their internship. Primary mentors for this year will be Nancy Baym,
Tarleton Gillespie, and Mary L. Gray, with additional guidance offered
by our lab postdocs and visiting scholars.
PhD interns at MSRNE are expected to devise and execute a research
project (see project requirements below), based on their application
project proposals, during their internships. The expected outcome of
an internship at MSRNE is a draft of a publishable scholarly paper for
an academic journal or conference of the intern’s choosing. Our goal
is to help the intern advance their own career; interns are strongly
encouraged to work towards a creative outcome that will help them on
the academic job market. Interns are also expected to collaborate on
projects or papers with full-time researchers and visitors, contribute
to the SMC blog, give short presentations, attend the weekly lab
colloquia, and contribute to the life of the community through weekly
lunches with fellow PhD interns and the broader lab community. While
this is not an applied program, MSRNE encourages interdisciplinary
collaboration with computer scientists, economists, and
mathematicians.
PEOPLE AT MSRNE SOCIAL MEDIA COLLECTIVE
The Social Media Collective is comprised of full-time researchers,
postdocs, visiting faculty, Ph.D. interns, and research
assistants. Current projects in New England include:
• How does the use of social media affect relationships between artists and audiences in creative industries, and what does that tell us about the future of work? (Nancy Baym)
• How are social media platforms, through algorithmic design and user policies, adopting the role of intermediaries for public discourse? (Tarleton Gillespie)
• What are the cultural, political, and economic implications of crowdsourcing as a new form of semi-automated, globally-distributed digital labor? (Mary L. Gray)
• How are predictive analytics used by law enforcement and what are the implications of new data-driven surveillance practices? (Sarah Brayne)
• What are the social and political consequences of popular computing folklore? (Kevin Driscoll)
• How are the technologies of money changing and what are the social implications of those changes? (Lana Swartz)
SMC PhD interns may have the opportunity to connect with our sister Social Media Collective members in New York City. Related projects in New York City include:
• What are the politics, ethics, and policy implications of big data science? (Kate Crawford, MSR-NYC)
• What are the social and cultural issues arising from data-centric technological development? (danah boyd, Data & Society Research Institute)
We are looking for applicants to focus their proposals on one of the following six areas:Audiences and the shifting landscapes of socially mediated entertainment
• Personal relationships and digital media
• Affective, immaterial, and other frameworks for understanding digital labor
• The social and political consequences of popular computing folklore
• The politics of big data, algorithms, and computational culture
• How emerging technologies shape countercultures, identities, and communities of difference
• Histories of computing and the internet that focus on the experiences of people from marginalized social, economic, racial, or geographic groups
Applicants should have advanced to candidacy in their PhD program by the time they start their internship (unfortunately, there are no opportunities for Master’s students or early PhD students at this time). Interns will benefit most from this opportunity if there are natural opportunities for collaboration with other researchers or visitors currently working at MSRNE. Applicants from historically marginalized communities, underrepresented in higher education, and students from universities outside of the United States are encouraged to apply.
For a complete list of all permanent researchers and current postdocs based at the New England lab see:
Which is: http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/labs/newengland/people/bios.aspx
Previous MSRNE interns in the Collective have included Amelia Abreu
(UWashington, information), Stacy Blasiola (University of Illinois,
Chicago, communication), Jed Brubaker (UC-Irvine, informatics), Aleena
Chia (Indiana U. communication and culture), Jade Davis (University of
North Carolina, communication), Brittany Fiore-Silfvast (University of
Washington, communication), Scott Golder (Cornell, sociology),
Germaine Halegoua (U. Wisconsin, communications), Tero Karppi
(University of Turku, media studies), Airi Lampinen (HIIT,
information), Jessa Lingel (Rutgers, library and information science),
Joshua McVeigh-Schultz (University of Southern California, interactive
media), Alice Marwick (NYU, media culture communication), J. Nathan
Matias (MIT Media Lab), Jolie Matthews (Stanford, learning sciences),
Tressie McMillan Cottom (Emory, sociology), Andrés Monroy-Hernandez
(MIT, CSAIL), Laura Noren (NYU, sociology), Nick Seaver (UC Irvine,
anthropology), Jaroslav Svelch (Charles University, media studies),
Katrin Tiidenberg (Tallinn University, Institute of International and
Social Studies), Shawn Walker (UWashington, information), Omar Wasow
(Harvard, African-American studies), Sarita Yardi (GeorgiaTech, HCI),
and Kathryn Zyskowski (University of Washington, anthropology).
For more information about the Social Media Collective, visit our blog: http://socialmediacollective.org/
APPLICATION PROCESS
To apply for a PhD internship with the social media collective:
• Fill out the online application form:
https://research.microsoft.com/apps/tools/jobs/intern.aspx On the
application website, indicate that your research area of interest is
“Anthropology, Communication, Media Studies, and Sociology” and that
your location preference is “New England, MA, U.S.” in the pull down
menus. Also enter the name of a mentor (Nancy Baym, Tarleton
Gillespie, or Mary Gray) whose work most directly relates to your own
in the “Microsoft Research Contact” field. IF YOU DO NOT MARK THESE
PREFERENCES WE WILL NOT RECEIVE YOUR APPLICATION. So, please, make
sure to follow these detailed instructions.
Your application will need to include:
• A brief description of your dissertation project.
• An academic article-length manuscript (~7,000 or more) that you have authored or co-authored (published or unpublished) that demonstrates your writing skills.
• A copy of your CV.
• The names and contact information for 3 references (one contact name must be your dissertation advisor).
• A pointer to your website or other online presence (if available; not required).
• A short description (no more than 2 pages, single spaced) of 1 or 2 projects that you propose to do while interning at MSRNE, independently and/or in collaboration with current SMC researchers. The project proposals can be related to but must be distinct from your dissertation research. Be specific and tell us: 1) What is the research question animating your proposed project? 2) What methods would you use to address your question? 3) How does your research question speak to the interests of the SMC? and 4) Who do you hope to reach (who are you engaging) with this proposed research? This is important – we really want to know what it is you want to work on with us and we need to know that it is not, simply, a continuation of your dissertation project.
On Letters of Reference:
After you submit your application, a request for letters will be sent
to your list of referees, on your behalf. NOTE: THE APPLICATION SYSTEM
WILL NOT REQUEST REFERENCE LETTERS UNTIL AFTER YOU HAVE SUBMITTED YOUR
APPLICATION! Please warn your letter writers in advance so that they
will be ready to submit them when they receive the prompt. The email
they receive will automatically tell them they have two weeks to
respond but that an individual call for applicants may have an earlier
deadline. Please ensure that they expect this email (tell them to
check their spam folders, too!) and are prepared to submit your letter
by our application deadline of Friday 29 January, 2016. Please make
sure to check back with your referees if you have any questions about
the status of your requested letters of recommendation. You can check
the progress on individual reference requests at any time by clicking
the status tab within your application page. Note that a complete
application must include three submitted letters of reference.
TIMELINE
Due to the volume of applications, late submissions (including
submissions with late letters of reference) will not be considered. We
will not be able to provide specific feedback on individual
applications. Finalists will be contacted the last week in February to
arrange a Skype interview before the internship slots available to us
are assigned (note: number of available slots changes
year-to-year). Please keep an eye on the socialmediacollective.org
blog as we announce the 2016 PhD Interns on the blog by the end of
March.
If you have any questions about the application process, please
contact Mary Gray at mLg@microsoft.com and include “SMC PhD
Internship” in the subject line.
PREVIOUS INTERN TESTIMONIALS
“The internship at Microsoft Research was all of the things I wanted
it to be – personally productive, intellectually rich, quiet enough to
focus, noisy enough to avoid complete hermit-like cave dwelling
behavior, and full of opportunities to begin ongoing professional
relationships with other scholars who I might not have run into
elsewhere.”
— Laura Noren, Sociology, New York University
“If I could design my own graduate school experience, it would feel a
lot like my summer at Microsoft Research. I had the chance to
undertake a project that I’d wanted to do for a long time, surrounded
by really supportive and engaging thinkers who could provide guidance
on things to read and concepts to consider, but who could also provoke
interesting questions on the ethics of ethnographic work or the
complexities of building an identity as a social sciences
researcher. Overall, it was a terrific experience for me as a
researcher as well as a thinker.”
— Jessica Lingel, Library and Information Science, Rutgers University
“Spending the summer as an intern at MSR was an extremely rewarding
learning experience. Having the opportunity to develop and work on
your own projects as well as collaborate and workshop ideas with
prestigious and extremely talented researchers was invaluable. It was
amazing how all of the members of the Social Media Collective came
together to create this motivating environment that was open,
supportive, and collaborative. Being able to observe how renowned
researchers streamline ideas, develop projects, conduct research, and
manage the writing process was a uniquely helpful experience – and not
only being able to observe and ask questions, but to contribute to
some of these stages was amazing and unexpected.”
— Germaine Halegoua, Communication Arts, University of Wisconsin-Madison
“Not only was I able to work with so many smart people, but the
thoughtfulness and care they took when they engaged with my research
can’t be stressed enough. The ability to truly listen to someone is so
important. You have these researchers doing multiple, fascinating
projects, but they still make time to help out interns in whatever way
they can. I always felt I had everyone’s attention when I spoke about
my project or other issues I had, and everyone was always willing to
discuss any questions I had, or even if I just wanted clarification on
a comment someone had made at an earlier point. Another favorite
aspect of mine was learning about other interns’ projects and
connecting with people outside my discipline.”
–Jolie Matthews, Education, Stanford University
Index of November 2015 | Index of year: 2015 | Full index