About the CDRP

The Center for Documentary Research and Practice is a multidisciplinary unit with The Media School at Indiana University that brings together scholars and artists from across Indiana University who are working on an array on nonfiction media projects. It also serves as a home to visiting artists and postdoctoral scholars who are working on projects with nonfiction media components.

The Center supports faculty and graduate students who make documentaries as part of their research and serves as a research hub for those doing historical, theoretical and critical research on nonfiction film and video. The Center provides direct assistance in the form of technological and creative support for projects, and it also serves as a forum for faculty and graduate students to present completed and in-process work.

Our Mission

To encourage the development of collaborative multidisciplinary documentary research and creative projects by faculty and graduate students.
To host documentary symposia and conferences out of which book and journal publications will develop.
To support the teaching of documentary and nonfiction media at both the graduate and undergraduate level.
To work with IU collections, including the Black Film Center/Archive, the Kinsey Institute, and the Indiana University Libraries Moving Image Archive, to facilitate research on and exhibition of their holdings.
To coordinate programs with the Indiana University Cinema on documentary and nonfiction-specific film and media.
To support initiatives that focus on documentaries with local or regional issues and concern

History

The Center for Documentary Research and Practice was founded in 2015. Its founding director, Joshua Malitsky (Cinema and Media Studies), and associate directors, Jeffrey Gould (History) and Christiana Ochoa (Law) recognized a need at the university to critically address non-fiction media as a research subject, and to promote professional standards and practices in the creation of documentary in all its forms. The CDRP absorbed the former Center for the Study of History and Memory, and became part of the newly formed IU Media School.

Staff & Advisory Board

Joshua Malitsky, jmalitsk@indiana.edu, Director CDRP, Cinema & Media Studies, the Media School

Jeffrey Gould, gouldj@indiana.edu, Associate Director CDRP, Department of History

Christiana Ochoa, cochoa@indiana.edu, Associate Director CDRP, Maurer School of Law

Barbara Truesdell, barbara@indiana.edu, Assistant Director CDRP

Jordi Cat, jcat@indiana.edu, Board Member, History & Philosophy of Science

Michael T. Conway, mtconway@indiana.edu, Board Member, Journalism

Danny James, dajames@indiana.edu, Board Member, Department of History

Mark David Janis, mdjanis@indiana.edu, Board Member, Maurer School of Law

Steven Krahnke, skrahnke@indiana.edu, Board Member, Telecommunications, Media Arts & Production

John Louis Lucaites, lucaites@indiana.edu, Board Member, Department of English

Lesa Hatley Major, lhmajor@indiana.edu, Board Member, Communication Science, Journalism

Marissa Moorman, moorman@indiana.edu, Board Member, Department of History

Ronald Osgood, osgoodr@indiana.edu, Board Member, Telecommunications, Hutton Honors College

James Calvin Paasche, jpaasche@indiana.edu, Board Member, The Media School

Sarah Drue Phillips, sadphill@indiana.edu, Board Member, Russian & East European Inst., Anthropology

Susanne K. Schwibs, sschwibs@indiana.edu, Board Member, Media Arts & Production

Jon William Vickers, jwvicker@indiana.edu, Board Member, IU Cinema

Gregory A. Waller, gwaller@indiana.edu, Board Member, Cinema & Media Studies