Education

  • Ph.D. (2014) Film and Television, University of California, Los Angeles  
  • M.A. (2007) Film and Television, University of California, Los Angeles
  • B.A. (2004) Communication Arts – Radio, Television, Film, University of Wisconsin, Madison 

Bio and Affiliation 

Jason Gendler holds a Ph.D. in Film and Television from UCLA’s Department of Film, Television and Digital Media. His areas of expertise include narrative and narration in film and television, style and aesthetics, Hong Kong cinema, documentary, Hollywood film history, and humanistic applications of cognitive psychology. 

He has published in Puzzling Stories: The Aesthetic Appeal of Cognitive Challenge in Literature and Film (New York: Berghahn, 2022), Projections: The Journal for Movies and Mind, the AFI reader Color and the Moving Image (New York: Routledge, 2013), and Nebula. He is currently revising for publication various articles and manuscripts, including an article in Imagining the Impossible: International Journal for the Fantastic in Contemporary Media, and a chapter in the forthcoming edited collection The Scene of Action, to be published by the University of Exeter Press. His interests include narration in film and television, style and aesthetics, seriality, and cognitive psychology, among other topics. His editorial experience includes serving as a peer reviewer for Projections and various other edited collections and manuscripts.

He has also taught film and television courses at UCLA, Chapman University, and California State University, Long Beach.

He also writes popular film and TV criticism on his blog, Jason Watches Television.

 

Jason Gendler's Picture

Awards and Honors 

  • Fellow of the Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image
  • British Society of Aesthetics Early-Career Award, 2015 
  • UCLA
    • Dissertation Year Fellowship, 2013-2014
    • Kemp R. Niver Scholarship, 2013
    • Harold Leonard Fund, 2007-2010
    • Chancellor’s Prize Fellowship, 2007-2009
    • Graduate Summer Research Mentorship, 2008
  • University of Wisconsin, Madison
    • Dean’s List, four semesters 2000-2004
    • Christopher Neal Heinlein Scholarship, 2003

Publications:  

  • “Serialized Television and the Action Scene: Game of Thrones.” In The Scene of Action (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, forthcoming)
  • “Creative Use of Superpowers in My Hero Academia.” Imagining the Impossible (forthcoming).
  • “Better Call Saul and the Cognitive Effects of Prequel Television Series.” Projections Special Issue on Serial Television. Volume 19, No. 2. (Winter 2025) 
  • “‘I Can’ Keep Track of Any of It Anymore’: Cognitive Challenge and Other Aesthetic Appeals in Community.” Solicited for Puzzling Stories: The Aesthetic Appeal of Cognitive Challenge in Literature and Film (New York: Berghahn, 2022)
  • “The Rich Inferential World of Mad Men: Serialized Television and Character Interiority.” Projections. Volume 10, No. 1 (Summer/Winter 2016)
  • “Where Does the Beginning End? Cognition, Form, and Classical Narrative Beginnings.” Projections. Volume 6, No. 2. (Winter, 2012)
  • “Are My Eyes Really Brown? The Aesthetics of Colorization in Casablanca.” Solicited for the Routledge AFI Reader Color and the Moving Image (New York: Routledge, 2013)
  • “Primer: The Perils and Paradoxes of Restricted Time Travel Narration.” Nebula Volume 3, No. 4, December 2006/January 2007.