The Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology is home to artists, scientists, designers, scholars, and researchers who collaborate to create an exciting and dynamic academic program. Faculty, students, and researchers explore innovative topics through the study of emerging media, artistic production and experimentation with recent technologies, and critical engagement with pressing social issues.

Arts, Technology, and Emerging Communication at UT Dallas

Students who complete a BA in Arts, Technology, and Emerging Communication receive a thorough grounding in the mutually productive interaction of technology with the arts, with specific emphasis on the interplay of visual art, music, and narrative with the new modes of expression and communication that have emerged from the convergence of computing and media technologies.

The Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology provides multiple creative labs that feature leading-edge technologies and high-performance workstations. Students also have access to a games and media library that holds over 1,000 digital and analog games spanning multiple game platforms including both classics and new releases.

All undergraduate students start their studies under the design and production umbrella, which provides a solid foundation in applied design while giving them the flexibility to pursue coursework in any of the school’s areas of study. Students interested in pursuing advanced work in a particular area may apply for one of the following specialized pathways/concentrations:
• Critical Media Studies
• Design and Creative Practice

Career Opportunities

Students earning an Arts, Technology, and Emerging Communication degree can enter a wide range of fields across many industries. Graduates gravitate to careers in the fields like advertising, journalism, media, communication, technology, education, administration, marketing, broadcasting, public relations, law, social advocacy, digital content management, and user experience and interaction.

Marketable Skills

Review the marketable skills for each pathway/concentration:

• Bachelor of Arts in Arts, Technology, and Emerging Communication with Critical Media Studies Concentration
• Bachelor of Arts in Arts, Technology, and Emerging Communication with Emerging Media Arts Concentration

Labs and Studios

The ArtSciLab is an interdisciplinary research lab that carries out national and international investigations on the hybridization of art and science, data visualization and experimental publishing. ArtSciLab exists to support innovation that involves art, scientific research, technology development and education. Research includes collaboration between artists and scientists who seek to investigate problems of cultural timeliness and societal urgency.

The Emerging Gizmology Lab research design, media and culture by studying the exponential proliferation of gizmos (products being built on new technologies). Gizmos are the leading-edge result of the technological imagination at work. The lab tracks, deconstructs and reconstructs gizmos to understand the culture that built them as well as the potential for repurposing them as materials for ATEC research and creative projects.

The Fashioning Circuits Lab is a public humanities project that combines scholarship, university coursework and community engagement. The goal of the project is to explore the ways in which fashion and emerging media intersect and to work with community partners to introduce beginners to making and coding through the arts and humanities. In Fashioning Circuits, “fashion” functions not just as a noun to describe cultural trends, but also as a verb, “to fashion,” to indicate the experiential and problem-based learning strategies of the project and the potential for a diverse range of students to fashion themselves as members of the publics and counter publics of the future.

The Future Immersive Virtual Environments (FIVE) Lab performs research on state-of-the-art virtual reality (VR) systems and 3D user interfaces (3DUIs). FIVE Lab research using immersive VR technologies to promote learning and to provide training solutions that are better than real-world exercises. Researchers investigate the effects of system fidelity through user studies focused on performance, experience, learning and training.

The Narrative Systems Research Lab pursues models of understanding, structural research and the creation of new work in the fields of narrative and interactive media. Research includes making connections between narrative, new media, digital games, the fine arts, engineering, literature and the humanities through independent research, collaborative projects, and serious game development.

The Public Interactives Research Lab investigates how emerging technologies will transform urban media landscapes. Researchers create new technologies that draw on developments in ubiquitous computing, public art and environmental design to create new interactive public experiences.

The Social Practice and Community Engagement Media Lab (SP&CE Media Lab), fosters knowledge exchange among diverse communities, creates visibility for existing projects that focus on social awareness and community engagement, and facilitates the development of new community-focused projects and collaborations within the Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology and with other disciplines at UT Dallas.

About the Bass School of Arts

The Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology  addresses the needs of a new generation of artists, performers and scholars. Bass students learn skills to craft exceptional work in an environment that encourages fluid movement between traditional disciplines and creative expression. Faculty integrate advanced technology with established artistic and research methods, equipping students to tackle pressing challenges. In exciting forms of collaborative and experimental learning at the intersections of arts, humanities, and emerging technologies, Bass students imagine, invent and create, while preparing to succeed and make a difference in a globally connected world.

Minors Offered

If your academic focus leads you elsewhere at UT Dallas, but you would still like to pursue studies in the Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology, the following minors are available:

• African American and African Diaspora Studies
• Art History
• Arts Management and Leadership
• Asian Studies
• Audio Production
• Communication Studies
• Creative Writing
• Dance
• Ethnic Studies
• Film Studies
• History
• Holocaust, Genocide and Human Rights
• Latin American Studies
• Literature
• Medicine, Arts, Science, and Humanities (MASH)
• Music
• Performing Arts
• Philosophy
• Religious Studies
• Spanish
• Theatre
• Visual Arts

Honors Thesis and Fast Track

The Harry W. Bass Jr. School of Arts, Humanities, and Technology honors thesis offers the opportunity for advanced creative and scholarly work and recognition. To earn honors, students must graduate with:

• A minimum of 3.0 graded, upper-division semester credit hours at UT Dallas.
• A GPA of 3.67 in a student’s major.
• The completion of an honors thesis or project evaluated by two faculty members with a grade of at least B+.
• *Exceptionally well-qualified undergraduates who meet the requirements for admission to graduate school should consider the Fast Track program, which allows them to begin work on a master’s degree before graduation. Qualified seniors may take up to 12 credit hours of approved graduate courses during their senior year, which will apply to their undergraduate degree plans. For more information regarding Fast Track, contact an undergraduate academic advisor.

Additional Facts

• Several faculty members have been awarded prestigious fellowships, including those from the National Humanities Center, Guggenheim, Fulbright, Alexander S. Onassis and Woodrow Wilson foundations. Others are recipients of the Füst Literary Award, as well as awards from the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
• Every year, many of our Animation and Games faculty work on blockbuster projects and with AAA game studios, producing content that is seen or played by millions worldwide.
• The school’s centers further enhance students’ educational experience by bringing the concept of globalism to campus, by bringing world events into focus through research and by encouraging innovation and creativity.
• The National Science Foundation recently awarded a major grant to the school’s Center for Values in Medicine, Science and Technology to study the mentoring and education that occurs in science laboratories.