Jeff Heinzl

  • Teaching Assistant Professor

Jeff Heinzl teaches courses in Public and Professional Writing, Composition, and Film and Media Studies. They also act as faculty advisor for two student groups (iGasm Digital Zine and BYO Bollywood) and currently supervise undergraduate research projects about the medical gaze in horror cinema and queerness in contemporary Bollywood cinema. In the recent past, they have acted as mentor for a Humanities Center Undergraduate Fellow, faculty client for students completing a Computer Science Capstone Project, and chair of the Film and Media Studies Undergraduate Symposium. They have regularly been teaching courses at the University of Pittsburgh in some capacity (graduate fellow, part-time faculty, visiting lecturer) since 2011.

Jeff received a B.A. from Furman University and completed a Ph.D. in Film and Media Studies at the University of Pittsburgh. Music video research, curation, and criticism is their passion and features prominently in courses they teach, as well as recent essays (“Close to the Edge: ‘This Is America’ and the Extended Take in Hip-Hop Music Video,” published in Boogie Down Predictions: Hip-Hop, Time, and Afrofuturism [Strange Attractor, 2022]) and campus screening events (Video Party & DJ Night: Celebrating Asian Music/Music Videos, Fall 2022). They are also a voracious music listener and an avid cinephile.

Recent courses taught:

ENGCMP 1112: Professional Uses of Social Media

ENGCMP 0520: Integrating Writing and Design

ENGFLM 1390: Contemporary Film

ENGCMP 0200: Seminar in Composition

ENGFLM 0400: Introduction to Film

ENGFLM 0401: Introduction to Visual Culture