Jessica Smiles

Media and communication doctoral fellow with five years of research experience in women and workplace experiences. Expertise in an array of qualitative research methods, sociology theories and thematic data analysis. Experience as an assistant film director prior to research career.

• Visiting Scholar, Michigan State University, MI, USA, Developed thesis proposal, and attended lectures on Women in Media and Ethnography, 2018
• Summer school, University of Tampere, Finland, Attended summer school on Film Media Literacy, ICT for Development and Human Technology Interaction, 2017

• Presented FPM-C thesis work at the 23rd Session of the Youth Assembly - 'Empowering Youth For Global Development', New York, NY, USA, 2019
• Stanley, S.J. (2018) Women Behind the Lens: An Interpretative Study on the Prevailing Gender Biases in the Indian Film Industry, Michigan State University, MI, USA, 2018
• Stanley, S.J. (2017). Understanding the Impact of Social Media on Culture: A Netnography Study on the Jallikattu Protest, Mumbai, India, 2017

• Under Submission: Stanley, S.J., & Patra, S.K. (2020) Through Her Lens: Narrating the Workplace Experiences of Women in Cinematography, Work, Employment and Society, Sage Publication
• Under Submission: Stanley, S.J., & Patra, S.K. (2020) Women in Filmmaking: A Comprehensive Literature Review, Gender & Society, Sage Publication

• Participated in a Qualitative Research workshop at MICA, Ahmedabad, Ahmedabad, India
• Participated in Case Study Writing at MICA, Ahmedabad, Ahmedabad, India
• Participated in a Phenomenology workshop at MICA, Ahmedabad, Ahmedabad, India
• Field immersion at Chota Udaipur (a small village in Gujarat), Gujarat, India, January 2017

• Created a 'Gujri Market Visit' video for MICA's FPM-C programme website
• Designed the FPM-C programme newsletter for MICA
• Conducted a photoshoot of the FPM-C community for the programme brochure
• Organized a youth festival - GROOVY'19 at Ahmedabad, Ahmedabad, India

• Invited to present thesis work in context of the UN's 2020 SGD goals, specifically on SGD05 and SGD10, New York, NY, USA, 2019
• Invited to present a lecture on master's degree project- 'Movies for the Blind' at the Film Media Literacy summer school, University of Tampere, Finland, 2017
• Invited to present a seminar on 'Working in the Film Industry' during the freshman orientation program, MICA, Ahmedabad, 2017
• Won 2nd best Masters' project award for a Tamil short film titled - 'Vaanavil', 2015

• Dr Santosh K. Patra, Associate Professor, MICA, santosh.patra@micamail.in
• Dr Preeti Shroff, Dean, MICA, preeti.shroff@micamail.in
• Dr Swarnavel E. Pillai, Associate Professor, Michigan State University, eswaran@msu.edu

• Thesis work, MICA, Ahmedabad, India, 2016-2019, Conducted 4 years of interpretative research using multi-sited ethnographic method. Developed detailed Structured Literature Review (SLR) on women and work. Employed observations, field notes, interviews, group discussions as research methods for the study. Trained in NVivo software for data analysis. Completed qualitative research course: 'Focus Group Discussion' and 'In-depth Interviews' (2017); conducted 50 interviews for my research work.
• Research Assistant, MICA, Ahmedabad, India, Developed literature reviews on female leadership in corporates for a PGDM-C course on 'Business of Media & Entertainment Industry 1 - Print, Television, Radio & OOH'. Collaborated on a Harvard-approved photo novel article as an orientation element for freshman communication management grad students. Conducted netnography for a study on luxury lingerie brand consumers. Conducted semi-structured telephonic in-depth interviews involving open-ended questionnaires designed for the purpose of gathering information relating to experience of cyber violence. Transcribed, entered and analyzed data collected from assessment interviews.