Texas Tech University

TTU English Media Lab

What is the Media Lab?

In 2024, almost every kind of creative work done by students and faculty in English Departments is born digital. Writing, editing, design, multimodal and interactive content, podcasts, video for teaching, collaboration, or presentation of research — all of these require digital tools which are consistently evolving.

But ask yourself — when did you last actually learn a new digital tool, thoroughly? One you'd never used before? We often figure out how to ‘muddle through' a new site, app, or application, but most of us don't ever spend focused time learning to understand new tools. As a result, many people in English aren't expert with software or hardware.

Which can be an issue, when every kind of creative work is born digital.

The Media Lab is a space for students and scholars to learn to use to create/edit digital, collaborative, or media-enhanced projects. The English Media Lab aims to foster pedagogy and cultivate research infused with creative media technology, and to support the development of digital and new media literacies.

Geoff Sauer, in the Media Lab

What can I do in the Media Lab?

Students, faculty, and staff are welcome to visit the lab to use our equipment and software. You can even borrow items from our equipment library, including mics, cameras, and more. We also have staff members who have skills that can help you complete your project.

Mission Statement

Computers are language machines.
—Paul N. Edwards 

The English Media Lab will become a space for small- to mid-sized collaboration. It will offer open-access scheduled meeting spaces with high-end workstations, laptop stations, greenscreen, video, and audio equipment, prosumer cameras, and web and database servers to facilitate online publishing. It will be available to both on-campus and online members of the department, as well as offer consultations and brown-bag lunches to invite students and faculty to raise the sophistication of multimedia we produce for our teaching and research.