● The Satellite Coast Research Project
About Us
Since its conception in Fall 2022, the Satellite Coast Research Project has been a collaboration amongst a team of undergraduate, graduate, and faculty researchers from the disciplines of Film and Media Studies, Chicana and Chicano Studies, Communications, Economics, and History of Public Policy. In addition to their work as scholars, this interdisciplinary group features filmmakers, artists, podcast producers, and activists. Collectively, each contributing members’ deep knowledge of satellite and telecommunications infrastructure, aerospace, technology, community digital media practices, and carceral media has informed the project.
● Who we are
Our Team
● Lisa Parks
Principal Investigator
Distinguished Professor of Film and Media Studies at UC Santa Barbara and a 2018 MacArthur Fellow. She studies media infrastructures — satellites, the internet, and AI systems — and their relation to cultural, geopolitical, and environmental conditions. She directs the GMTaC Lab and is currently writing Skyward, a history of SpaceX and Starlink.
● Althea Wasow
Co-Principal Investigator
Assistant Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies in Film and Media Studies at UC Santa Barbara. Her research and creative practice connect the study of film, media, and technology with inquiry into the police power and the prison. She is co-principal investigator of The Satellite Coast research project.
● Carlos Jimenez Jr.
Co-Principal Investigator
Associate Professor at the University of Denver. He researches the intersection of media and labor within immigrant communities. Author of the forthcoming book Strawberries and Technology, Jimenez is a co-PI on the 2024 NSF-funded study documenting farmworker experiences with rocket launches in Lompoc, CA.
● Sophia Abbey
Graduate Student Researcher
Ph.D. student and Regents Fellow in the Film and Media Studies department at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She is an artist and researcher whose research interests are environmental media, cultural geographies, and military media infrastructures.
● Tara Plath
Graduate Student Researcher
PhD candidate in the Film and Media Studies Department at UC Santa Barbara.
She is a practice-based researcher whose research interests include border media, activist media, and media infrastructure. She is also an organizer with grassroots community defense and humanitarian organizations in Santa Barbara, CA and Ajo, Arizona.
● Ricardo Mata Vazquez
Graduate Student Researcher
First-generation Chicano scholar from Tataviam Lands (San Fernando Valley). In 2018, he completed his bachelor's with a double major in Chicano Studies and Anthropology. Ricardo is currently enrolled in the MA/PhD program in Chicana and Chicano Studies researching the relationship between artificial intelligence and Chicana\o\x communities.
● Dariel U. González García
Graduate Student Researcher
Associate Professor at the University of Denver. He researches the intersection of media and labor within immigrant communities. Author of the forthcoming book Strawberries and Technology, Jimenez is a co-PI on the 2024 NSF-funded study documenting farmworker experiences with rocket launches in Lompoc, CA.
● Ranna Zahabi’s
Undergraduate Student Assistant
Graduate student pursuing an M.A. in International Studies at the Josef Korbel School of Global and Public Affairs at the University of Denver. He holds a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez Campus.
● Mariana del Carpio Salgado
Undergraduate Student Assistant
Distinguished Professor of Film and Media Studies at UC Santa Barbara and a 2018 MacArthur Fellow. She studies media infrastructures — satellites, the internet, and AI systems — and their relation to cultural, geopolitical, and environmental conditions. She directs the GMTaC Lab and is currently writing Skyward, a history of SpaceX and Starlink.
● Garret Fuller
Undergraduate Student Assistant
Assistant Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies in Film and Media Studies at UC Santa Barbara. Her research and creative practice connect the study of film, media, and technology with inquiry into the police power and the prison. She is co-principal investigator of The Satellite Coast research project.
● Tijana Petrović
Filmmaker
Filmmaker and artist from the former Yugoslavia. Her moving image practice examines the layered relationships between history, place and the natural world. Working in essayistic and analog modes, she traces connections between landscapes, materials and technologies that shape them. She is a Lecturer in Film and Media at UC Berkeley.