My First Week as an Intern

My last post was published the night before my first day in The Paley Center's curatorial department, and I'm happy to say that it's going really well so far; I love my internship! It combines my passion for history and media, and I would be more than willing to have a career in this field, or at least a similar one.

A question I get a lot from people is, "What exactly is The Paley Center?" Their website sums it up best:  

"The Paley Center for Media, with locations in New York and Los Angeles, leads the discussion about the cultural, creative, and social significance of television, radio, and emerging platforms for the professional community and media-interested public."

As a curatorial intern, much of my work entails assisting one of the curators with his projects, which involves conducting research on and viewing programs for content, and writing summaries and descriptions of programs for the Center's use. An awesome thing about The Paley Center is that it houses a collection of about 150,000 television and radio programs that cover almost 100 years of media history. About a quarter of it is digitized, so that's where I look first when I need to find clips.

The main project I've been working on the past week is research for PaleyFest, an event held annually in March in Los Angeles that consists of a series of panel discussions with the casts of some of the most popular shows on television. This year's lineup is amazing. So far, I've been helping with research and clip gathering for three of the panels. The clips will be compiled into short videos that will play as part of the events, so I'll get to do a bit of editing, too.

If you haven't seen or heard of PaleyFest, check out this clip from 2012's Modern Family panel. Not a Modern Family fan? Browse through The Paley Center's YouTube channel and see if your favorite show has participated. Odds are, it most likely has.