Dr. Mary E. Hopper held a number of affiliations at MIT from 1990 to 2000.
This page summarizes her various positions and activities.
Postdoctoral Associate, Comparative Media Studies (1998-2000)
Literature, School of Humanities, Arts, Social Sciences
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA

Dr. Hopper served as Managing Editor of Media in Transition, a joint project of the MIT Communications Forum, the Comparative Media Studies Program, and the Markle Foundation. This was the flagship project of the newly formed Comparative Media Studies Graduate Program. The project was designed to generate a corpus of appropriate curriculum materials for the new program. Coordinated work on the project with outside contractors, undergraduate research assistants and graduate students.
In addition, Mary Hopper performed web master duties that included site design, programming, editing and posting as well as systems administration for the MIT Communications Forum and Media-in-Transition web servers.

Finally, Dr. Hopper also co-organized the first Media-in-Transition International Conference.
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Mary Hopper’s Presentations @ MIT
Hopper, M. E. (2009, April). Cosma: Constructing a Kingdom of Knowledge [Presentation]. Media in Transition 6 Conference: Stone and Papyrus, Storage and Transmission, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
Hopper, M. E. (2007, April). The Knowledge Gates to SecondLife [Presentation]. Media in Transition 5 Conference: Creativity, Ownership and Collaboration in the Digital Age, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
Hopper, M. E. & Summer, R. B. (2001, February). Where’s the media? Models for creating and distributing teacher and student made digital media [Presentation]. Second Wiring the Classroom Conference. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
Hopper, M. E. (2000, January). Knowledge systems 101: From Alexandria to Hitchhiker’s Guide [Short Course]. Independent Activity Period (IAP), Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
Hopper, M. E. (1999, October). A Project About Projects: Watching Academic E-Media Projects Evolve [Presentation]. Media in Transition: An International Conference, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
Hopper, M. E. (1998, October). Hypertext in historical context: Vannevar Bush and Ted Nelson revisited [Presentation]. Media-in-Transition Project / Communications Forum, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
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Event Summaries
Mary Hopper wrote and posted these as Managing Editor of Media in Transition.
The Digital Library, April 20, 2000
Clifford Lynch, Deanna Marcum, Ann Wolpert, Marlene Manoff
“Real Artists Don’t Go to MIT”, February 24, 2000
John Maeda
Media in Transition Conference Plenary Sessions, October 8-10, 1999
- Childhood and Adolescence in a Mediated Culture, Moderated by Steven Lerman
Fairy Tales Across Media, Maria Tatar
Children, Toys, Media, Mitch Resnick
New Media and Children’s Identity, Sherry Turkle
Historical Views: Children, Technology, Play, Henry Jenkins - Democracy and New Media, Moderated by Hal Abelson
Growing a Democratic Culture, Phil Agre
Citizenship and the Internet, Elaine Kamarck
Global Perspectives, Adam Powell
Internet Democracy: American Prospects, Paul Starr - Digital Books, Digital Teaching, Moderated by Peter Donaldson
Empowering Authors in the Digital Age, Bob Stein
New Media Design, John Maeda
Wiring the Classroom Conference Sessions, May 1, 1999
- Online Inquiry: From Classroom Curriculum to
District Adoption and Everything In Between, Elliot Soloway - New Media in the Classroom Panel,
Henry Jenkins, Mitchel Resnick and Lynn Moore-Bensen - Questions and Answers/Open Discussion
- Language and Culture Demonstrations,
Shigeru Miyagawa, Mary Rudder, Maria D’Itria and Gilberte Furstenberg - De-briefing, Audience and Elliot Soloway
Stealth Bombers: Invisible Information?, April 15, 1999
Robert Zalisk
The Dark Side of Information Technology, March 15, 1999
Kenneth Keniston and Venkatesh Hariharan
Beyond the Ivory Tower: Academic Discourse in the Age of Popular Media, February 18, 1999
William Calvin, Stephen J. Gould, Alan Lightman and Lester Thurow
Covering Cyberspace, Moderated by John Driscoll, November 5, 1998
- Harmon’s Presentation, Amy Harmon
- Bray’s Presentation, Hiawatha Bray
- Audience Discussion
Digital Journalism, Moderated by James Carey, November 12, 1998
- Ashe’s Presentation, Reid Ashe
- Fixmer’s Presentation, Rob Fixmer
- Audience Discussion
Digital Cities:Urban Environments and Interactive Technologies, Sept 25, 1998
- Welcome and Introduction, William Mitchell
- Emerging Cultural Geographies of Cyberspace,
Malcolm McCullough, Thomas Campanella and Anne Beamish - Designing Interactive Virtual Worlds, Bruce Joffe and Linda Stone
- General Discussion – Morning Session, Moderated by Bernard Frieden
- Four Visions of the Digital City and Panel Discussion,
Theresa Duncan, Shigeru Miyagawa, Glorianna Davenport, Kurt Fendt and Ellen Crocker - General Discussion – Afternoon Session, Moderated by William Mitchell
Democracy and Digital Media Conference, May 8-9, 1998
- Bearings, David Thorburn and Lloyd Morrisett
- Changing Conceptions of Democracy, Lawrence Grossman and Michael Schudson
- On-line Tools and Democracy, Eric Loeb, David Winston and Ellen Hume
- Democracy and Cyberspace,Ira Magaziner, Benjamin Barber and Joshua Cohen
- The New Media and the Old Regime, Paul Starr and Yaron Ezrahi
- Media Access and Media Power, Doug Schuler and Nolan Bowie
- The Agenda-Setting Function of Media, Christopher Harper and Benjamin Barber
- Summary Views, Roger Hurwitz, Henry Jenkins and Michael Schudson
Race and Cyberspace, April 23, 1998
Glenn Kaino, Tara McPherson, Erika Muhammad and Brenda Cotto-Escalera
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Archival Intern/Processing Associate, Institute Archives and Special Collections (2000)
Mary Hopper completed an internship for credit arranged in cooperation with Simmons College’s Archival Science Program. She researched, processed and wrote a finding aid for 5 boxes (4.3 cu. ft.) of records from American Institute of Planners, 1925-1940 (MC 556). The collection contained records of the American City Planning Institute (ACPI, 1917- 1938) and its successor, the American Institute of Planners (AIP, 1939-1978). This organization joined with the American Society of Planning Officials (ASPO) in 1978 to form the American Planning Association (APA). The records include information about the central role the organization played during the early period in the planning profession, correspondence of key figures in the field, communications and works of Frederick Law Olmstead Jr. and the production history of the renowned film The City that was shown at the 1939 New York World’s Fair.
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MIT E-Knowledge System: A Systematic Approach to Improving Academic Enterprises at MIT and Beyond (1999)
Proposal submitted to iCampus, an MIT and Microsoft collaboration.
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Course Assistant, 21L015 Introduction to Media Studies (1998)
Assisted with instruction and grading for an introductory course that utilized Media-in-Transition content as an evolving curriculum. More…
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Visiting Scientist, Center for Educational Computing Initiatives (1996-1998)
Office of the Provost, Center for Advanced Educational Services
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
Compiled the final report about Networked Multimedia Information Services, the main project of a research consortium co-funded by NSF, IBM and Turner Learning. Collected information using ethnographic interviews, created documentation and produced print and electronic versions for distribution to all project constituencies. Participated in writing further proposals to funding agencies and corporations, including NIST, IBM Watson Research, Turner Learning and NSF. Also served as editor for the last edition of documentation for AthenaMuse 2, an experimental “java-like” authoring language originally intended to serve as multimedia extensions to X-Windows. Interviewed participants, analyzed and compared existing code and documentation to determine needs, and generated print and electronic versions of the documentation.
Related Publications (Reports)
Hopper, M. E. (Ed.) (1997). Networked Multimedia Information Services: Final report. Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Center for Educational Computing Initiatives.
Ali-Ahmad, et.al. [Hopper, M. E. (Ed.)] (1996). AthenaMuse 2.2 Documentation. Cambridge, MA: Center for Educational Computing Initiatives, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
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Doctoral Researcher, Project Athena (1990-1993)
Center for Educational Computing Initiatives
Office of the Provost and Academic Computing
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
Conducted a doctoral study under the direction of Steven Lerman. The study was designed to explore how issues from older educational computing projects became intertwined with new problems during courseware projects in distributed computing environments at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Brown University and Purdue University. Interviews with 19 participants and content from documents were used to construct a model describing relationships among educational goals, technical characteristics, and organizational structures
Hopper, M. E. (1993). Educational courseware production in advanced computing environments. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN.