John Bresland

John Bresland works in radio, video, and print. Currently a teacher of writing and a student of the UI Nonfiction Writing Program, he has built homes, sold used cars, and translated French video games into English for a living. Several of John Bresland's radio essays have aired on public radio, and his video essay "Les Cruel Shoes" (2005) is a current feature of Blackbird, an online journal of literature and the arts. His print essay "The Horns You Get" was published in North American Review (2002), and his commentary appears regularly in Midwestern editorial pages.

THE HORNS YOU GET
Running time: 30 minutes. Audio format: MP3
A radio documentary about one family's love... and hate.

THE SEINFELD ANALOG
Running time: 10 minutes. Video format: QuickTime movie (QuickTime 7 required)
A genre-bending glimpse of the 1994 massacre in Rwanda, The Seinfeld Analog reveals a surprising connection between the most efficient campaign of genocide in modern history and the rise to iconic status of Seinfeld , the sitcom that epitomized the self-obsessed ironic culture of 1990's America. Equal parts collage, personal essay, documentary.

NOTES FROM THE DRY CAMPUS
Running times vary (4-15 minutes); QuickTime 7 required
A selection of video essays by a group of Iowa nonfiction writing students who set out to reveal the unseen (or reinterpret the seen) using not only text, but images and sound. In ways both funny and distressing they examine the drinking culture that surrounds them.