Biography
William Mc Carthy is an Assistant Professor in Media Production and Storytelling, and Tourism. His primary area of academic research explores the historical and contemporary intersection of media corporations and audiences/participants at places and non-places, and on online social platforms. His research also examines semiotics, branding, audience, experiential media, and leisure, and his work has been published in journals such as Quarterly Review of Film and Video, Social Semiotics, Semiotica, Tourism Geographies, and Journal of Leisure Research. His book, Contested Kingdom: Fan Attachment and Corporate Control at Disneyland, focuses on the effect of online social platforms of the last three decades on corporate-consumer interactions and was published by University Press of Mississippi in 2024. He is currently working on articles analyzing Disney's Arab audiences and a platform study of TikTok creator labor, crowdsourcing content creation, distribution, exhibition, and extension through the Ratatousical phenomenon. He has presented at numerous international conferences and led student trips to Greece, Japan, and the US. Committed to innovative, creative, and active learning, students in his multimedia class create immersive and thematic multisensory experience rooms. A member of the Themed Entertainment Association (TEA) and the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions (IAAPA).
Designation
Assistant Professor
Education
Terminal degree
PhD
Awarding Institution
University of Adelaide
Research/Creative Areas
online social platforms, place, media history, semiotics, leisure, theme parks
Teaching Areas
Storytelling, tourism, event management and promotion, media history, media and cultural criticism, interpersonal and intercultural communication, media law and ethics, research methods, and multimedia.