In her practice-based research, Dana Little specializes in design faction — creating fictional digital media based on factual research into various areas, including artificial intelligence, human-computer interaction, and social media. Her doctoral thesis, “Factions,” was a satirical, speculative website curated by her digital twin persona, an AI mystic called Dr. Wu. The site uses design faction, an outgrowth of design fiction, to examine elements of the transformative tech that can create a double helix of the facts and fictions permeating the Internet. Little developed the social media genre of “factions” to interrogate the means in which humans and computers communicate in digital spaces.

Little received her Doctor of Fine Arts degree in creative writing from the University of Glasgow, her Master of Arts in writing from Johns Hopkins University, and her bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Georgia. She comes to UVA from the University of Maryland Eastern Shore where she was the Acting Director and Assistant Professor of their Digital Media Studies Program.

At UVA, Little will continue her ongoing podcast project, “The-Channel-Show.” She will carry forward the research used in in completing her doctoral monograph, Factions: acts of worldbuilding on social media platforms, in her upcoming publications, which include an article for The Writer's Chronicle ("I Am Assimilation"), and the Kendall Hunt publishing company’s workbook, The Fundamentals of Contemporary Speech.

As a member of the College’s Writing and Rhetoric Program, Little will teach first-year “Writing and Critical Inquiry” courses, as well as “Special Topics” writing seminars that touch on issues of global media while developing the critical skills students need for media literacy.