Written by Cole Jersek ’27, World Cinema major
Now enjoying a career as a creative producer in Atlanta, Addison Cox credits much of her success to the skills she gained through her experience as a double major in World Cinema and English at Clemson.
“With the exposure to film and creative projects across the globe, it really did open your eyes to different ways of doing things and different forms of storytelling,” she explained, reflecting on her time learning about film at Clemson. She recognized World Cinema as a unique form of film studies, where students are exposed to diverse cultures and filmmaking styles.
She added that, “being immersed in the cultural environment…It gave me that extra punch of courage and bravery to go out of the country and tackle a media project.”
Cox is currently directing and co-producing a documentary-style podcast called Common Ground. Her work primarily involves creating video content, where she works in a bilingual environment with people from various backgrounds, producing content about people from different cultures.
Cox believes that her experience with theoretical approaches to global film form helped her later in her career, as she found greater confidence in meeting people from different cultures and languages and in traveling to different countries. She noted that the World Cinema program gave her the confidence to take opportunities abroad, such as an internship with Verín International Film Festival in Spain and an internship as a photographer for Dusk Studios in South Africa.
Majoring in English proved valuable for Cox, as her professors encouraged her to develop her unique, personal writing style. She maintains that English is “a degree in critical thinking,” where she became a much stronger communicator as a result.
Screenwriting courses gave Cox a new perspective on the mechanics of live and staged production, whether in plays and films or in live events and podcasts. “Having that literacy and screenwriting was a big help,” she said.
“I do have a lot of appreciation for that degree, and I hope people can find the value in it, because it’s very useful and very versatile,” says Cox, reflecting on her English degree.
During her time at Clemson, Cox also completed an internship with the Pearce Center for Professional Communication, where she applied her communication and writing skills to work with clients and other external audiences while still a Clemson student.
“That did introduce me to the world because it was the first internship that I had that put me in front of clients and taught me how to communicate and set expectations.”
Cox continues, adding that, “It was kind of a crash course in professionalism and communication. And those were the two things that are vital to my job right now.”
The aforementioned writing skills come in handy for Cox in her career as a producer, where she regularly applies professional writing and communication: “We now have to pitch ideas to clients, or to film studios and production companies.”
She encourages students to take World Cinema and English classes, so they can learn the same useful skills that she did during her time at Clemson.
