Melanie Selfe

Dr Melanie Selfe, BA Hons (Aberystwyth), MA (Nottingham), PhD (UEA) 
Research Fellow

Melanie Selfe graduated in Film and Television Studies in 2002 (University of Wales, Aberystwyth), obtaining AHRC funding to pursue postgraduate study. She completed a Film Studies MA at the University of Nottingham in 2003, transferring to UEA to undertake a PhD. In 2006 she spent seven months working as RA on a study exploring audience responses to films containing scenes of sexual violence. This was led by Prof. Martin Barker and funded by the BBFC. She joined the Centre in September 2007.

Melanie’s research has explored the cultivation and development of ‘quality’ film culture, and the British reception of international cinema. She has approached these topics through historical studies and through qualitative research with contemporary audiences, exploring the evolving relationships between cultural organisations, professional criticism, pedagogy, and interpretative practice. Particular areas of interest include the differences between metropolitan and regional versions of highbrow culture; mapping the impact of central arts policy in diverse locations; and investigating the relationship between amateur and professional status in the production, consumption and criticism of the arts.

In summer 2009 Melanie was awarded £1630 from the Carnegie Trust to facilitate an archival study of ‘the mediated performance of film criticism in post-war Britain'.

Recent Publications

Articles

2008, 'Inflected Accounts and Irreversible Journeys', Participations, 5:1.

2007: 'Doing the work of the NFT in Nottingham– or How to Use the BFI to beat the Communist Threat in Your Local Film Society, Journal of British Cinema and Television, 4:1, 80-101

Book Chapters

2010 (forthcoming) 'The View From Outside London: The Centre and the Regions 1960-1980', in Geoffrey Nowell-Smith and Christophe Dupin (eds) The British Film Institute: The Government and Film Culture 1933-2007, Manchester: Manchester University Press.

2009 (forthcoming) ‘Incredibly French’?:Nation as an Interpretative Context for Extreme Cinema' in Lucy Mazdon and Catherine Wheatley (eds), Je t'aime... moi non plus: Franco-British Cinematic Relations, Oxford & New York: Berghann.

2009, 'Putting Film on Nottingham’s Cultural Map: Film Production and The Festival of Britain', in Ian Craven (ed.) Amateur Matters, Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars.

Reports

2007: (contributor with Martin Barker, Ernest Mathijs, Jamie Sexton, Kate Egan and Russ Hunter): Report to the British Board of Film Classification upon completion of the research project: 'Audiences and Receptions of Sexual Violence in Contemporary Cinema'.

Conference presentations since September 2007

‘Marketing, Musicals and the Ultimate Salesman: Conquering the Crash with branded and flexible product placement’ – presented at the 50th Screen Conference, University of Glasgow, July 2009.

‘A Regional National Film Theatre in Glasgow: making a cultural statement on two national stages’ – European Network for Cinema and Media Studies: Locating Media,  University of Lund, June 2009.

‘The Shifting Cultural Politics of Subsidised Exhibition’ – presented at MeCCSA 2009, University of Bradford, January 2009.

‘“Incredibly French”: Nation as an interpretative context for extreme cinema’ – presented at Anglo/French Cinematic Relations, Southampton, September 2007.