Personal Statement.

From The Star And Shadow Cinema Wiki

I am a professional film programmer, with 6 years experience in programming independent cinema spaces in Newcastle, and 3 years developing new audiences for non-mainstream film in rural Northumberland. During my career development, I have frequently felt the urge to back it up with post-graduate research. Finishing my first degree I felt overwhelmed by the formal processes of analysis demanded of students studying "the cultural canon." I wanted to strengthen my skills of judgement on a personal level. The last 7 years have been a period of nourishing my 'experiential' side, while maintaining the academic skills of research gained during my formal studies. I now feel better prepared to return to university, with a strong desire to eventually undertake doctoral work.

Throughout my MA in Art History, I developed critical tools that I feel have relevance to the World Cinemas MA, such as knowledge of (Post)-Structuralism, Semiotics, Deconstruction and an understanding of the influence of Feminism, Marxism and psychoanalysis on critical theories. I hope to develop this knowledge base looking towards further post-graduate research.

My work in independent cinema has concerned itself with everything films are about, which draws me particularly towards the World Cinemas MA at Leeds: unveiling the diversity of interests, methods, conditions and contexts in which people live/ relate/ create, and evaluating them in a post-modern, polycentric approach. In my work and life I see this approach as dialectically opposed to what I perceive as the general homogenization and commodification of culture, whereby economics is often the driving factor in what audiences are exposed to (not only film). This can be reflected in the conventional approach to film studies which places Hollywood at the centre and everything else as 'other'.

Part of my professional work has been developing film clubs, young-peoples' film making projects and festivals in conjunction with specific communities. For instance, the Cinema of the World Club involves asylum seekers and refugees; the South Asian Cinema programme engages the diverse Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities. Films from Senegal, Mali, Iran, Eritrea, Tamil-speaking India, Bollywood are a regular part of our programme at the Star and Shadow Cinema. I am interested in developing a broader knowledge of World Cinema to help with programming this area, and also to gain a deeper understanding of the cultural conditions in which these cinematic forms are made. I hope to learn a post-colonialist approach to viewing rather than the default Eurocentric one.

I intend to research how the strategies of satirical parody and the Situationist theory of Detournement, could be used by film-makers in a post-colonialist context, which makes the course at Leeds - only 3 years old and the first of its kind in the UK - ideal for my studies. Professor Nagib, course designer, specializes in areas I would be keen to research - African Francophone cinema and the 1960s New Waves. Her theory of a poly-centric approach to cinema gives a clarity to the term ‘world cinema’ which is lacking in all other UK courses I have researched.