About
I am a Lecturer in Film Studies who has a particular love for Television Studies; my research expertise and teaching experience bridges across both disciplines. In addition to teaching on the BA in Film, supervising PhD students and conducting research, I also work as Senior Tutor in Film and Research Integrity Champion of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, as well as being Deputy Chair of the Faculty Research Ethics Committee.
Research
Research groups
Research interests
- Television studies
- Science, medicine and policing on television
- Medical humanities
- Feminist film history
- Early film titling
Current research
I have a particular research expertise in televisual discourses on science, medicine, and policing. My PhD thesis examined the portrayal of forensic science and biomedicine in crime dramas of the early 2000s, with a focus on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, and I have a continued research interest in crime television more broadly (both crime dramas and true crime formats). I have also published on different forms of medical reality shows, including US, UK and Scandinavian programmes depicting midwifery and childbirth. I’m currently working on a new project on the representation of viral disease and contagion across the history of UK television, which also seeks to explore the television medium’s more general ability to help us imagine biological processes at different levels of scale.
My monograph, Television and the Genetic Imaginary (Palgrave, 2019), examines the complex ways in which television articulates ideas about DNA in the early 21st century, across a wide range of US and UK programmes. From science documentaries, science fiction serials and crime procedurals, to family history programmes, sitcoms and reality shows, I consider television's distinct aesthetic and narrative forms, as well as its specific cultural roles. Identifying TV as a key site for the genetic imaginary, this book addresses the key themes of complexity and kinship, which function as nodes around which older essentialist notions about the human genome clash with newly emergent post-genomic sensibilities.
In addition, I also have a long-running research interest in feminist film history. In the past I have contributed to the Women Film Pioneers Project in several different roles, for example, as a co-editor of the Overview Essays Section of the project's online publication. I have particular interests in early female film workers and film title production before the 1950s. I am the leading expert on the work and career of Alva Lundin: Sweden’s most prolific film title designer.
Publications
Teaching
I am the module lead of FILM2027 Television Studies: Key Debates, FILM2028 Crime TV: Technologies of Detection and FILM1001 Introduction to Film 1: Style and Analysis. I supervise dissertation projects at BA and MA level, as well as supevising PhD students.
Biography
I am originally from Sweden and graduated with a PhD in cinema studies from Stockholm University, but I have been studying and working in the UK on and off since 2008. I have been a visiting doctoral student at King’s College London and Queen Mary, University of London, and a postdoctoral researcher at University of Warwick. Before I started working at University of Southampton in 2015, I have also held a position as Assistant Professor in film and television studies at University of Gothenburg and conducted postdoctoral research at Columbia University as part of the Women Film Pioneers Project.