Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research
Overview
The Centre brings together over 30 research academics and research degree students working broadly in the field of media and cultural studies. The field covers the new online and interactive media along with traditional forms of broadcasting and print, as well as the popular culture, in which they are consumed, and the media and creative industries and cultural policy which organise and regulate their production.
Members of the Centre are involved in research and knowledge transfer projects, which means that they develop new insights into aspects of the media as well as use their expertise to assist public bodies, commercial companies and community organisations.
The Centre's work is funded by UK research councils like the AHRC, regional funders such as Advantage West Midlands and Screen West Midlands, and media companies like the BBC. The Centre collaborates with other research centres in the university through the Institute for Digital Experience and Applications, and with other universities in the UK and internationally.
The Centre provides research degree supervision for all areas of their work, and offers studentships in priority areas.
The Centre’s current work is organised into seven clusters, which represent the expertise and reputations of their academic staff:
- creative economies and cultural policy;
- global media (including media for development);
- journalism and PR;
- media and cultural learning and education;
- radio and popular music;
- social media;
- television, film and visual media.
Work in these clusters shares a number of key intellectual themes, resulting in distinctive research and publication:
- technological innovation;
- professional production practice;
- interactivity;
- social inclusion and action;
- culture;
- enterprise;
- history and archives;
- political economy;
- regionalism.
Researchers from Media and Cultural Studies will also contribute significantly to research within the IDEAs (Institute of Digital Experience and Applications). For more information contact: tim.wall@bcu.ac.uk or media-research@bcu.ac.uk