About

Since the turn of the millennium, Screen studies has been searching for new paradigms to address rapid transformations of the moving image caused by the shift from analogue to digital formats. At the same time, there has been a growing recognition among film and screen studies scholars that it is necessary to approach the digital present and its futures through a historical understanding of earlier theoretical, cultural and technological developments. The Screen Histories & Futures Research Program responds to this conjuncture. The program is a concerted and integrated unit committed to the collaborative study of the history, theory, practice, criticism and future developments of the moving (audio-visual) image as it evolved over the long durée of the twentieth century and as it progresses through the digital era of the twenty-first century. The program promotes and facilitates a host of approaches to moving image, mobilising both traditional and innovative perspectives in film and screen scholarship as they inform the practice and criticism of all screen-based audiovisual culture.

The Screen Histories & Futures Research Program draws on existing School of Media, Film and Journalism (MFJ) research strengths to expand into newer areas of enquiry in and through collaborations with adjacent fields of study. These fields include cultural studies, media archaeology, history of science, research on AI, electronic games, database artworks, social media, VR, interactive and communal creativity in sound and image, streaming technologies, mobile/locative artwork, network theory and practice, and eye-tracking technologies. In other words, the program encompasses all the digital audio-visual creativity that has grown out of film and television and that now exists alongside them. The program has a particular focus on the under-researched and marginalised aspects of moving image histories and cultures, including research on Indigenous screen media, environmental media studies, the utilitarian use of film, diasporic and multicultural cinema and the history of Australian film criticism.

This work is led by research personnel in MFJ who have developed nationally and internationally recognised expertise in a broad range of disciplinary areas, including European, American, Asian, and Australian film and television histories and cultures, realist and documentary film theory, feminist film studies, Indigenous filmmaking, experimental and avant-garde film theories, film and television seriality, cinema institutions and the archive, screen adaptation and translation, and interdisciplinary research on cinema, subjectivity and AI.

Through various initiatives, including public forums, symposia and conferences, the Screen Histories & Futures Research Program seeks to advance its research, forging links with such areas as Monash Art, Design and Architecture (MADA), Information Technologies, SensiLab and Education Faculties at Monash, external research centres (for example, ACMI), universities, film-makers and audio-visual industries nationally. At the same time, it is distinctly international in its outlook, building upon previous and existing contacts at such institutions as University of California San Diego, King’s College London, Warwick University and Free University Berlin, to continue and extend its international collaborations and reputation.