Research Leadership Team
The Institute Director works closely with the Research Leadership Team in Media, Arts and Humanities, who oversee the strategic and operational direction of research in the School.
Professor Mat Dimmock
Associate Dean (Research)
As Associate Dean for Research Mat leads the research portfolio in the School of Media, Arts, and Humanities. He works closely with the Research Manager, the Professional Services Team, and the Directors of Research and Knowledge Exchange to plan and implement the School's research strategy.
His research is focused on early modern English conceptions of and interactions with the non-Christian world and he has published widely in this area, including the recent monograph Elizabethan Globalism (Yale/Paul Mellon, 2019) and the prize-winning article 'Tudor Turks' (English Literary Renaissance, 2020). Forthcoming work includes the expanded second edition of the anthology Amazons, Savages, and Machiavels, co-edited with Andrew Hadfield (June 2022), and Writing Tudor Exploration: Richard Eden and West Africa (Cambridge Elements, July 2022). He is currently working on a book-length study of the polar explorer and all-round fascinating individual Captain John Davis. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.
Email: m.dimmock@sussex.ac.uk
Professor Lucy Robinson
Associate Dean (Doctoral Studies)
As Associate Dean of Doctoral Studies, Lucy develops and oversees strategic and operational plans for doctoral researchers in the School. She is part of the School’s Leadership Team and works closely with the Head of School, the other Associate Deans and the Professional Services Research Team. She chairs the School’s Research Degree Committee and represents the School at the University’s Doctoral Studies Board.
Lucy is Professor of Collaborative History and works in a number of collaborative heritage, cultural and activist projects including Vivienne Westwood’s Intellectuals Unite. She works on the contemporary history of popular culture, politics and identity. She is currently lead editor of the journal Contemporary British History, and one of the original organisers of the Subcultures Network. She works closely with Chris Warne with whom she also publishes pedagogical research. Her new book Now that’s what I call a history of the 80s: Pop Culture and Politics in the Decade That Shaped Modern Britain with be published by MUP this summer.
Medeni Fordham
Senior Research Manager
Medeni is the Senior Research Manager for the School of Media, Arts and Humanities. She works closely with the Associate Dean for Research, the Associate Dean for Doctoral Studies, the Directors of Research and Knowledge Exchange and the Research Professional Services team to develop, support and improve the research experience and environment for researchers and doctoral researchers in the new School.
Medeni works collaboratively on the delivery of the REF, KEF and with teams within the Research Portfolio to manage research grant capture, knowledge exchange and impact development, research events and doctoral research. She develops projects and structures, such as the Early Career Researcher network and Advisory Board, that enable researchers to flourish. She has specific expertise in impact development and working with policymakers.
As an experienced HEI research manager working across science, arts and social science research areas, as well as working in arts management, Medeni can help from idea development, building and fostering relationships with external partners (arts, media, creative, cultural sector and heritage, NGOs and parliament and policy) to the strategic development and delivery of systems, events and external engagement activities in HEI environments.
Please contact Medeni if you would like to explore connections with the School.
Email: M.Fordham@sussex.ac.uk
Professor Flora Dennis
Director of Research and Knowledge Exchange (Knowledge Exchange & Impact)
Flora is responsible for guiding and supporting research to enhance its impact and especially to develop collaborations with external partners. This includes connecting and co-curating with those working in the creative industries, local businesses and communities, education, government, heritage and conservation, and health and well-being. She works closely with Margaretta Jolly and with the Professional Services Research and Communications teams, as well as with colleagues in the Sussex Festival of Ideas, the Attenborough Centre for Creative Arts, Doctoral events, Research Centres and with subject group heads in History, English Literature and Language, Art History, and Philosophy.
Her research focuses on the visual and material culture of music and sound in Italy between the mid-fifteenth and the early seventeenth centuries, tracing the changing cultural importance of music in everyday life and considering how sound influenced the design, use and experience of domestic space. She co-curated the V&A exhibition At Home in Renaissance Italy (2006) and has held fellowships from the AHRC and at the Harvard University Centre for Renaissance Studies, Villa I Tatti (Florence), the Italian Academy, Columbia University (New York) and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (Berlin).
Email: F.Dennis@sussex.ac.uk
Professor Lizzie Thynne
Director of Research and Knowledge Exchange (Grant Development)
Lizzie is responsible for the development of external grant bids. She advises faculty on funding for research projects, developing research partnerships outside of HE and oversees the process of internal peer review of bids from the School. She facilitates research relationships between academics within the School and beyond and works closely with Sarah Frisby-Osman, the School's Research Development Officer, the Professional Services Research Team in the School as well as the other Directors of Research and Knowledge Exchange.
Lizzie ’s practice-based research has resulted in three documentary features. Her writing includes articles on her own and others’ related work in film and photography in journals (Papers of Surrealism, JMP Screenworks, Journal of British Cinema and Television) as well as on women’s employment in television (Feminist Review). She is PI on Jill Craigie: Film Pioneer a four-year AHRC funded project exploring what the career of this under-explored director, one of the first British women to direct documentaries, suggests about how women’s contribution to film histories can be recognized and understood. The project encompasses the biopic, Independent Miss Craigie (2021) which builds on Lizzie’s previous work in film auto/biography such as Playing a Part: The Story of Claude Cahun (AHRC-funded) and On the Border (2013). At Sussex, she teaches documentary theory and practice, instituted the PhD programme in Creative and Critical Practice and established the BA Media Production. Her work has been shown on television and in festivals and galleries internationally including the Jeu de Paume, La Virreina Centre de L’Imatge and MOCA, Sydney.
Email: L.Thynne@sussex.ac.uk
Professor Margaretta Jolly
Director of Research and Knowledge Exchange (Knowledge Exchange & Impact)
Margaretta is responsible for guiding and supporting research to enhance its impact and especially to develop collaborations with external partners. This includes connecting and co-curating with those working in the creative industries, local businesses and communities, education, government, heritage and conservation, and health and well-being. She works closely with Flora Dennis and with the Professional Services Research and Communications teams, as well as with colleagues in the Sussex Festival of Ideas, the Attenborough Centre for Creative Arts, Doctoral events, Research Centres and with subject group heads in Media + and Practice, Film, Music, Drama, and Language Studies.
Margaretta is Professor in Cultural Studies with a specialism in Life Writing, Oral History and Audio/Visual Life Story-telling and she directs the Centre for Life History and Life Writing Research. She is particularly interested in the application of these methods in women's history and gender studies, directing the Sisterhood and After: Women's Liberation Oral History Project with the British Library (2010-2014). Her books include The Encyclopedia of Life Writing (Routledge, 2001), In Love and Struggle: Letters in Contemporary Feminism (Columbia, 2008), We Shall Bear Witness: Life Narrative and Human Rights (U or Wisconsin, 2014) and Sisterhood and After: An Oral History of the UK Women’s Liberation Movement, 1968-Present (OUP, 2019). Her project The Business of Women’s Words: Purpose and Profit in Feminist Publishing (2017-2022) explores cultural and creative industries with a focus on the people who pioneered social, heritage and ethical models of enterprise. She convenes the MA in Cultural and Creative Industries.
Email: M.Jolly@sussex.ac.uk