Paul McDonald
Professor of Creative Industries, Faculty of Arts
Contact
Biography
I joined the Department of Culture, Film and Media in September 2011 as the new Chair of Creative Industries.
After training as a professional actor at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, I worked for a small production company in Soho and at the National Film Theatre. I was introduced to Film Studies through an evening course at Birkbeck College, and a first degree in film at the University of Reading and a doctorate at the University of Warwick followed.
Before joining Nottingham I have held appointments at the University of Portsmouth, Roehampton University, London South Bank University, and the University of Salford.
Co-chair and founder of the Media Industries Scholarly Interest Group of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies
Coordinator of the Film Industries Work Group of the European Network for Cinema and Media Studies
Member of the AHRC Peer Review College
Trustee of the British Universities Film and Video Council
Expertise Summary
My research focuses on the screen industries. Central to this work are concerns with how those industries are shaped by structural, operational, technological and legal factors, and with how these institutional dynamics influence the conditions in which symbolic goods and services are made, circulated, presented and consumed.
I am interested in supervising research students in the following areas:
Screen industries
Film distribution, marketing and exhibition
Home and personalized entertainment technologies
Video piracy
Hollywood stardom
Teaching Summary
Current Teaching:
V94023 Working in the Culture Industry: Case Study Workshops
V94CSP Cultural Studies and Entrepreneurship Research Project
AA3DIS International Media and Communication Dissertation
Research Summary
Principal investigator with Dr Patrick Vonderau (Stockholms universitet) on 'Your Entertainment Set Free?' Connected Viewing in Europe. This is part of the Connected Viewing Initiative examining how… read more
Selected Publications
PAUL MCDONALD, 2010. IMAX: The Hollywood Experience. In: SHELDON HALL and STEVE NEALE, eds., Widescreen Worldwide John Libby. 246
PAUL MCDONALD, 2009. Digital Discords in the Online Media Economy: Advertising Versus Content Versus Copyright. In: PELLE SNICKARS and PATRICK VONDERAU, eds., The YouTube Reader National Library Sweden. 387-405
Current Research
Principal investigator with Dr Patrick Vonderau (Stockholms universitet) on 'Your Entertainment Set Free?' Connected Viewing in Europe. This is part of the Connected Viewing Initiative examining how patterns of media use are customized by innovative search and discovery technologies and social networking sites, which is coordinated by the Carsey-Wolf Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara in collaboration with Warner Bros Digital Distribution.
Co-investigator with Dr Justin Smith (University of Portsmouth) for the four-year AHRC funded project Channel Four and British Film Culture. This project examines C4's role as a leading producer-distributor of original films and as an innovative and occasionally challenging programmer-exhibitor of film.
My monograph Hollywood Stardom on the symbolic commerce of the post-studio star system in conglomerate Hollywood will be published in late 2012.
Co-editor with Dr Philip Drake (University of Stirling), Dr Emily Carman (Chapman University) and Eric Hoyt (University of Southern California) on Hollywood and the Law, forthcoming 2013, in which contributors are exploring how copyright, moral rights and laws of authorship, image rights, piracy, antitrust regulation, international trade, censorship, talent contracts, labour and tax influence the business of film and television.
Since 2000 with Professor Michael Curtin (University of California, Santa Barbara) I have co-edited the International Screen Industries series.
Past Research
In the book Video and DVD Industries I provided the first major study of the home entertainment business in the digital age, exploring the technological development of DVD and hi-definition video formats, the growth of the DVD market, Hollywood's early involvement in online delivery, and the technical, legal and enforcement measures taken to protect against industrialized video piracy.
With Professor Janet Wasko (University of Oregon), I co-edited The Contemporary Hollywood Film Industry, which brought together contributions from authors exploring the changing contours of the Hollywood film business.
My research has been funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), British Academy, and the Leverhulme Trust.