Dr Maria Velez Serna

Lecturer

Communications, Media and Culture University of Stirling, Stirling, FK9 4LA

Dr Maria Velez Serna

Contact details

About me

I went to film school in Colombia but decided that I liked history better, so I got my PhD at Glasgow in 2012 with a thesis on early film distribution in Scotland. I then worked as a research assistant for an AHRC-funded project on Early Cinema in Scotland, and joined Stirling as a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow in 2015, to carry out a research project on film exhibition in non-permanent venues. I am now a lecturer and mainly teach core undergraduate classes.

Soy egresada de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia, donde estudié Cine y Televisión. Luego hice mi trabajo de doctorado en la Universidad de Glasgow, estudiando la exhibición y distribución del cine en Escocia a principios del siglo XX. Desde 2015 trabajo en Stirling, inicialmente con un proyecto financiado por el Leverhulme Trust investigando la exhibición de cine fuera de salas y en espacios temporales o no convencionales. Ahora soy docente, principalmente de cursos básicos en el pregrado.

I am interested in media as something people do, collectively, often as a way to share or remake spaces. I tend to take a geographical approach to media uses, thinking about exhibition spaces, film circulation, and more recently about the relationship between media and uses of the land.

Previously I have worked on early cinema and historical audiences in Scotland and Colombia. I then followed my fascination with non-theatrical cinema spaces into contemporary practices of pop-up, community and travelling exhibition. I also think about archives and the re-use of media, in relation to questions of environmental justice and degrowth.

My recent work has focused on the role of moving images in transnational histories of extraction, particularly in relation to coal mining in Colombia and in Scotland.

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Me interesan los medios como práctica social, algo que la gente hace. En particular, estudio la exhibición cinematográfica como actividad que requiere colaboración y espacios compartidos. Me atraen los momentos de incertidumbre antes de que se cristalicen las convenciones de un medio o práctica cultural (por eso he estudiado el cine de primeros tiempos, y la transición al sonoro). También me interesan los márgenes de las industrias culturales y la persistencia de la informalidad.

Me interesa la exhibición de cine en espacios temporales o multi-propósito, incluyendo prácticas como el cine 'pop-up', al aire libre, itinerante, y el cineclubismo. También me gustan los archivos y el reciclaje de medios, y ando buscando una perspectiva para pensarlos en un marco de sostenibilidad y justicia.

Mi interés por las geografías del cine útil me lleva a mi investigación actual, que se trata de el papel de la imagen en movimiento dentro de la historia transnacional del extractivismo.

Outputs (39)

Article

Enough: Reading notes from media studies

Velez Serna M, Keilbach J, Pabiś-Orzeszyna M, Pape T, Pedregal A, Price JR & Voelcker B (2024) Enough: Reading notes from media studies. NECSUS European Journal of Media Studies, (Autumn 2024). https://necsus-ejms.org/enough-reading-notes-from-media-studies/

Conference Paper (published)

Interaction Design for Audiences: A Proposition for Building Resilience and Recovery for COVID-safe Independent Cinemas

Zioga P & Vélez-Serna MA (2022) Interaction Design for Audiences: A Proposition for Building Resilience and Recovery for COVID-safe Independent Cinemas. In: Tsitsou L, Rana H & Wessels B (eds.) The Formation of Film Audiences: Conference Proceedings. Studies in the Digital Humanities. Audiences beyond the multiplex: understanding the value of a diverse film culture, Online, 02.03.2021-03.03.2021. Sheffield: Digital Humanities Institute. https://www.dhi.ac.uk/books/film-audiences/interaction-design-for-audiences/

Conference Paper (unpublished)

Interaction Design for Audiences: A Proposition for Building Resilience and Recovery for COVID-safe Independent Cinemas

Zioga P & Vélez-Serna M (2021) Interaction Design for Audiences: A Proposition for Building Resilience and Recovery for COVID-safe Independent Cinemas. Audiences beyond the multiplex: understanding the value of a diverse film culture, Glasgow, 02.03.2021-03.03.2021. https://www.beyondthemultiplex.net/session-9-audiences-accessibility-and-responding-to-the-pandemic/

Monograph

Ephemeral Cinema Spaces

Velez Serna MA (2020) Ephemeral Cinema Spaces. Film Culture in Transition. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. https://www.aup.nl/en/book/9789462986541/ephemeral-cinema-spaces

Edited Book

Early Cinema in Scotland

Caughie J, Griffiths T & Velez-Serna MA (eds.) (2018) Early Cinema in Scotland. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-early-cinema-in-scotland.html

Book Chapter

Travelling bioscopes and borrowed spaces

Velez-Serna MA (2018) Travelling bioscopes and borrowed spaces. In: Caughie J, Griffiths T & Velez-Serna M (eds.) Early Cinema in Scotland. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-early-cinema-in-scotland.html

Book Chapter

Fixed-site cinemas and the first film renters

Velez-Serna MA (2018) Fixed-site cinemas and the first film renters. In: Caughie J, Griffiths T & Velez-Serna M (eds.) Early Cinema in Scotland. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-early-cinema-in-scotland.html

Book Chapter

Maps, grids, instructions: Pop-up Cinemagoing and Tourist Performance

Velez-Serna MA (2017) Maps, grids, instructions: Pop-up Cinemagoing and Tourist Performance. In: Atkinson S & Kennedy H (eds.) Live Cinema: Cultures, Economies, Aesthetics. London: Bloomsbury, pp. 101-116. http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/live-cinema-9781501324833/

Article

(Micro)film studies

Vélez-Serna MA (2017) (Micro)film studies. Moving Image, 17 (2), pp. 95-100. https://doi.org/10.5749/movingimage.17.2.0095

Book Review

Human Rights Film Festivals: Activism in Context

Velez-Serna MA (2016) Human Rights Film Festivals: Activism in Context. Review of: Human rights film festivals: activism in context, by Sonia M. Tascón, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, 248 pp., ISBN: 978-1-137-45423-2. Studies in Documentary Film, 10 (1), pp. 87-88. https://doi.org/10.1080/17503280.2016.1186350

Book Review

Jean Desmet’s dream factory: the adventurous years of film (1907–1916)

Velez-Serna MA (2016) Jean Desmet’s dream factory: the adventurous years of film (1907–1916). Review of: Jean Desmet’s dream factory: the adventurous years of film (1907–1916), Marente Bloemheuvel, Jaap Guldemont and Mark-Paul Meyer (Eds.), Amsterdam, EYE Filmmuseum/nai010, 2014, 192 pp. ISBN 978-9-46208-174-1. Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 36 (2), pp. 277-279. https://doi.org/10.1080/01439685.2016.1164477

Website Content

Early Cinema in Scotland

Velez-Serna MA, Caughie J, Griffiths T, Bohlmann J & Merz C (2016) Early Cinema in Scotland. 23.04.2016. http://earlycinema.gla.ac.uk/

Book Review

The City and the Moving Image: Urban Projections

Velez-Serna MA (2011) The City and the Moving Image: Urban Projections. Review of: Richard Koeck and Les Roberts (eds), The City and the Moving Image: Urban Projections. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010, 281 pp. ISBN-13: 978-0230243385. Screen, 52 (4), pp. 544-546. https://doi.org/10.1093/screen/hjr042

Book Review

From Silent Screen to Multi-screen: a history of cinema exhibition in Britain since 1896

Velez-Serna MA (2010) From Silent Screen to Multi-screen: a history of cinema exhibition in Britain since 1896. Review of: Stuart Hanson. From Silent Screen to Multi-screen: a history of cinema exhibition in Britain since 1896. Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2007. 256 pp.. Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 30 (4), pp. 563-565. https://doi.org/10.1080/01439685.2010.509984

Book Chapter

Imagen dialéctica y 'Allá en el Trapiche': Un experimento

Velez-Serna MA (2008) Imagen dialéctica y 'Allá en el Trapiche': Un experimento [Dialectical image and ‘Allá en el Trapiche’: An experiment]. In: Arias HJ (ed.) Textos (18). Documentos de historia y teoria. Escritos de estudiantes. Textos, 18. Bogota, Columbia: Universidad Nacional de Colombia, pp. 92-106. http://www.maachistoriayteoria.unal.edu.co/portfolio/coleccion-textos-18-2/

Book Chapter

Historia de Divulgación Cultural en la sede Bogotá

Velez-Serna MA (2006) Historia de Divulgación Cultural en la sede Bogotá [History of the Cultural Redifussion Department in the Bogota campus]. In: Políticas de Divulgación Cultural de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia: Procesos Inaugurales. Bogotá: Dirección Nacional de Divulgación Cultural - Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

Book Chapter

Dogma 95: Provocación, emoción y estilo

Velez-Serna MA (2005) Dogma 95: Provocación, emoción y estilo [Dogma 95: Provocation, emotion and style]. In: Memorias del Seminario ‘Movimientos y Renovación en el Cine’ / Revista del Cine Club. Bogotá: Universidad Central.

Teaching

During my time at Stirling I have mostly taught Media 1 (first year module), where we talk about current issues in media industries and institutions; Understanding Audiences in second or third year; and Researching Media and Culture (research methods for undergraduate dissertations). I have also convened the dissertation modules and supervised student projects. I contribute to other modules such as Experimental Cinema, The Poetic Eye, Researching Gender, and Global Creative Industries.

Research programmes

Research themes