University of Reading cookie policy

We use cookies on reading.ac.uk to improve your experience, monitor site performance and tailor content to you

Read our cookie policy to find out how to manage your cookie settings

Professor Jonathan Bignell

Professor Jonathan Bignell

Research Division Lead for Film, Theatre & Television

Areas of interest

I work primarily on television history and the methodologies of television and film analysis. So my work includes using archival sources alongside the detailed study of the audiovisual form and style of films and television programmes, mainly from the UK and USA. I was taught by Raymond Williams, Stephen Heath and other screen theorists, studying at the universities of Cambridge and Sussex. I also have longstanding research interests in Samuel Beckett's media drama. I have led teams of researchers on several major collaborative externally-funded research projects: Spaces of Television (2010–2015), Acting with Facts (2007–2010), Beckett and the Phenomenology of Doodles (2006–2009), British TV Drama and Acquired US Programmes, 1970–2000 (2005–2008), Cultures of British Television Drama, 1960–1982 (2002–2006) and The BBC Wednesday Play and Post-War British Drama (1996–2000). Most recently, on Harold Pinter: Histories and Legacies, funded by AHRC from 2017-20, I led research into Pinter's work for television, radio and cinema. 

Postgraduate supervision

I welcome enquiries from prospective postgraduate students who would like to work on such topics as the history or theory of television, children's media, or Samuel Beckett's work in film and television. I have supervised over 20 PhD theses on topics in TV drama, science fiction film and television, Beckett's media plays, and screen adaptations of British classic novels.

Teaching

I have taught television, cinema, critical theory and literature at the universities of Sussex, Royal Holloway and Reading.

Research centres and groups

Samuel Beckett Research Centre

Centre for Film Aesthetics and Cultures

Professional bodies/affiliations

  • Corresponding Editor, Critical Studies in Television
  • General Editor, The Television Series, Manchester University Press
  • Member of the editorial advisory board, Journal of Science Fiction Film and Television
  • Member of the editorial advisory board, New Review of Film and Television Studies
  • Member of the editorial advisory board, International Journal of Scottish Theatre and Screen
  • Member of the editorial advisory board, Studies in Documentary Film
  • Member of the editorial advisory board, Journal of Popular Television
  • Member of the editorial advisory board, Symbolism: An International Annual of Critical Aesthetics
  • Scientific Committee, Revue LISA/LISA e-journal
  • Member of the Board of Trustees, the Beckett International Foundation 
  • Member and Co-Chair, the Southern Broadcasting History Group
  • Member of the Board, the Graduate Centre for International Research in Childhood
  • Member of the Advisory Committee, the British Association for Modernist Studies
  • Member of the Executive Committee, the Centre for Film Aesthetics and Cultures (CFAC)

Selected publications

Full-text PDFs of some of my publications can be downloaded for free on Academia or from the list of publications below.

Publications