Assoc Professor Deb Verhoeven

Position

Associate Professor, Screen Studies

School / Work Unit

Media and Communication

Contact Details

+(61 3) 9925 2908

deb.verhoeven@rmit.edu.au

Location

Building: 21
Level: 4
Room: 8

City Campus

Portfolio

Design & Social Context

 

Qualifications

PhD, University of Melbourne

Bachelor of Arts, Combined Honours (Visual Arts and Politics), Monash University

Certificate IV in Workplace Training & Assessment

Teaching/Work responsibilities

Deb Verhoeven is Director of the AFI Research Collection, a strategic resarch resource located in the School of Applied Communication. In this role Associate Professor Verhoeven is responsible for liaising with professional and industry organisations to promote collaborative research projects; overseeing academic and industry client-based research as well as determining collection policy.

She teaches in the Bachelor of Communication (COMM2411 Communication and Social Relations) and currently supervises the following post-graduate students:

Dean Brandum (PhD) Developing a model for understanding the box-office ‘viability’ of British films released in the US: 1965-70

Alwyn Davidson (PhD) A Spatio-Temporal Methodology for the Representation and Analysis of Micro-Historical Data: A Case Study in Australian Cinema Audiences

Rachel Wilson (PhD) To establish the prototype for an online digital archive for the screen production & research sectors

Professional Experience

Associate Professor Verhoeven has a prominent position in the Australian film industry having served on the boards and committees of various national screen culture organizations including the Australian Film Institute (AFI) and Women in Film and Television (WIFT). Verhoeven is currently Deputy Chair of the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (NFSA). She is a founding member of the Screen Economics Research Group (SERG) and an executive member of the International Cinema Audiences Research Group (ICARG). She has convened and managed conferences including, 'The Glow in their Eyes': Global perspectives on film cultures, film exhibition and cinemagoing held in Ghent (2007); the 4th International Documentary Conference (1995), the Passionate City Symposium (2004) and the XIIIth Biennial Conference of the Film and History Association of Australia and New Zealand (2006). Between 2000 and 2002 Verhoeven was CEO of the Australian Film Institute.

Deb Verhoeven's high profile as a film history and policy expert ensures that she is regularly consulted for opinion by media outlets including the ABC, The Age, The Australian, and The Financial Review. In the past 5 years she has made more than 100 media appearances as an expert commentator. In 2006 she was awarded the university's overall Media Star award for most media appearances. She is a practising film critic and for many years held a regular slot on 774 ABC Melbourne and Radio National, and was the film critic for the Melbourne Times (1994 to 2000). She is a current member of the Australian Film Critics Association (ACFA), the Federation Internationale de la Presse Cinematographe (FIPRESCI), an accredited member of the AFI and an Honorary Life Member of Women in Film and Television (WIFT).

Research Grants, Awards & Honours

Honorary Creative Fellowship, State Library of Victoria (2009/2010)

Visiting Professor, School of Arts, Universidade Católica Portuguesa (Porto) (2007)

ARC Discovery Grant (with Flinders University, Wollongong University, Australian National University) Mapping the Movies: the changing nature of Australia’s cinema circuitsand their audiences, 1956-1984 (2008-2011)

Media Star Award (Overall winner), RMIT University (2006)

ARC Discovery Grant (with Flinders University and University of Wollongong), Regional Markets and Local Audiences: Case Studies in Australian Cinema Consumption, 1928–1980 (2005-2007)

ATN Research Challenge Grant Community Networks: Human Communication as a Source of Sustainability in Global Australia (2005)

CUTSD Grant (with Adrian Miles, RMIT), Developing Authentic Research and Writing Skills in Cinema Studies using a Hypermedia Database (1999-2000)

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