Dr Sarah Ralph
Senior Lecturer

Research interests: Film & TV audiences, Media in Everyday Relationships, Cultural Memory, Gender, Girlhood
Twitter: @sarah_ralph
Twitter: @GirlKindNE
Academia.edu: Profile
About
My research interests centre on media-making and media viewing/consumption, and particularly how these activities relate to, reflect and express gender identities and relationships. I am the co-founder of Girl-Kind North East (a part-Economic and Social Research Council IAA funded project working with girls in the North East of England, coordinated by Northumbria and Newcastle Universities), and a Trustee of the Young Women's Film Academy.


Qualifications
PhD in Film and Television Studies: 'Watching with Mother: How Film Stars Are Utilized in Mother-Daughter Relations', Aberystwyth University
​MA Audience and Reception Studies, University of Wales, Aberystwyth (Distinction).
​BA (Hons) Film and Television Studies, University of Wales, Aberystwyth (First class).​
Professional Affiliations
  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (HEA).
  • Executive committee member, International Girls’ Studies Association.
  • ​Media, Communication and Cultural Studies Association (MeCCSA)
  • Women's Film and Television History Network (WFTHN).
  • Book Review Editor: Participations:  Journal of Audience and Reception Studies
Employment
Sarah joined Northumbria University in September 2015 and is currently Senior Lecturer in Media and Cultural Studies in the Department of Arts.
​From 2012 to 2015 she was Research Associate on the Arts and Humanities Research Council funded project 'Make Me Laugh: Creativity in the British Television Comedy Industry' at the University of East Anglia.
​Sarah has previously taught film, television and media at ​Aberystwyth University, Portsmouth University and the University of East Anglia
​​Institutional Roles
Sarah is ​currently Media Subject Lead for the AHRC Northern Bridge Consortium.
She has previously acted as Kaplan Partnership Lead, and Acting Programme Leader for Mass Communications programme  pathways.

External Relevant Roles
  • Advisory Board member, Plan International UK’s State of Girls’ Rights in the UK 2019-2020 report.
  • Trustee Young Women’s Film Academy, registered charity (Registered Charity Number 1179614).
​PhD Supervision 
Sarah is currently supervising PhDs on identity formation in audience memories of The Exorcist, and print media representations of women's team sports pre- and post- the 2012 Olympics. 
​Sarah recently supervised a PhD on postfeminism and historical female ensemble dramas to successful completion (November 2017).
​Sarah welcomes PhD applications in the areas of media audiences, media consumption and everyday family life, feminism and popular media consumption, girlhood and media culture, and cultural memory. Doctoral projects that demonstrate innovative empirical research methodologies would be very warmly received.
Modules Taught
Level 3 (Foundation): Media and Society.
Level 4: ​Global Media; Concepts, Culture and Society; Intercultural Communication and Diversity.
​Level 5: Researching Audiences; Sex and Gender in Society (Sociology), Media Methodologies, Media Cultures.
​Level 6 & 7: Supervision of Media Dissertations
Public Engagement 
  • Invited panelist, 'Women in Film: What next now #TimesUp?', Newcastle International Film Festival.
  • Core group committee member for The Women's 100 events and activities celebrating the centenary of women's suffrage in 2018.
  • Co-organiser of Girl-Kind North East (an ESRC-funded engagement and impact project working with girls in the region)
  • Trustee of the Young Women’s Film Academy
  • Under the Shadow, invited public film introduction, Kurja Polt Film Festival, Slovenia.
  • Harold and Maude, invited public film introduction for International Women's Day film screenings, Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle.
  • ‘Re-masculating the Hero?: The Curious Case of the 80s Female Action Star’. invited public lecture, Offscreen Film Festival, Brussels.
Conferences & Talks
  • ‘What’s Your Worry?’ Using historical media artefacts to discuss girlhood with contemporary girls (with Mel Gibson), IAMHIST Conference, Northumbria University
  • Motherhood and Monsters: Audience recollections of 'Ripley-as-mother' Researching Past Cinema Audiences conference, Aberystwyth University
  • 'Shared Pleasures? Watching Game of Thrones 'as a couple' MeCCSA conference, London South Bank University
  • 'Queen Bee: Tina Fey and the Enduring Resonance and Cultural Reception of Mean Girls' SCMS conference, Chicago
  • Book launch and Panel: 'The Politics of Funny Women', invited speaker and panellist, Birmingham City University.
  • ''Girl-fighting' to 'sisterhood': Negotiating femininity and friendship in (and through) popular girl culture‘ Talk at North East Film & TV Network
Recent Publications​
  • Family Reminiscence, Cultural Memory and the Media: 'Watching with Mother', Palgrave MacMillan, (forthcoming 2021).
  • Girls Shift Digital: Reflecting on the impact of moving online in girls’ creative youth projects (with Amanda McBride) In: MAI: A Journal of Feminism and Visual Culture. (Summer 2020) 
  • ‘Mean Girls’ in Ross, K. et al. (Eds) Encyclopaedia of Gender, Media and Communication Wiley Blackwell (2020).
  • Alien Audiences: Understanding the Pleasures of Ridley Scott’s Film (with M. Barker, K. Egan & T. Philips) Palgrave Pivot, 2016.
  • Celebrity Audiences (edited with S. Holmes & M. Barker) Routledge, 2016.
  • Using Stars, Not Just ‘Reading’ Them: The roles and functions of film stars in mother-daughter relations In: Audiences for Celebrity Special Issue of Celebrity Studies. 6:1 2015: 23-38.
  • "A place for talking about female stars”: Exploring versatility, femininity and ‘fantasy’ in mother-daughter talk on film stars In: Gender and 21st Century Popular Culture: The Politics of Being A Woman. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan (2015): 91–111.
Policy/Research Reports
  • Holland, T., A. McBride, Ralph, S. and Winkler-Reid, S. (2020) Hearing Girls’ Voices: Girl-Kind North East’s Story So Far (Published Report).
  • Ralph, S. and Winkler-Reid, S. (2020) ‘Girl-Kind North East: Creating spaces of girlhood in the North East of England’. Betrifft Mädchen magazine (Concerning Girls), German translation.
  • The Voices of Girls in Middlesbrough (with Dr Mel Gibson) Spotlight section of the Plan International UK State of Girls’ Rights in the UK 2019-2020 report (2020)
  • Ralph, S. and Winkler-Reid, S. (August 2018) Girls Will: A Guide to the Girl-Kind North East Programme (Published Report).


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Peer Review
Sarah has acted as peer reviewer for journals such as Celebrity Studies, ​Critical Studies in Television, Journal of Popular Television, and Participations​. She has also acted as a manuscript reviewer for ​Palgrave Macmillan (BFI Classic Film Series).