Professor Philip Powrie appointed Dean of Faculty of Arts and Human Sciences at the University of Surrey
Friday 19 March 2010
The University of Surrey is delighted to announce the appointment of Professor Philip Powrie as the new Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Human Sciences. He will be succeeding Professor Nick Emler who stands down from his post in July 2010.
Professor Powrie is a Linguist with interests in Film & Cinema; both are strong areas of teaching and research within the Faculty. He studied Modern Languages at the University of Oxford, and joins Surrey following a successful academic career at the Universities of Newcastle and Sheffield. During his time at Newcastle he was Head of the School of Modern Languages, and Director of the 5* Centre for Research into Film and Media which he established in 1996. He was Dean of Research in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, and as Chair of Newcastle University’s Research Committee was responsible for their Research Assessment Exercise submission of 2008.
In Sheffield, he was Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the new Faculty of Arts and Humanities; he set up the Faculty and oversaw the relocation of most of its departments to new and refurbished buildings. He championed the notion of an ‘Arts Quarter’, celebrated by an extensive and successful programme of events (‘New Ground’), and he initiated contacts with regional cultural providers as part of the city’s bid for European Capital of Culture.
Professor Powrie is currently a visiting professor at the Central Academy of Film and Drama (Beijing), and a member of the Association of University Professors and Heads of French.
His research focuses on French cinema with a particular emphasis on issues of gender, and more recently, the interface between music and the cinema. He has authored or co-authored ten books, edited or co-edited a further nine, covering both recent French cinema and cinema in the silent period. He has also published 90 journal articles and book chapters. He established the Association for Studies in French Cinema with Professor Susan Hayward (Exeter) in 2000. Through this association he is co-editor of the only journal world-wide devoted entirely to French cinema - Studies in French Cinema. In recognition of his work and services to French cinema, he was decorated in 1999 by the French government and made Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Acadéiques.
Professor Powrie will join Surrey as Dean Designate on 1st June 2010 and will fully assume the appointment as Dean at the end of July 2010.
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