Profile
Abstract
Dr. Elizabeth Ward is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Fellow with the Department of History, Chair for the History of the 19th to 21st Centuries.
Her research project, “Projecting the GDR on Screen. Film Festivals and Cultural Diplomacy in Cold War Germany” examines how the GDR harnessed the opportunities of film festivals in the West as a form of cultural diplomacy. The project examines how state officials, cultural institutions, and individuals used the Berlin, Cannes and Venice Film Festivals as a platform for acquiring cultural prestige and political influence for the GDR in the West.
Her publications include East German Film and the Holocaust (Berghahn Books, 2021) and Entertaining German Culture: Contemporary Transnational Television and Film (ed. with Stephan Ehrig and Benjamin Schaper, Berghahn Books, 2023).
She received her PhD from the University of Leeds and studied at the University of Cambridge (MPhil, BA Hons).
Professional career
- since 09/2023
Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Fellow in the Department of History, Chair for the History of the 19th to 21st Centuries - since 12/2021
English Department, European University Viadriana Langauge Centre - 09/2021 - 03/2023
Visiting Fellow am Institute of Languages, Cultures and Societies, University of London - 09/2020 - 12/2020
Lecturer in the Department of German, King's College London - 09/2020 - 06/2021
Lecturer in the Department of German, University of Liverpool - 09/2019 - 07/2020
Lecturer in the Department of German und Centre for World Cinemas, University of Leeds - 01/2017 - 08/2020
Lecturer in the School of Modern Languages and Cultures, University of Hull - 09/2015 - 06/2017
Lecturer in the Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures, Royal Holloway University of London
- Film in the GDR
- Cultural foreign policy during the Cold War
- Holocaust in film
Research fields
Eastern Germany, Communication and media studies, History, Cultural studies
Specializations
Film in the GDR / DEFA
20th and 21st-century German film
Film and the Cold War
Film festivals
East German culture and history
Representative the Holocaust on film
History on film
Contact for media inquiries