"Who are these people?"
Enquiring after the audiences

2nd Edinburgh Film Audiences Conference

22/23 March 2007

The 2nd Edinburgh Film Audiences Conference took place on the 22 and 23 March 2007 at Filmhouse, Lothian Road, Edinburgh. This conference was an opportunity to hear about the latest empirical research into film audiences. Building on the success of the first conference, one of the aims for this year was to continue to bring academics and the film industry together to engage in fruitful discussion about the state of current audience research and its impact on policy and practice. Unlike other conferences, it was offering single-track sessions so that difficult choices do not have to be made. The conference presenters comprised well-established academics as well as more junior researchers and there are ample spaces in the timetable for meaningful discussion and networking.

The papers covered an international selection of research, such as the study of young audiences in Sweden to larger cross-cultural studies of audience reception in the UK, Border cinema in Mexico or Colombian film makers of the 1940s. There were papers that deal with the British experience, notably diasporic experiences of Nollywood (Nigerian Cinema). There were explorations of film in relation to national identity within Britain and Ireland as well as the feminine in horror. There was a special session for work in progress that was at too early a stage to be submitted as an abstract.

Our opening guest speaker was David Bruce, former director of The Scottish Film Council (Scottish Screen's predecessor organisation) and the Edinburgh International Film Festival. The author of 'Scotland - the Movie', he is currently chair of Glasgow Film Theatre.

The closing plenary session included academics and industry representatives.

Abstracts and Programme
(full colour pdf format or no background pdf format)

Conference organisers/ email contacts: Dr Ailsa Hollinshead and Ms Nicola Hay

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