Mette Hjort

Current research

One ongoing project focuses on transnational talent development and capacity building. I am particularly interested in collaboration on a North/South basis, between practitioners in the Nordic region and in West Africa, East Africa, and the Middle East. This project builds on earlier work on small-nation filmmaking and seeks, among other things, to pinpoint the dynamics, benefits, and challenges of collaboration between small nations.

 

Primary Research Areas

My research focuses on moving images in relation to:

 

-       small nations

-       talent development

-       transnational collaboration

-       practitioner’s agency

-       rights-based cultural development policies

-       diversity debates (gender and ethnicity)

-       environmental aesthetics

-       health and well-being

-       the feel good genre and positive psychology

-       public values

-       soft power

Teaching

At UCPH

Courses (2016-2017)

Media, Genres and Aesthetics: Issues in World Cinema

Film and Audiovisual Aesthetics

 

At UCPH

Supervision (Masters level)

Karen Kristianna Gram (children & youth initiatives in the Faroese film industry)

Cecilie Hornung Jensen (production design in contemporary Danish TV series)

Lærke Ina Krogaard Hansen (web documentaries)

Mette Olsen (cross media distribution strategies)

Mia Lange (rethinking the market for Danish cinemas)

Nadia Wardi (cross media, virtual reality and the experience economy, with a focus on Skam)

Nicklas Smedegaard Pedersen (Nordisk Film and Olsen Banden)

Raoul Suvi (award winning Danish documentaries and questions of value)

 

CV

Education

1986-1989

Ph.D. (‘Nouveau Doctorat’), École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris, France (CRAL, Centre de Recherches sur les Arts et le Langage); 

Supervisor, Louis Marin

1983-1985

M.A., McGill University, Montreal, Canada (Graduate Program in Communications);

Supervisors, Charles Taylor and Irena Bellert

1980-1983

B.A. first class honors, McGill University, Montreal, Canada (Department of English Literature, Film and Communications, and Theatre)

 

Honorary doctorate

2017

Aalborg University (to be awarded April 7^th)

 

Academic Appointments

Current

2016 —

Professor of Film Studies, Department of Media, Cognition and Communication,

University of Copenhagen

2018 --

Professor II, Department of Art and Media Studies, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)

2016 —

Affiliate Professor, Department of Visual Studies, Lingnan University, Hong Kong

2008 —

Affiliate Professor, Department of Scandinavian Studies, University of Washington, Seattle

 

Previous

2009-2016 

Chair Professor (with substantiation/tenure), Visual Studies, Lingnan University

2013—2015

Associate Vice President (Academic Quality Assurance & Internationalisation), Lingnan University

2011—2014

Founding Co-director, Centre for Cinema Studies, Lingnan University; Director from 2012 onwards

2009

Declined, Chair Professorship, Film Studies, University of St Andrews, Scotland

2005—2009

Full Professor (with substantiation/tenure) and Director, Visual Studies Programme, Lingnan University

2004—2006

Full Professor, Languages and Intercultural Studies, Aalborg University, Denmark

2004—2005

Visiting Research Associate, Kwan Fong Center for Cultural Research and Development, Lingnan University, Hong Kong

2001—2004

Associate Professor, Department of Comparative Literature, University of Hong Kong

(Head of Department, 2003—2004)

1998—2004

Senior Lecturer, Languages and Intercultural Studies/School for Postgraduate Interdisciplinary Research on Interculturalism and Transnationality, Aalborg University, Denmark (Professor, 2004-2006)

1997—1998

Senior Lecturer, Department of English, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark

1994—1997

Associate Professor, granted early tenure, Department of English, McGill University, Montreal, Canada

1991—1994

Assistant Professor, tenure-track, Department of English, and Director of Film and Communications/Cultural Studies (1992-1994), McGill University, Montreal, Canada

1989—1991

Tenure at McGill University of a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) postdoctoral research fellowship

1989

Declined, tenure-track position, Department of Romance Languages, The Johns Hopkins University

 

Guest professorships

2017

Guest Professor, Nordic Media Cultures: Nordic Noir, Public Service Media and Digital Challenges. Nordic Centre, Fudan University, Shanghai (in collaboration with the University of Copenhagen and the University of Tampere).

2009

Guest Professor, Copenhagen Classroom 2009: Ethnicity, University of Washington, Seattle, Summer Programme at the University of Copenhagen

2008

Guest Professor, Copenhagen Classroom 2008: Sustainable Designs and Artful Traditions, University of Washington, Seattle, Summer Programme at the University of Copenhagen

2007

Guest Professor, Copenhagen Classroom 2007: Danish Innovations: Tracking the Process, University of Washington, Seattle, Summer Programme at the University of Copenhagen and the Danish Film Institute

2007

Visting Leverhulme Professor of Film Studies (one term), University of St Andrews, St Andrews, Scotland

2007

Distinguished Visiting Professor, Department of Scandinavian Studies, University College London

2006

Guest Professor, Copenhagen Classroom 2006: Danish Innovations -- Less is More, University of Washington, Seattle, Summer Programme at the University of Copenhagen and the Danish Film Institute

2001–2002

Declined, Senior Researcher Fellowship, The Danish Institute for Advanced Studies, Copenhagen

1997

Visting Senior Lecturer, Department of Danish Studies, Aalborg University, Denmark

1996

Research Fellow (1 year), Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University.

 

Publications  (book length)

Monographs

2010

Lone Scherfig’s Italian for Beginners. Nordic Film Classics Series. Seattle: University of Washington Press, in collaboration with Museum Tusculanum, University of Copenhagen (289 pages).

2006

Stanley Kwan’s Centre-Stage. Hong Kong Film Classics Series. Hong Kong: University of Hong Kong Press (156 pages).

2005

Small Nation, Global Cinema: The New Danish Cinema. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, Public Worlds Series (300 pages).

1993

The Strategy of Letters. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press (267 pages).

 

Edited volumes

Advance contract

Co-editor, with Eva Jørholt, African Cinema & Human Rights, to be published in the “Studies in the Cinema of the Black Diaspora” series, edited by Michael T. Martin and David C. Wall.Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press and the Black Film Center/Archive.

2016

Co-editor, with Ursula Lindqvist, A Companion to Nordic Cinema, Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.

2013

The Education of the Filmmaker in Europe, Australia, and Asia. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

2013

The Education of the Filmmaker in Africa, the Middle East, and the Americas. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

2012

Co-editor, with Meaghan Morris, Creativity and Academic Activism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press; Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.

2012

Film and Risk. Detroit: Wayne State University Press.

2008

Dekalog 01: The Five Obstructions. London: Wallflower Press.

2007

Co-editor, with Duncan Petrie, The Cinema of Small Nations. Bloomington, IN:  Indiana University Press; Edinburgh: The University of Edinburgh Press.

2003

Co-editor, with Scott MacKenzie, Purity and Provocation: Dogma 95. London: The British Film Institute Publications.

2002

Co-editor, with Ulf Hedetoft, The Postnational Self. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

2000

Co-editor, with Scott MacKenzie, Cinema and Nation. London: Routledge.

1997

Co-editor, with Sue Laver, Emotion and the Arts. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

1993

Rules and Conventions: Literature, Philosophy, Social Theory. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

 

Interview Books focusing on Practitioner’s Agency

2014

With Ib Bondebjerg and Eva Novrup Redvall, Danish Directors 3: Dialogues on the New Danish Documentary Cinema. Bristol: Intellect Press.

2010

With Eva Jørholt and Eva Novrup Redvall, Danish Directors 2: Dialogues on the New Danish Fiction Cinema. Bristol: Intellect Press.

2001

With Ib Bondebjerg, The Danish Directors: Dialogues on a Contemporary National Cinema. Bristol: Intellect Press, 2001.

2000

With Ib Bondebjerg, Instruktørens blik -- en interviewbog om dansk film. Copenhagen: Rosinante, 2000.

 

Translated Books

1994

Translator of Louis Marin’s Détruire la peinture. Paris: Galilée, 1977. Translated as To Destroy Painting. Chicago: Chicago University Press.

1989

Translator of Louis Marin's La parole mangée. Paris: Méridiens Klincksieck, 1986. Translated as Food for Thought. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.

 

Outreach / community engagement

2017

Produced report, with Khulood Badawi, on chldren & youth initiatives in Palestine (West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza). Report commissioned by FilmLab:Palestine, the Danish Film Institute, the Danish House in Ramallah, and International Media Support. Report presented to stakeholders during Days of Cinema in October 2017 and to the Ministry of Education and Higher Education and the Ministry of Culture in Ramallah.

2013, 2011

With Rod Stoneman (Huston School of Film and Digital Media, Galway, Ireland) and Gaston Kaboré (founder of the alternative film school IMAGINE, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso), production of student newsreels, FESPACO, Burkina Faso.

FESPACO Newsreel 1 (2013)

FESPACO Newsreel 2 (2013)

FESPACO Newsreel 3 (2013)

FESPACO Newsreel 1 (2011)

FESPACO Newsreel 2 (2011)

FESPACO Newsreel 3 (2011)

 

Grants and awards

2013-2015 GRF (Hong Kong Research Grants Council competitive grants). ‘Practice-oriented Film Education and Its Institutions: Values, Methods, Transferable Models.’ (RGC Ref No.340612)

2012-2013 Teaching Development Grant. ‘Independent Chinese Cinema: A Pedagogical Resource.’ (TG11A9)

2011-2012 Direct Grant. ‘Contemporary Documentary Filmmaking in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the PRC: Understanding Practitioner’s Agency.’ PI, Hjort. Co-Is: Cheung Tit Leung, Ma Ran, Hu Liu Bin. (DA11B1)

2010 Scan-Design Foundation, Seattle. Grant in support of Nordic Film Classics Series

2010 Danish Film Institute. Grant in support of Danish Directors 3

2010 Teaching Development Grant. ‘Film and Education: Documentary Film.’ (TG10B1)

2010 Teaching Development Grant. ‘Key Issues in Contemporary Documentary Filmmaking: Practitioners’ Perspectives’ (TG10B2)

2010 Teaching Development Grant. ‘Developing a Virtual World Teaching Resource.’ Hjort, Mette, Co-supervisor (with Dr. David M. Kennedy and Ms. Christine Shirley; Principal Project Supervisor, Brant Knutzen)

2010 Direct Grant, with Meaghan Morris. ‘Instituting Cultural Studies’ (DA10A2)

2008-2010 Direct Grant. ‘Art and Risk’ (DA08A7)

2009 Danish Film Institute. Grant in support of Danish Directors 2

2007-2009 CERG (Hong Kong Research Grants Council competitive grant). ‘The Cinema of Lone Scherfig’

2007 Leverhulme Trust. Leverhulme Visiting Professor, University of St Andrews. ‘Transnational Cinema’

2006-2007 Direct Grant, with Meaghan Morris. ‘University Culture: Markets, Globalization, Norms’ (DA06A7)

2006-2007 Direct Grant. ‘Small Nations, Film Culture, and Transnationalism’

2002-2004 Research Initiation Grant. University of Hong Kong

2001-2002 Declined, Danish Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities. ‘Small National Cinemas’

1995-1998 SSHRC (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada competitive grant). ‘Cinema and the Politics of Recognition’

1995-1998 SSHRC. Release Time Stipend

1991-94 FCAR (Fonds de recherche du Québec competitive grant). ‘Cinema and the Politics of Recognition’

1991-94 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, General Research Grant

1989-91 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Postdoctoral Research Grant

1985-86 McGill Alma Mater Fellowship

1984-85 McGill Alma Mater Fellowship

1983 McGill University Scholar

1983 Dora Forsyth Prize in English

1983-84 Max Bell Open Fellowship

1982 McGill Faculty Scholar

1982 James McGill Award

1982-83 Dow-Hickson Scholarship

1981 McGill Faculty Scholar

1981 James McGill Award

 

Service to the profession

Series editor

2017-

Co-editor, Journal of Scandinavian Cinema, Intellect Press

2016-

Series Editor, with Andrew Higson, Ib Bondebjerg and Caroline Pauwels, Palgrave European Film and Media Studies series

2008-

Nordic Film Classics Series

Founding Series Editor, with Peter Schepelern. 15 books envisaged in the first phase, focusing on Danish, Swedish, Finnish, Icelandic and Norwegian film classics. University of Washington Press and Museum Tusculanum Press (at the University of Copenhagen). 

For introduction to series, see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gk7SGfrIHGA

 

Advisory work

2015-

Member, Advisory Board, Palgrave Communications

2015-

Member, Advisory Board, “Remapping World Cinema: Regional Tensions and Global Transformations”

2014-

Member, Advisory Board, “Environmental Management of the Media Industries” (Stirling University)

2013-

Member, Advisory Board, Palgrave European Film and Media Studies, (book series)

2012-

Member, Advisory Board, Cinema & Cie

2012-

Member, Advisory Board, Frames Cinema Journal

2011-

Member, Editorial Board, Visual Methodologies

2010-

Member, Advisory Board, Short Film Studies

2010-

Member, Advisory Board, Transnational Cinemas

2010-

Member, Advisory Board, Journal of Scandinavian Cinema

2010-

Member, Advisory Board, ‘A Transnational History of Finnish Cinema’

2010-

Member, Advisory Board, Alphaville: Online Graduate Journal of Film and Media Studies

2010-

Member, Editorial Board, Cultural Histories of Cinema, British Film Institute

2009-

Member, Advisory Board, Encounters: An International Journal for the Study of Culture and Society

2005-

Member, Executive Committee for the Hong Kong Film Classics Series, Hong Kong University Press

2005-

Corresponding editor, Northern Lights, Intellect Press

2005-2010

Member, Advisory Board, pov

1994-1998

Founding Member, Editorial Committee, AE: The Canadian Journal of Aesthetics

1995-1997

Member, Editorial Committee, Fontanus

1993-1995

Member of the Editorial Committee, Lekton

1992-1995

Member, Editorial Committee, Ratio: Institute for the Humanities (University of Michigan)

1991-2000

Member, Advisory Committee, Kultur og Klasse

1989-1991

Member, Editorial Committee, Horizons philosophiques

 

Conference organization

2012

‘The Education of the Filmmaker: Views from Around the World.’ Lingnan University (May) (http://www.ln.edu.hk/ccs/conferences/index.php)

2011

With Rafael De Clercq. ‘What Environment Do We Want? Environmental Aesthetics and Its Implications.’ Lingnan University (November) (http://www.ln.edu.hk/visual/conference/index.php)

2011

With Rod Stoneman and Gaston Kaboré. ‘Film Training and Education in Africa: Challenges and Opportunities.’ Imagine Institute, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (March).

1999

With Ulf Hedetoft. ‘Reimagining Belonging: Self and Community in an Era of Nationalism and Postnationality.’  Aalborg University (May).

 

Administration and Service

Copenhagen

2016-

PhD Coordinator, Film and Media Studies

 

Hong Kong – Government and Tertiary Sector

2013-2016

Member, University Grants Committee (appointed by Hong Kong’s Chief Executive)

2013- 2016

Member, Steering Committee on Competitive Research Funding for the Self-financing Degree Sector (under Research Grants Committee)

2013-2016

Member, General Affairs and Management Sub-Committee (GAMSC), UGC

2013-2016

Member, Research Group (RG), UGC

2012-

Founding Fellow, Hong Kong Academy of the Humanities

Member, Executive, Hong Kong Academy of the Humanities (2012-2013, Treasurer, 2015-2016, Vice President, 2014-)

2011

Member, panel, Hong Kong Council for Accreditation of Academic and Vocational Qualifications (HKCAAVQ)

2010

Member, assessment panel, Creative Arts and Culture, proposed new programme, Hong Kong Institute of Education

Assessor, various capacities: HKIED; School of Creative Media, City University

 

Hong Kong - Lingnan University

2013-2015

Associate Vice President and Member of the Senior Management Team (Academic Quality Assurance & Internationalisation)

2009-2013

Founding Head of Department, Visual Studies

2005-1009

Founding Director, Visual Studies Programme

2006-2013

Founding Director, Artist in Residence Programme

2011-2014

Founding Director, Centre for Cinema Studies

 

Hong Kong - University of Hong Kong

2003-2004

Head of Department, Comparative Literature

 

McGill University

1992-1994

Director, Film and Communications/Cultural Studies

1991-1992

Director, Teaching Assistants

 

PhD Supervision

2013-2016

Nis Grøn (funded by UGC’s competitive Hong Kong PhD Fellowship Scheme) (area: small national cinemas – Mongolia, Bhutan, Myanmar) (Lingnan University)

2009-2012

Cheung Tit Leung (area: Asian film festivals) (Lingnan University)

2001-2005

Carol Archer (area: philosophical aesthetics and collaborative artmaking) (Hong Kong University)

1995-2001

Sue Laver (area: T. S. Eliot; Dean’s List) (McGill University)

1995-1997

Marcel DeCoste (area: literary theory; Dean’s List) (McGill University)

1995-1997

Scott MacKenzie (Quebecois cinema; Dean’s List) (McGill University)

 

Second Supervisor

2013-2016

Samson Wong (area: art and well-being) (Lingnan University)

2011-2014

Henri Tung (area: philosophy of architecture and the built environment) (Lingnan University)

 

Mentor for Visiting Postgraduate Students (at Lingnan University)

2015-2016

Louisa Mitchell, Leeds University

2014-2015

Jason Lau, New School for Social Research

2014-2015

Anton Willemann, University of Southern Denmark

2009-2010

Eva Novrup Redvall, University of Copenhagen

2006-2007

Niels Bjoern, University of Copenhagen