A new report, Greening European Film Policy: Towards a Sustainable European Film and Television Industry, has been released, emphasising the critical role of collaboration between academics, industry leaders, and policymakers in addressing the environmental impact of Europe’s film and television sectors.

The report underscores the importance of applying research in driving policy shifts and industry best practices toward sustainability.

Co-authored by environmental media experts Pietari Kääpä (University of Warwick) and Hunter Vaughan (Emerson College/Cambridge), the report presents a comprehensive analysis of current practices, highlights areas for improvement, and outlines actionable recommendations for industry-wide transformation.

Professor Pietari Kaapa from the Centre for Cultural and Media Policy Studies at the University of Warwick, explained: "We’re at a pivotal moment where academic research can directly inform and support industry practices, and that’s why working closely with production companies and policymakers is essential.

“This report offers a roadmap to help the industry embrace sustainable practices and align with broader environmental goals."

Drawing from detailed surveys and consultations with industry insiders, the report highlights both success stories and challenges across European nations.

Best practices include the implementation of energy-efficient production techniques, reduction of waste, and the integration of sustainable materials in film and TV sets. However, the report also identifies significant needs, such as stronger support structures for smaller production companies and more consistent application of sustainability standards across the continent.

Dr Hunter Vaughan added, "We’ve seen real progress in certain areas, but there are still gaps that need to be addressed, particularly in the way sustainability practices are implemented across different regions.

"Our goal with this report is to offer clear, practical steps that can be applied at every level—from small independent productions to large-scale international projects."

The report advocates for a series of industry-focused solutions, such as:

· Collaborative policy development between academics, industry leaders, and policymakers to ensure consistent sustainability standards

· Increased support for industry training and development, particularly for small and medium-sized productions

· Independent third-party audits to ensure transparency and accountability in sustainable practices

· Graduate student initiatives, aimed at equipping the next generation of media professionals with the tools and knowledge to lead the industry’s sustainability efforts

The report is the culmination of over five years of work by the Global Green Media Network (GGMN), a collective of academics, sustainability experts, and industry professionals committed to advancing sustainable media production practices.

By bridging the gap between academic research and industry practice, GGMN aims to empower future media professionals to drive sustainable change within the audiovisual sector.

Produced in collaboration with key organisations, including Green Eyes (Hungary), Ecomuvi (Italy), Film London (UK), Screen Greening (Ireland), and Neptune Environmental (UK), the report calls for continued partnership and dialogue between academia, industry, and policymakers to achieve meaningful progress in the years ahead.

For more information and to read the full Greening European Film Policy report, visit the Global Green Media Network.

Film and Television Studies at the University of Warwick are delighted to be partnering with the Pod on a new collaborative research project: ‘Using Film to Affect Change: Mental Health, Social Advocacy and the Moving Image’.

New for September on the Material Musings blog, Jurriaan Gouw discusses changes to Greek warfare in the 5th-4th centuries BC and the development of the Macedonian phalanx, in an article entitled 'Less is More: The Transition from Hoplite to Phalangite'.

You can read it here.

We are delighted to share some brilliant news from one of our PGR students - Raad Khair Allah, has successfully published a critical reflection on Syria's war. This important piece was featured in a special issue by the Institute of Advanced Study at Leicester University.

Dr Fred Reid, Emeritus Reader and former Head of Department for History, features in the 13 November dated edition of 'insite', the Warwick staff hub, for Disability History month.

Fred, who was 14 years old when he went blind, is known for his work to support blind and disabled people across the UK. He and his wife Etta have even been presented with honorary Warwick degrees to recognise their efforts.

UK Disability History Month (UKDHM) is an annual event which aims to promote disabled people's rights and their struggle for equality now and in the past. This year, UKDHM will take place from 14 November – 20 December 2024. Every year, UKDHM focuses on a theme. This year, the theme is Disability, Livelihood and Employment.

Read the insite article in full.

Autumn School for Postgraduate Students and Early Career Researchers

Venice, 30 September – 4 October 2024

Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Warwick are delighted to announce that a Commonwealth Shared Scholarship is available for the MA Applied Theatre: Arts, Action, Change in 2025/26. Click for further details.

The University of Warwick’s School of Modern Languages & Cultures invites applications from highly qualified prospective doctoral students for its PhD programmes in French, German, Italian, and Hispanic Studies, and Translation & Translation Cultural Studies (TTS).

For further information, see the School’s webpages on postgraduate study.

Doctoral funding is available through university-wide schemes (Chancellor’s International Scholarships, China Scholarship Council/University of Warwick scholarships), the AHRC Midlands4Cities Doctoral Training Partnership, and joint PhD programmes (e.g. the Monash-Warwick Alliance, Shanghai Jiao Tong University-Warwick Joint PhD programme).

Given the early deadlines (in late November; December; or January, depending on the scheme), and the multi-stage selection process, we encourage applicants to get in touch with their preliminary enquiries by sending an academic CV and draft research proposal to the School Director of Graduate Studies, Professor Ingrid De Smet (I.de-Smet@warwick.ac.uk), by 28 October 2024,

and/or to the relevant subject-specific postgraduate research admissions advisors:

• French & francophone: Prof. Ingrid De Smet (i.de-smet@warwick.ac.uk)
• German: Dr Nicholas Jones (Nicholas.d.jones@warwick.ac.uk)
• Italian: Prof. Fabio Camilletti (F.Camilletti@warwick.ac.uk)
• Hispanic Studies: Assoc. Prof. Tom Whittaker (t.whittaker@warwick.ac.uk)
• Translation & Transcultural Studies: Assoc. Prof. Caroline Summers (Caroline.Summers@warwick.ac.uk)

Enquiries from suitably qualified self-funded or externally funded (sponsored) students are also welcome.

Online PhD admissions interviews will likely be held in the weeks commencing 9^th and 16^th December 2024.

On Tuesday 29th October, the School for Cross-Faculty Studies (SCFS) ran its Work Placement Fair, offering Warwick students the opportunity to meet students who have undertaken a work placement and find out more about their experiences.

Read more.

Louise is a former Warwick Liberal Arts student currently pursuing a PhD at Harvard University in the USA. She shares some of her undergraduate study experiences and how the Liberal Arts programme at Warwick contributed to her continued success in academia.

Read more.

Lead authors: Pietari Kääpä (Warwick) and Hunter Vaughan (Emerson College/Cambridge)

Co-authors: Norma Cuadros (Warwick), Kate Moffat (Warwick) and Vanessa Zarm (UCL)

The Greening European Film Policy report is available for download from the Global Green Media Network website: https://www.globalgreenmedianetwork.org/reports

This report examines European film, television, and streaming industry sustainability policies, management, financing, and production at local, state, and EU levels. It explores policy support for institutionalizing these practices and offers solutions to fill policy gaps.

Produced in collaboration with Green Eyes (Hungary), Ecomuvi (Italy), Film London (UK), Screen Greening (Ireland), and Neptune Environmental (UK), the report aims to make green film production an active agent for positive transformation in the industry. Addressing funding, production, and reportage phases, the report provides three key recommendations.

1. Minimum Standards:

Establish standardised sustainability expectations and norms, from development-stage planning to on-set baselines, for both publicly-financed and commercial productions.

2. Finance

Adopt mandatory financial investment schemes for all productions, including incoming mobile productions and international co-productions, to link financial incentives with verifiable reductions in environmental impact.

3. Auditing

Introduce third-party auditing and certification focused on exceeding minimum standards, directly tied to financial incentivisation.

Please contact Pietari Kaapa (P.Kaapa@warwick.ac.uk) or Hunter Vaughan (hunter.vaughan@emerson.edu) with any questions.

During a year of research leave, Prof. Beat Kümin has investigated the phenomenon of depositing chronicles and objects into tower spheres on top of prominent buildings like churches, town halls and fortifications.

During a year of research leave, Prof. Beat Kümin has investigated the phenomenon of depositing chronicles and objects into tower spheres on top of prominent buildings like churches, town halls and fortifications. Documented from the Middle Ages to the present, seemingly only in and around territories of the erstwhile Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, the custom provides fascinating insights into how local societies saw themselves and what they wished to pass on to successive generations. The project, supported by the German Gerda Henkel Foundation, has so far identified over 1600 sites and thousands of separate deposits (at one Zurich church, there were no fewer than 20 between 1505 and 1996). The funder has just released a video series of six episodes (accessible in both English and German) documenting field work in Switzerland in autumn 2003.

[English Trailer] [Episodes] [Project Homepage]

This workshopLink opens in a new window focuses on significant theoretical and methodological developments in the interdisciplinary field of travel studies and reflects on the directions that it might take next. We will consider the legacies of the New Historicist and postcolonial approaches which shaped the study of travel in the 1980s and 1990s before turning to the insights and provocations offered by more recent scholarship rooted in feminist, queer, Black, migration, and decolonial studies. With these various theories and methods in mind, we will examine items drawn from the Newberry Library’s extensive collection of materials on travel, including maps. In doing so, we will discuss the questions these materials raise about issues at the heart of travel studies, such as the relationship of knowledge and power, different forms of positionality and perspective, the challenges of translation and comparison, and the definition of “travel” itself.

Led by Natalya Din-Kariuki (University of Warwick). May 16, 2025, 9:30am–4:30pm, at the Newberry. The application deadline is November 15, 2024.

Iain EmsleyLink opens in a new window has had a paper, Stable Ecologies?: Computational Audible Infrastructures in Generative AI Audio, accepted to be given at the Music & Online Cultures in a Changing Platform Ecosystem