Professor Karen Boyle

Personal statement

I am Professor of Feminist Media Studies and Head of Department of Humanities. I have been at Strathclyde since 2018, having previously held positions at the Universities of Stirling (Professor of Feminist Media Studies), Glasgow (Senior/Lecturer in Film & Television Studies) and Wolverhampton (Lecturer in Women's Studies). 

My research has long focused on questions of violence, gender and representation: my most recent books are #MeToo, Weinstein and Feminism (Palgrave, 2019 - with an expanded and revised edition commissioned for publication in 2024) and the Routledge Companion to Gender, Media and Violence (co-edited with Susan Berridge). Earlier publications include Media and Violence: Gendering the Debate (Sage 2005) and, as editor,  Everyday Pornography (Routledge 2010). I have additional research interests in media audiences, gender and news, and the women's movement in Scotland.

Recent funded projects include a BA/Leverhulme small grant project on the use of Trigger Warnings in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (with Melanie McCarry) and a Scottish Universities Insight Institute Project on women of colour in Scotland's news media (with Talat Yaqoob from Pass the Mic). The SUII project builds on previous work with Talat Yaqoob and Melody House. I was Scottish coordinator for the Global Media Monitoring Project (2015, 2020) and, in 2018, I led a Royal Society of Edinburgh-funded Workshop series on Tackling Gendered Inequalities in Scottish News, which led to the foundation of Gender Equal Media Scotland (the forerunner of the Equal Media and Culture Centre), a grouping of academics, journalists and activists working towards gender equality in Scottish media. 

On the teaching side, I contribute to the MSc in Applied Gender Studies and supervise Masters students across Gender Studies and Media and Communication. 

I am an experienced PhD supervisor and examiner and welcome applications from new students working in the broad areas of feminist film, television and media studies; gendered violence and representation; audience research and genre studies; and interdisciplinary feminist approaches to gender and violence.

I have supervised 19 PhDs to completion including two AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Awards (one with Glasgow Film, the other with the Scottish Football Association). Other completed PhDs include projects on #MeToo in English and Francophone literature and film; Women’s Aid networks and anti-domestic abuse activism in the UK, 1971-1996; gendered election coverage; forensic crime drama; female atheleticism in cinema; sexual violence in teen television; queer relationships in teen film; lesbian representation in contemporary horror; masculinity and surveillance in the serial killer film; female cannibalism in film & literature; rape discourse on social media; feminist anti-violence campaigns in Scotland; as well as two-practice based projects, one using the audio-visual essay to explore female performance in film, the other a novella series exploring women's experiences of violence over time. 

I was Deputy Chair of Sub-Panel 34 (Communication, Cultural and Media Studies, Library and Information Management) for REF2021, and am an elected member of the Media Communication and Cultural Studies Association (MeCCSA) Executive Committee (2014-2024).