Biography
Dr. Victoria Duckett is Senior Lecturer in Screen. She is an award winning international scholar and teacher who advocates for female leadership in the creative industries. Joining theatre to film, she helps foster unique interdisciplinary connections in her teaching, research and public outreach.
Most recently, Victoria won the Senses of Cinema Annual Essay Prize (2021), was a Visiting International Scholar in Film and Theatre in the Cini Foundation (Venice, 2018), a Scholar in Residence at the University of Exeter (2018), and the recipient of an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Research Fellowship at the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas, Austin (2017). A founding participant in the Women and Silent History Conference (Utrecht, 1994), she introduced this conference to Australasia (Melbourne 2013, Shanghai 2017) when she served as Chair of Women and Film History International (2009-2013). Victoria’s debut monograph, supported by an Australian Academy of the Humanities grant, was the winner of a Choice Outstanding Academic title (2016). Research for her current monograph (University of California Press, 2022) has been enabled by her ongoing collaboration with the Cinémathèque Française (Paris), the Gaumont Pathé Archives (Paris), the EYE Filmmuseum (Amsterdam) and the British Film Institute. With Professor Richard Abel, Victoria curates programs at the world’s foremost archival film festival, Le Giornate del Cinema Muto (Italy; 2019 and forthcoming 2022 and 2023). Invited editor of 5 special editions of Q1 journals, Victoria is on the founding editorial board of Feminist Media Histories (UC Press) and Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film (SAGE). Her work has been translated into Chinese, French and Italian, and is feature in 2021 with Bridget Kendall on BBC World Forum.
Read more on Victoria's profileBiography summary
Dr. Victoria Duckett is Senior Lecturer in Screen. She is an award winning international scholar and teacher who advocates for female leadership in the creative industries. Joining theatre to film, she helps foster unique interdisciplinary connections in her teaching, research and public outreach.
Career highlights
Senses of Cinema Annual Essay Prize (“The Lecturer’s Legacy; In Memory of Peter Wollen.” 2021.
Visiting Professor, ALMED (Postgraduate School in Media, Communication and Performing Arts). Catholic University of Milan, 2019.
International Scholar in Residence, Cini Foundation, San Giorgio, Venice, 2018.
International Visiting Researcher Stipend, The Bill Douglas Cinema Museum, University of Exeter, 2018.
Visiting Professor, ALMED (Postgraduate School in Media, Communication and Performing Arts) Catholic University of Milan. Topic: Film Festivals. 2018.
Harry Ransom Center Research Fellowship in the Humanities, University of Texas at Austin, 2017.
Visiting Professor, Department of Musicology and Culture, University of Pavia. Workshop: Film Theory, 2017,
Choice selection of Seeing Sarah Bernhardt: Performance and Silent Film as “one of the best academic books of 2015.” 2016.
Annual Keynote Lecture, Society for Theatre Research, Swedenborg Hall, London. 2016.
Australian Academy of the Humanities Publication Subsidy. 2015.
Visiting Fellowship, Humanities Research Centre, Australian National University, Canberra. 2014.
Research interests
Women and creative industries, film and technological change, screen performance, archives
Affiliations
Professional Memberships
American Society of Theatre Research
EADH (European Association for the Digital Humanities)
Society for Cinema and Media Studies
Women and Film History International
Teaching interests
I am a teaching leader with over thirty years of experience in curriculum design and delivery at renowned universities across the world. My excellence in the classroom has been recognized by teaching awards (2019, 2014, 1998) and consistently high student satisfaction rates. I excel at introducing inclusive pedagogy and adapting learning materials to ensure gender and cultural equity. I am a committed mentor of junior staff and HDR students, and excel in building collaborative teaching teams.
Areas of teaching specialisation: Screen industries, transnational film, film and technological change, feminist film.
Units taught
ACF104: Moving Pictures: Screening Film History (Unit Chair)
ACF206: Contemporary Topics in Screen Culture: Film Festivals today (Unit Chair; designed and introduced Unit)
ACF320: The Australian Moving Image (Unit Chair)
ACA492: Creative Arts Exegesis (Unit Chair; Honours, including Film, Perofrming Arts, Creative Arts, and Dance)
Knowledge areas
Victoria's knowledge areas include:
Screen cultures, screen performance, film history, media archives
Expertise
- Teaching
Conferences
Maynooth University, Ireland, “French actresses and the formation of transnational fil.,” New Historiographies: The Role of Women panel, HoMER (History of Moviegoing, Exhibition and Reception) Conference, May 29, 2021.
Università degli Studi di Milano and Deakin University, “A Neapolitan in Melbourne: Building the Giannini Archive.” Guglielmo Giannini: Entertainment and Political Activism, November 18, 2020.
EYE Filmmuseum, Amsterdam, “Les Deux Orphelines: the emergence and endurance of sisterhood in France.” Women and Silent Screen Conference, May 26, 2019.
Manchester University, “Theatre, early film and the birth of intervisual culture: Between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” Department of Drama and Screen Studies, Keynote, January 29, 2018.
University of Warwick, “Multiple Sightings: Sarah Bernhardt in the City.” City, Space, and Spectacle in Nineteenth-Century Performance. Palazzo Pesaro-Papafava, Venice, 11 June 2018.
University of Otago, New Zealand, “Screening the stage: Actresses and acting in France from Theatre to Silent Cinema.” Keynote. Media, Film & Communication Department, October 27, 2017.
Columbia University, “Performing in pairs: Sarah Bernhardt and Gabrielle Réjane.” Columbia University Film and Media Studies Colloquium, Keynote, April 3, 2017.
Shanghai Film Museum, “The Demimondaine as Transmedia Celebrity: Remembering La Belle Otèro”. Histories, Her-stories, and Methods International Conference, June 18, 2017.
Swedenborg Hall, London, “Screening Sarah Bernhardt: Reinterpreting Acting on Silent Film." Society for Theatre Research Annual Lecture, January 19, 2016.
Professional activities
Referee for Marie Sklodowska Curie Actions (European Commission, 2020)
Referee for American Fulbright Award (2019, 2020)
International referee for the National Agency for the Evaluation of Universities and Research Institutes, Italy (ANVUR, ongoing).
Women and Film History International Steering Committee (2010–2015)
Feminisms, Medias, Histories Journal, University of California Press, Founding Editorial Board member.
Journal of Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film, Editorial board, SAGE.
Global Digital Humanities Program Committee Referee, 2014-2019
External Assessor, Research Foundation–Flanders (National Fund for Scientific Research: Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek– Vlaanderen, FWO), 2016.
Article/Book referee for:
Cinegrafie, Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, Feminist Media Histories, French Studies, Global Digital Humanities Conference Referee, Immagine (Journal of the Italian Association for Research in Film History)
Media Industries Journal, Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film, Palgrave MacMillan (Victorian Studies), Popular Entertainment Studies, Routledge, Gender Studies series, Senses of Cinema, Screening the Past
Media appearances
BBC World Forum: “Sarah Bernhardt on Stage and Screen.” With Bridget Kendall, October 21, 2021.
The Conversation: “International film archives are streaming up a storm during lockdown.” 18 May, 2020.
ABC Radio Melbourne: “Accessing Australian Film online.” Discussion with Marc Fennell. Download This Show. 21 May, 2020. (With Gillian Armstrong).
2esr 107.3: “Film Archiving in Australia.” With Mikayla Floriano. Archives. May 18, 2020.
ABC Adelaide Drive: “Film in Australia.” With Jules Schiller. May 22, 2020.
ABC Melbourne Radio interview: “Australian films are not online.” With Jacinta Parsons. Afternoons, 26 June 2020.
3RRR: “Performance and Silent Film.” With Paul Harris. Film Buff’s Hour, May 7, 2016.
Research groups
Contemporary Histories Research Group
Deakin Motion Lab
Gender and Sexuality Research Network
Keylight (Gender and screen)
Awards
Senses of Cinema Annual Essay Prize (“The Lecturer’s Legacy; In Memory of Peter Wollen.”) 2021.
Faculty of Arts and Education Faculty Fellowship Grant, 2021. $6 022.
Deakin University Mid-career Research coaching, Research Coaching Australia (with Roy Jones)
Deakin University Community Bank for Geelong Arts Centre, REFLEX: The Future of our Creative Community, 2019. $6000.
Greater Geelong City Council, Creative Communities (Arts) Grant, Geelong Arts Centre, REFLEX: The Future of our Creative Community, 2019. $6 000.
International Visiting Researcher Stipend, The Bill Douglas Cinema Museum, University of Exeter, UK, 2018. $3000.
Invited international Scholar in Residence, Cini Foundation, San Giorgio, Venice
Visiting Professor, Department of Musicology and Cultural Heritage, Univeristy of Pavia, Italy.
Seeing Sarah Bernhardt: Performance and Silent Film named a 2016 Choice Outstanding Academic Title.
Harry Ransom Center Research Fellowship in the Humanities (supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Research Fellowship Endowment), University of Texas at Austin, 2017. $5 000.
Central Research Grant Scheme Award, Deakin Research, Faculty of Arts and Education, Deakin University, 2016. To build theatre and theatre archiving capacity in the SCCA; for Guglielmo Giannini: A Digital Archive of Film, Theatre, and Political Activity, the SCCA’s first digital archive, $10 000.
Australian Academy of the Humanities Award, 2015. $2400.
Visiting Fellowship, “History, Cinema, Digital Archives.” Humanities Research Centre, Australian National University, Canberra, 2014. Travel, accommodation.
Projects
Media matriarchs: the French stage celebrity and the development of transnational film (monograph, University of California Press). This project explores a generation of celebrity actresses who drove the global emergence and development of the culture industries in the early twentieth century, but who have beenoverlooked, elided and ignored in public history.
Building a Popular Memory Bank in Australia: the People of Hong Kong at the End of the British Empire. The project is exploratory in terms of archive engagement and collections. It draws on my established expertise in building internationally significant collections with Deakin’s Digital Libraries and Repositories (Guglielmo Giannini: A Digital Archive of Theatre, Film, Entertainment and Political Activism, 2019).
Towards a national history of stage and screen: Developing ACMI’s Screen History exhibition
This project develops the application of VR to national film history, drawing on my expertise in the related histories of theatre and film.
Publications
Celebrating Transgressive Celebrity: Sarah Bernhardt
Victoria Duckett
(2021), pp. 221-227, The Art of Being Dangerous : Exploring Women and Danger through Creative Expression, Leuven, Belgium, B1
Victoria Duckett
(2021), pp. 3-10, Guglielmo Giannini: Uomo di Spettacolo, Bari, Italy, B1
Guglielmo Giannini : Uomo di Spettacolo
Victoria Duckett, Elena Mosconi, Raffaele de Berti, Mariagabriella Cambiaghi, Gian Brunetta, Franco Perelli, Paolo Quazzolo, Paolo Caponi, Maria Pagani, Cristina Formenti, Mario Galeotti, Rinaldo Vignati, Irene Piazzoni
(2021), Bari, Italy, A7
The lecturer's legacy: In memory of Professor Peter Wollen
Victoria Duckett
(2020), Senses of Cinema, Melbourne, VIC, C1
Performing art nouveau: Sarah Bernhardt and the development of industrial modernism
Victoria Duckett
(2019), Vol. 4, Modernism/modernity, Baltimore, Md., C1
The demimondaine as transmedia celebrity: remembering La Belle Otèro
Victoria Duckett
(2019), Vol. 7, pp. 115-127, Dianying yanjiu (film studies), China, C1
V Duckett
(2018), Vol. 2, pp. 1-14, Close-up : Great cinematic performances Volume 2 : International, Edinburgh, Sco., B1
Cinematizing theatre: Sarah Bernhardt, Gabrielle Réjane, and the early French double feature film
Victoria Duckett
(2018), Vol. 58, pp. 23-40, L'Esprit createur, New York, N.Y., C1
The actress-manager and the movies: resolving the double life of Sarah Bernhardt
V Duckett
(2018), Vol. 45, pp. 27-55, Nineteenth century theatre and film, London, Eng., C1
Editorial: the actress-manager and early film
Victoria Duckett, Vito Adriaensens
(2018), Vol. 45, pp. 3-8, Nineteenth century theatre and film, London, Eng., C1
Sarah Bernhardt's career as a movie star
Victoria Duckett
(2018), pp. 1-1, Screen Studies, London, Eng., C1
Victoria Duckett
(2018), Exeter, Eng., A6
When fame precedes them: cinema and 'the most beautiful women in the world'
V Duckett
(2018), pp. 1-23, Histories, her-stories and methods : Proceedings of the 2017 International Film Conference - Women and Silent Screen International Conference IX, Shanghai, China, E1
Guglielmo Giannini: a digital archive of theatre, film, entertainment and political activism
V Duckett
(2018), [Buwood, Vic.], J2
Guglielmo Giannini e la via del giallo, dal teatro al cinema
V Duckett
(2017), Vol. 587, pp. 129-132, Bianco e nero, Rome, Italy, C1
Her Majesty moves: Sarah Bernhardt, Queen Elizabeth and the development of motion pictures
V Duckett
(2016), pp. 111-131, British monarchy on screen, Manchester, Eng., B1
Celebrating transgressive celebrity: Sarah Bernhardt
V Duckett
(2016), pp. 1-6, Dangerous Women Project, Edinburgh, Scot., B1
V Duckett
(2016), Vol. 1.5.2.05 Nineteenth-Century French Writing and Culture, pp. 1-1, Literary encyclopedia, [London, Eng.], B1
Editors' introduction: archives and archivists
V Duckett, J Matthews
(2016), Vol. 2, pp. 1-5, Feminist media histories, Oakland, Calif., C1
An introduction to the interviews
V Duckett
(2016), Vol. 2, pp. 87-92, Feminist media histories, Oakland, Calif., C1
Introduction: Women and the silent screen
V Duckett, S Potter
(2015), pp. 1-7, Screening the past, Melbourne, Vic., C1
Unwinding the film spool: Hugo, Méliès, and our return to early film
V Duckett
(2014), Vol. 8, pp. 33-42, Studies in documentary film, Abingdon, England, C1
V Duckett
(2014), Vol. 42, pp. 528-540, Literature-Film quarterly, Salisbury, U. S., C1-1
The "voix d'or" on silent film: the case of Sarah Bernhardt
V Duckett
(2013), pp. 318-333, Researching women in silent cinema: new findings and perspectives, Bologna, Italy, B1-1
Kaleidescope: women and cinematic change from the silent era to now
V Duckett
(2013), pp. 2-12, Researching women in silent cinema: new findings and perspectives, Bologna, Italy, B1-1
Pictures and prizes: Le Grand Prix de Rome and Grand Prix
V Duckett
(2011), pp. 129-142, A little solitaire: John Frankenheimer and American film, New Brunswick, N.J., B1-1
The stars might be smiling : a feminist forage into a famous film
V Duckett
(2011), pp. 161-181, Fantastic voyages of the cinematic imagination : Georges Méliès's trip to the moon, Albany, N.Y., B1-1
La 'voix d'or' al cinema: l'eco di Sarah Bernhardt in Italia
V Duckett
(2011), Vol. 570, pp. 74-81, Bianco e Nero, Rome, Italy, C1-1
Women and the silent screen VI
V Duckett
(2011), Vol. 50, pp. 102-105, Cinema journal, Austin, Texas, C1-1
Who was Sarah Bernhardt? Negotiating fact and fiction
V Duckett
(2011), Vol. 10, pp. 103-112, Journal of historical biography, [Abbotsford, British Columbia], C1-1
Investigating an interval: Sarah Bernhardt, Hamlet, and the Paris Exposition of 1900
V Duckett
(2010), pp. 193-212, Reclaiming the archive: feminism and film history, Detroit, Michigan, B1-1
The European actress, the Liberty style, and the diva on the silent screen
V Duckett
(2010), pp. 126-136, Not so silent : women in cinema before sound, Stockholm, Sweden, B1-1
Reworking romanticism: Paul Cox's 'Man of flowers'
V Duckett
(2009), Senses of cinema, Melbourne, Vic., C1-1
Reflections on a feminist future: cooking cakes and baking biscuits in an early documentary film
V Duckett
(2007), Vol. 2, pp. 178-187, Comunicazioni sociali, Milan, Italy, C1-1
The moving pictures : Sarah Bernhardt and the theatrical film
V Duckett
(2006), pp. 314-326, Cinegrafie : the comic and the sublime, Bologna, Italy, B1-1
Beyond the body: Orlan and the material morph
V Duckett
(2000), pp. 209-223, Metamorphing : visual transformation and the culture of quick-change, Minneapolis, Minn., B1-1
Digitized dreamtime: the case of 'From Alice to Ocean'
V Duckett
(1998), Vol. 25, pp. 27-37, Iris: a journal of theory on image and sound, Des Moines, Iowa, C1-1
Funded Projects at Deakin
No Funded Projects at Deakin found
Supervisions
Vejune Zemaityte
Thesis entitled: Global cinema distribution: a large-scale data-driven study of film screenings
Doctor of Philosophy, School of Communication and Creative Arts