Professor Anandi Ramamurthy BA, PGDip, PhD
Professor in Media and Culture
Summary
I am a Professor in Media and Culture. My research has focused on critically analysing ‘race’ and racism in media and culture to challenge hegemonies and amplify the voice of communities whose stories are often not heard. I am committed to research that is driven by the desire to bring progressive change and to communicating outside of academia. I believe the arts and media can have a powerful role to play in this. These interests have led to research projects in places as diverse as Pakistan, Palestine, Bradford and Sheffield. Currently I am working on a UKRI Urgent Covid19 Call project funded by the AHRC which aims to shed light on experiences of Black, Asian and minority ethnic health care workers in the Pandemic. Nursing Narratives: Racism and the Pandemic.
About
My interest in racialised representations began with the organistion of the exhibition Black Markets: Images of black people in advertising and ephemera in Britian (Cornerhouse and South Bank Touring). This led to a PhD that focused on changing ideologies of colonialism and racism in British advertising 1880-1990, published in Imperial Persuaders: Images of Africa and Asia in British Advertising (2003 MUP). Since the publication of Imperial Persuaders, I have explored contemporary representations of the Global South to consider the racialised nature of promotional culture. I have also sought to explore resistance to stereotyping and racism and to document people’s histories. In 2003 I produced the website www.tandana.org to collect the public documents produced by the Asian Youth Movements. My book Black Star: Britain’s Asian Youth Movements was based on interviews with dozens of participants as well as the digital archive. My interest in people’s histories also led me to collect Partition stories in Pakistan to consider not just the manifestations of fear and violence, but class relations that were communalised in pre-partition Punjab. In 2016-2019 I was part of the Creative Interruptions consortium that explores a series of ways in which the arts were used to challenge the status quo. The strand at Hallam focused on Palestinian cinema to consider the challenges faced by Palestinian filmmakers and the ways they have tried to overcome them. . Struggling to be seen: The travails of Palestinian cinema documents the work that we undertook during those three years. In response to the unequal impact of the pandemic on the lives of Black and Asian people in the UK, I am currently leading the project Nursing Narratives: Racism and the Pandemic to document the experiences of racism faced by Black and Asian health care workers both during and prior to the pandemic. I am interested in supervising doctoral students, both theoretical and practice based on topics relating to ‘race’ and racism in media and culture; opening up the archive; anti-colonial/ anti-racist histories and heritage.
Teaching
Department of Media Arts and Communication
Social Sciences and Arts
Subject area
Media
Courses
BA Media
Modules
Power Politics and the Media;
News Media
Research
Current Projects
The inter-disciplinary research project, Nursing Narratives – Racism and the Pandemic, is being undertaken by academics from the Culture and Creativity Research Institute and the College of Health, Wellbeing and Life Sciences at Sheffield Hallam in collaboration with Migrant Media, Kanlungan, Carribean African Health Network and Manchester Metropolitan University. It has been awarded funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council following UKRI’s call for projects to explore the impact of Covid-19. The study will explore how racism has played out during the pandemic and the impact that this has had on the lives of those working in healthcare. Film and wider storytelling techniques will be used to profile the stories of nurses and care staff, and to document the diverse racisms that they have encountered and challenged throughout their working lives.
Featured Projects
https://www.shu.ac.uk/news/all-articles/latest-news/hallam-study-to-explore-racism-in-healthcare-during-pandemic
https://nursingnarratives.com
https://blogs.shu.ac.uk/c3riimpact/anandi-ramamurthy-blog-palestine-film/?doing_wp_cron=1506728692.1921479701995849609375
www.tandana.org
https://archive.discoversociety.org/2019/04/03/racism-self-defence-and-the-asian-youth-movements/
https://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/families-divided-the-campaign-for-anwar-ditta-and-her-children
Relevant Projects
nursingnarratives.com
www.tandana.org
creativeinterruptions.com/commissions/palestiniancinema
bradfordsnationalmuseum.org
Collaborators and Sponsors
I dont know what this means - there are many depending on the project
Publications
Journal articles
Ramamurthy, A., & Edwards, L. (2017). (In)credible India? : a critical analysis of India’s nation branding. Communication Culture and Critique, 10 (2), 322-343. http://doi.org/10.1111/cccr.12152
Ramamurthy, A. (2016). Contesting the Visualisation of Gaza. Photographies, 9 (1), 31-50. http://doi.org/10.1080/17540763.2016.1138994
Ramamurthy, A. (2012). Absences and silences: the representation of the tea picker in colonial and fair trade advertising. Visual Culture in Britain, 13 (3), 367-381. http://doi.org/10.1080/14714787.2012.717457
Ramamurthy, A. (2011). Remembering the Asian youth movement in Manchester. Journal of the North West Labour History, 36, 31-36.
Ramamurthy, A. (2011). South Asian mobilisation in two northern cities: a comparison of Manchester and Bradford Asian youth movements. Ethnicity and Race in a Changing World, 2 (2), 26-42. http://clok.uclan.ac.uk/2096/
Ramamurthy, A. (2006). Archiving the history of a social movement: Tandana-Glow worm, the Asian Youth Movements Archive. South Asian Cultural Studies, 1 (1), 12-13. http://www.southasianculturalstudies.co.uk/Documents/Document%204%20Ramamurthy,%20A%20-%20Tandana-Glowworm%20%E2%80%93%20Archiving%20struggles%20for%20social%20justice%20The%20Asian%20Youth%20Movements.pdf
Ramamurthy, A. (2006). The politics of Britain's Asian youth Movements. Race and Class, 48, 38-60. http://doi.org/10.1177/0306396806069522
Ramamurthy, A. (2000). Landscapes of order and Imperial control: The representation of plantation production in late-Nineteenth and Early-Twentieth Century tea advertising. Space and Culture, 2 (4-5), 159-168. http://doi.org/10.1177/120633120000200407
Ramamurthy, A. (1999). Greater France: A history of French overseas expansion. EUROPEAN HISTORY QUARTERLY, 29 (1), 161-163. http://doi.org/10.1177/026569149902900108
Conference papers
Ramamurthy, A. (2015). Marxism and anti-imperialism in Britain's Asian youth movements. In MeCCSA Annual Conference : Generations, Northumbria University, 7 January 2015 - 9 January 2015.
Ramamurthy, A. (2005). Waiting for an Engineer: Memories of Partition in Porthohar. In Sustainable Development Policy Institute's Eighth Sustainable Development Conference, Islamabad, ISBN 969878450-0, (pp. 307-315).
Book chapters
Ramamurthy, A. (2021). Advertising and Race. In Farris, S., Skeggs, B., Toscano, A., & Bromberg, S. (Eds.) The SAGE Handbook of Marxism. Sage: https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/the-sage-handbook-of-marxism/book248518
Ramamurthy, A., & Wilson, K. (2017). ‘An act of struggle in the present’: History, education and political campaigning by South Asian anti-imperialist activists in Britain. In Choudry, A., & Vally, S. (Eds.) Reflections on knowledge, learning and social movements: History's schools. Abingdon: Routledge: https://www.routledge.com/Reflections-on-Knowledge-Learning-and-Social-Movements-Historys-Schools/Choudry-Vally/p/book/9781138059108
Ramamurthy, A. (2015). Spectacles and illusions: photography and commodity culture. In Photography: a critical introduction. (pp. 205-256). London: Routledge: http://doi.org/10.4324/9781315727370
Ramamurthy, A. (2014). Marxism and Anti-imperialism in Britain’s Asian Youth Movements. In Price, S., & Sabido, R.S. (Eds.) Contemporary Protest and the Legacy of Dissent. (pp. 189-206). Rowman and Littlefield: https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781783481750/Contemporary-Protest-and-the-Legacy-of-Dissent
Ramamurthy, A., & Wilson, K. (2013). "Come and Join the Freedom Lovers!": Racism, appropriation and resistance in Advertising’. In Hund, W.D., Pickering, M., & Ramamurthy, A. (Eds.) Commodity Racism and Colonial Advertising. Lit Verlag
Ramamurthy, A., & Wilson, K. (2013). "Come and Join the Freedom Lovers!": Racism, appropriation and resistance in Advertising’. In Hund, W.D., Pickering, M., & Ramamurthy, A. (Eds.) Commodity Racism and Colonial Advertising. Lit Verlag
Ramamurthy, A. (2009). Spectacles and illusions: photography and commodity culture. In Photography: a critical introduction, Fourth Edition. (pp. 205-256). London/New York: Routledge
Ramamurthy, A. (2006). Images of an industrialised Empire and Commonwealth during the shift to neo-colonialism. In Faulkner, S., & Ramamurthy, A. (Eds.) Visual culture and decolonisation in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate
Ramamurthy, A. (2006). Images of an industrialised Empire and Commonwealth during the shift to neo-colonialism. In Faulkner, S., & Ramamurthy, A. (Eds.) Visual culture and decolonisation in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate
Adi, H., & Ramamurthy, A. (2006). Tracing fragments in the visual culture of anti-colonial struggle in Britain. In Faulkner, S., & Ramamurthy, A. (Eds.) Visual culture and decolonisation in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate
Adi, H., & Ramamurthy, A. (2006). Tracing fragments in the visual culture of anti-colonial struggle in Britain. In Faulkner, S., & Ramamurthy, A. (Eds.) Visual culture and decolonisation in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate
Ramamurthy, A. (2006). Waiting for the engineer: memories of Partition in Pothohar. In At the crossroads: South Asian research, policy and development in a globalized world. Pakistan: Sustainable Development Policy Institute
Ramamurthy, A. (2005). Secular identities and the Asian Youth Movements. In 10th International conference on alternative futures and popular protests. Manchester: Manchester Metropolitan University
Ramamurthy, A. (2003). Orientalism and the paisley pattern. In Boydell, C., & Shaffer, M. (Eds.) Disentangling textiles. (pp. 121-134). Middlesex: Middlesex University Press
Books
Ramamurthy, A., & Kelemen, P. (2020). Struggling to be seen: The Travails of Palestinian Cinema. Daraja Press. https://darajapress.com/publication/struggling-to-be-seen-the-travails-of-palestinian-cinema
Ramamurthy, A. (2013). Black Star: Britain's Asian Youth Movements. London: Pluto Press.
Hund, W.D., Pickering, M., & Ramamurthy, A. (Eds.). (2013). Colonial advertising and commodity racism. Lit Verlag.
Ramamurthy, A., & Faulkner, S. (Eds.). (2006). Visual culture and decolonisation in Britain. Aldershot: Ashgate.
Ramamurthy, A. (2003). Imperial persuaders: images of African and Asian People in British Advertising. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Internet Publications
Ramamurthy, A. (2019). Resisting Displacement, Overcoming Separation in Palestinian Cinema. https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/viewfinder/articles/resisting-displacement-overcoming-separation-in-palestinian-cinema/
Ramamurthy, A. (2019). ‘Racism, Self Defence and the Asian Youth Movements’. https://archive.discoversociety.org/2019/04/03/racism-self-defence-and-the-asian-youth-movements/
Exhibitions
Ramamurthy, A. (2005). Come what may: The Asian youth movements and campaigns for social justice in the 1970s and 1980s Britain. Manchester Central Reference LIbrary/ National Museum of Labour History.
Ramamurthy, A. (1990). Black markets: images of black people in advertising and packaging 1880-1990. Touring exhibition Manchester Cornerhouse, South Bank Centre, Coventry Art Gallery.
Ramamurthy, A. (1990). Fear and fantasy. Manchester City Art Gallery.
Media
Ramamurthy, A. (2007). Kara Tara: a history of the Asian youth movements. [Video/streaming video]. http://www.tandana.org/Video/watch-kala-tara-dvd-online.html
Presentations
Ramamurthy, A. (2015). Open Bethlehem - post screening discussion with director Leila Sansour. Presented at: Open Bethlehem screening, Sheffield Showroom Cinema, 2015
Ramamurthy, A. (2014). The lessons and legacies of Britain's Asian youth movements. Presented at: Political Studies Association, Manchester, 2014
Ramamurthy, A. (2014). Black star: Britain's Asian youth movement. Presented at: Bristol Anarchist Book Fair, Hydra Books
Other publications
Ramamurthy, A. (2005). Tandana-Glow worm archive of approximately 2000 documents relating to the Asian Youth Movements. Not specified: http://www.tandana.org/
Postgraduate supervision
I am interested in supervising doctoral students, both theoretical and practice based on topics relating to ‘race’ and racism in media and culture; opening up the archive; anti-colonial/ anti-racist histories and heritage. Recent supervision: Miles Umney, The discursive construction of amateur filmmaking: a video-based genealogy, First supervisor, submission date January 2021 Aditi Jaganathan, Decolonial Ruptures : Black and Brown Audio-Visual Culture in Britain, Brunel University, second supervisor, Submission date April 2021 Shahd Abusalama Representations of Gaza refugees in documentary film: colonial, humanitarian and Palestinian discourses DOS (submission Date June 2021)