Review of the Research Institute for History and - Universiteit Utrecht

from Utrecht and Amsterdam. The database will collect and digitalise sources relating to cinema history
before 1940 and make this accessible through the internet. It is expected that such digital databases will
become increasingly important for fi lm studies. Thissen, Van der Velden and dr Karel Dibbets from the
University of Amsterdam are closely involved in the creation of an international network with similar aims.
The fi eld of Media Studies in the Netherlands is rapidly expanding, and attracts growing numbers of students.
In such a new discipline qualifi ed faculty is scarce. To cope with this problem OGC and the programme leadership
have decided in 2002 to appoint fi ve junior faculty with half-time research facilities, who can use that
extra time to fi nish their PhD-theses. International recruitment has helped to bring many faculty to Utrecht
from abroad. This has had the exciting side-effect of creating a mix of international scholars, from Australia,
Belgium, Germany, and the US. This in turn has brought scholars from many other countries to Utrecht, to
participate in such conferences as Visible Evidence in 2000, Level Up in 2003, and the Domitor conference
on early cinema in 2004.
A 4. Academic Reputation
Since 1998, Media Studies has grown into a group in its own right, with a strong international profi le. Uricchio
is one of the world’s leading experts on early German television, while De Leeuw is the acknowledged
expert on early Dutch television. The inclusion of dr Andreas Fickers has provided the group with an expert
on the history of media technology. Dr Joost Raessens and Marinka Copier MA have staked a claim for
Utrecht in the fi eld of computer games research by organizing the international conference Level Up (2003).
Members of the group are on the editorial boards and editorial advisory boards of national and international
scholarly journals, such as Tijdschrift voor Mediageschiedenis (Fickers, Hogenkamp, De Leeuw, Uricchio) Journal
of Popular British Cinema (Hogenkamp), the internet journal E-view (dr Chiel Kattenbelt), Living Pictures
(Kessler), Iris (Kessler), Montage/av (Kessler, Müller), and The International Journal of Cultural Studies (Uricchio).
Uricchio combines his position in Utrecht with a full professorship at MIT. Thissen and Van der Velden were
visiting professors at the UCLA History Department (2004), while Kessler is president of DOMITOR, the
International Association for Research on Early Cinema since 2003. The programme is successful in obtaining
funding from NWO.
A 5. External validation
Researchers in this group collaborate with numerous non-academic individuals and organizations, such as
the Raad voor Cultuur (Arts Council), in the fi eld of Media to help develop policies for the future. There are
also many routine contacts with institutions such as the Filmmuseum in Amsterdam, the Instituut voor Beeld
en Geluid (Institute for Vision and Sound), fi lm theatres, and fi lm festivals in the Netherlands to develop
interesting programmes.
The European CHICAM project is coordinated by De Leeuw. This project combines ethnography with a
socio-theoretical analysis of the role of media in the lives of migrants, and especially migrant children. This
research was commissioned by the European Commission in Brussels. Hogenkamp’s chair was instituted by
the Institute for Vision and Sound in 1998, and has been continued in 2003 for another fi ve-year period.
A 6. Internal evaluation and analysis: perspectives and expectations for the research programme
1. Strengths
This group has a broad orientation, and manages to combine a variety of approaches to Media Studies in a
programme that is becoming increasingly more coherent. Particularly in early fi lm, there is a strong focus
and cohesion. The members of the group are generally young and represent various national backgrounds
and intellectual traditions. The group has put itself, and Utrecht University, on the map by organizing several
international conferences in the recent past. Members of this group are in regular contact with policy makers
and collaborate with non-academic institutions and in the media sector itself.
OGC The Cultural Construction of Media
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