Ghada Habib

Profile

Taking the career of John Akomfrah as its focus, my project considers his career-length engagement with the question of historicity with a particular emphasis on the role of montage. The project places Akomfrah in conversation with a number of critical thinkers including Stuart Hall and Walter Benjamin to make a case for the theoretical contributions his films make, and to frame the interventions they stage. Hall’s conceptualisation of articulation and conjunctural analysis form important nodes of this account, and are invoked to recognise the presence of a post-colonial historicity in Akomfrah’s films. Reaching back to the start of Akomfrah’s career and attending to the ‘audio’ of Black Audio Film Collective, the project additionally explores the use of sound in works he has directed.

The project is supported by the AHRC funded doctoral training partnership, White Rose College of the Arts & Humanities.

Research interests

My interests include aethetics and politics, diasporic history and identity, the essay film, moving image, and post-colonial and feminist perspectives.

Qualifications

• MA History of Art, University of Leeds (2017)
• BA (Hons) English Literature, University College London (2013)