Linda Ruth Williams
Encyclopedia
Linda Ruth Williams is Professor
of Film Studies
in the School of Humanities at the University of Southampton
, UK. Her special interests include sexuality and censorship in cinema and literature (she has written widely on pornography
, including a book on soft-core cinema), women in film, psychoanalytic theory
and D. H. Lawrence
.
from Sussex on Lawrence, Nietzsche, Freud and Feminism
.
, Manchester and Exeter Universities, and, since 1994, at Southampton University.
She has written several books including the influential Critical Desire: Psychoanalysis and the Literary Subject, The Erotic Thriller in Contemporary Cinema, and is a regular contributor to the British Film Institute
's Sight and Sound magazine, and to radio programmes including Woman's Hour
. Her 2006 book, Contemporary American Cinema was co-edited with fellow Southampton lecturer Dr Michael Hammond.
, and they have two children. She is co-curator of the annual Shetland Film Festival, Screenplay, run by Shetland Arts
, and is a founding organiser of the New Forest Festival
.
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
of Film Studies
Film theory
Film theory is an academic discipline that aims to explore the essence of the cinema and provides conceptual frameworks for understanding film's relationship to reality, the other arts, individual viewers, and society at large...
in the School of Humanities at the University of Southampton
University of Southampton
The University of Southampton is a British public university located in the city of Southampton, England, a member of the Russell Group. The origins of the university can be dated back to the founding of the Hartley Institution in 1862 by Henry Robertson Hartley. In 1902, the Institution developed...
, UK. Her special interests include sexuality and censorship in cinema and literature (she has written widely on pornography
Pornography
Pornography or porn is the explicit portrayal of sexual subject matter for the purposes of sexual arousal and erotic satisfaction.Pornography may use any of a variety of media, ranging from books, magazines, postcards, photos, sculpture, drawing, painting, animation, sound recording, film, video,...
, including a book on soft-core cinema), women in film, psychoanalytic theory
Psychoanalytic theory
Psychoanalytic theory refers to the definition and dynamics of personality development which underlie and guide psychoanalytic and psychodynamic psychotherapy. First laid out by Sigmund Freud, psychoanalytic theory has undergone many refinements since his work...
and D. H. Lawrence
D. H. Lawrence
David Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation...
.
Education
Williams went to school in Bristol, where she grew up, and followed her English degree at Sussex University with an MA in Critical Theory. She earned her PhDPHD
PHD may refer to:*Ph.D., a doctorate of philosophy*Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*PHD finger, a protein sequence*PHD Mountain Software, an outdoor clothing and equipment company*PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
from Sussex on Lawrence, Nietzsche, Freud and Feminism
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
.
Career
She has lectured at LiverpoolUniversity of Liverpool
The University of Liverpool is a teaching and research university in the city of Liverpool, England. It is a member of the Russell Group of large research-intensive universities and the N8 Group for research collaboration. Founded in 1881 , it is also one of the six original "red brick" civic...
, Manchester and Exeter Universities, and, since 1994, at Southampton University.
She has written several books including the influential Critical Desire: Psychoanalysis and the Literary Subject, The Erotic Thriller in Contemporary Cinema, and is a regular contributor to the British Film Institute
British Film Institute
The British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
's Sight and Sound magazine, and to radio programmes including Woman's Hour
Woman's Hour
Woman's Hour is a radio magazine programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in the United Kingdom.-History:Created by Norman Collins and originally presented by Alan Ivimey the programme was first broadcast on 7 October 1946 on the BBC's Light Programme . It was transferred to its current home in 1973...
. Her 2006 book, Contemporary American Cinema was co-edited with fellow Southampton lecturer Dr Michael Hammond.
Personal life
She is married to the film critic Mark KermodeMark Kermode
Mark Kermode is an English film critic, musician and a member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts. He contributes to Sight and Sound magazine, The Observer newspaper and BBC Radio 5 Live, where he presents Kermode and Mayo's Film Reviews with Simon Mayo on Friday afternoons...
, and they have two children. She is co-curator of the annual Shetland Film Festival, Screenplay, run by Shetland Arts
Shetland Arts
Shetland Arts Development Agency or Shetland Arts for short, is a charitable organisation formed in 2006 with a remit to "encourage and assist in promoting and advancing the creation, practice and presentation and study of all forms of art - visual, performing and creative."The organisation, based...
, and is a founding organiser of the New Forest Festival
New Forest Festival
- Overview :According to the official site, the New Forest Festival is a "celebration of Storytelling, Film, Food & Music inspired by the natural beauty and cultural heritage of its setting"...
.
Books
- (1990) The Body and the Text: Hélène Cixous, Reading and Teaching, edited by Helen Wilcox, Keith McWatters, Ann Thompson and Linda Ruth Williams. Wheatsheaf.
- (1992) The Twentieth Century: From 1900 to the Present Day (Bloomsbury Guides to Literature), Bloomsbury Press
- Women in Love by D. H. Lawrence. Everyman Paperbacks, 1993. (Ed. and introduction.)
- (1993) Sex in the Head: Visions of Femininity and Film in D. H. Lawrence, Harvester Wheatsheaf
- (1995) Critical Desire: Psychoanalysis and the literary subject. Edward Arnold
- (1997) D. H. Lawrence, 'Writers and their Work' series. Northcote House/The British Council
- (2005) The Erotic Thriller in Contemporary Cinema. Edinburgh University Press
- (2006) Contemporary American Cinema, Open University Press (With Dr. Michael Hammond.)
Articles
- (1989) "Submission and reading: Feminine Masochism and Feminist Criticism", in New Formations, 7, Spring 1989, p. 9-19
- (1989) "Behind the Silken-Folded Mask: Victorian and Modern Poetry", in The Bloomsbury Guide to English Literature, edited by Marion Wynne Davis, Bloomsbury Press, pp. 253–291. (Also wrote numerous reference entries on British Poetry since 1830 for that text.)
- (1990) "Men in Feminism" in Women: A Cultural Review, 1, July 1990, pp. 63–5
- (1991) "Critical Warfare and Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer", in Feminist Criticism: Theory and Practice, edited by Susan Sellers, Harvester Wheatsheaf, pp. 23–43
- (1992) "Happy Families? Feminist Transmission and Matrilineal Thought", in New Feminist Discourses, edited by Isobel Armstrong, Routledge, pp. 48–64
- (1992) "The Trial of D. H. Lawrence" in Critical Survey, July 1992, pp. 154–161
- (1993) "Everything in question: women and film in prospect", pp. xxiv-xxix; "Sisters under the skin: video and blockbuster erotic thrillers", pp. 105–114; "Select Bibliography", pp. 254–264; all in Women and Film: A Sight and Sound Reader, edited by Pam Cook and Philip Dodd, Scarlet Press.
- (1994) "The Pornographic Subject: Feminism and Censorship in the 1990s", in Political Gender, edited by Sally Ledger, Josephine McDonagh and Jane Spencer, Harvester Wheatsheaf, pp. 189–203
- (1995) "Identity Orgies" in New Formations, No. 25, Summer 1995, pp. 123–127
- (1996) "Fiona Banner" in Spellbound: Art and Film, ed. Philip Dodd with Ian Christie, BFI and Hayward Gallery, pp. 52–59
- (1997) "Sex and Censoriousness: Pornography and Censorship in Britain", in The Media Reader, ed. Adam Briggs and Paul Cobley, Addison Wesley Longman, pp. 426–443
- (1997/8) "We've Been Forgetting that We're Flesh and Blood, Mother: Glad Ghosts and Uncanny Bodies", in D. H. Lawrence Review, Vol. 27, Nos 22-3, 1997/8, special edition on D. H. Lawrence and the Psychoanalytic, ed. Howard J. Booth, Elizabeth M. Fox and Fiona Becket, pp. 233–253
- (1999) "The Inside-Out of Masculinity: David Cronenberg's Visceral Pleasures", in The Body's Perilous Pleasures: Dangerous Desire and Contemporary Culture, ed. Michele Aaron, Edinburgh University Press 1999, pp. 30–48
- (1999) "Dream Girls and Mechanic Panic: Dystopia and its others in Brazil and Nineteen Eighty-Four", in Unearthly Strangers: The British Science Fiction Film, ed. I.Q. Hunter, Routledge, pp. 153–168, also reprinted in the 2004 anthology Liquid Metal: The Science Fiction Film Reader, ed Sean Redmond, Columbia University Press/Wallflower Press, 2004, pp. 64–73
- (1999) "The Edge of the Razor" (interview with director Catherine Breillat), in Sight and Sound, October 1999, pp. 13–14
- (2000) "Body Talk" in Action/Spectacle Cinema: A Sight and Sound Reader, ed. José Arroyo, London: BFI Publishing 2000, pp. 44–50
- (2001) "Blood Sisters" in Sight and Sound, 11 (6) June 2001, pp. 36–7
- (2002) "Escape artist" in Sight and Sound, October pp. 22–25
- (2002) "Sex and Censoriousness: Pornography and Censorship in Britain", extended and updated, The Media: An Introduction, second edition ed. Adam Briggs and Paul Cobley, Pearson Education pp. 477–495
- (2003) "Swing high, swing low" in @Sight and Sound@, March, pp. 32–3
- (2004) "Ready for Action: G.I.Jane, Demi Moore's Body and the Female Combat Movie", in Action and Adventure Cinema, ed. Yvonne Tasker, London: Routledge, pp. 169–185
- (2005) "Twin Peaks: David Lynch and the serial-thriller soap", in The Contemporary Television Series, edited by Michael Hammond and Lucy Mazdon, Edinburgh University Press, pp. 37–56
- (2005) "Songs For Swinging Lovers", in Sight and Sound, December 2005
- (2007) "Sleeping With The Enemy", in Sight and Sound, February 2007
- (2007) "Ken Russell: Sweet Swell Of Excess", in Sight and Sound, July 2007
- (2009) "Mister Strangelove", in "Sight and Sound", March 2009