Dr Joan Ormrod  

Research
Researching women in comics and subcultural identities. Research into subcultures develops my PhD, 'Expressions of Nation and Place in British Surfing Identities' which focused on analysing representations of surfing and national identity through film and popular culture. I have extensive publications in surfing, surfing cultures and their representations.

Currently writing a book on Wonder Woman which examines cultural, political and social influences upon the representation of the human body from the 1940s . I co-edit Routledge's Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics www.tandf.co.uk/journals/rcom with David Huxley . We have organised three international comics conferences at Manchester Metropolitan University:
The Aesthetics of Trash, 28th - 29th August, 2007
The International Conference of Graphic Novels and Comics, 12-14th April, 2010
Joint International Conference of Graphic Novels, Bandes dessinées and Comics July 5-8th 2011, (with Studies in Comics and The European Journal of Comic Art).
This year we are co-organisers with Julia Round and Chris Murray putting on the conference at the University of Bournemouth (28-29th June)
I am interested in supporting anyone researching in any of the areas mentioned above.

Teaching
I am a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and teach a range of units over the three years undergraduate degree in film and Media. In the past twelve years I have been programme leader and year tutor for all three years. I have also tied practice and theory on my units as this is a method that seems to be a source of inspiration to students. "Youth Cultures and Subcultures", "Fantasy Myth and Fairytales" and "Science Fiction". I also teach research methods, especially empirical research and qualitative methods to undergraduates. I have also worked with postgraduate students supervising their research and teaching on the MA.
Employability
My current role is in developing employability across the curriculum and I organise the second year Business Portfolio unit. In this unit students develop their career skills and as a final project they can choose either to organise work experience for themselves, research a career, volunteer or plan an enterprise project. In developing employability across the curriculum, I have strong links with MMU careers office and external media producers who speak on the year two programme. I am currently a member of the employability skills online group and who are producing an online teaching programme for students to support their career development.