Research

Grants: total career grants and awards $468,926

Current Project: AusStage Phase 7, ‘Visualising the Victoria,’ ARC LIEF LE210100007. VR and web-based visualisation of Newcastle’s heritage-listed Victoria Theatre, 1891. Extensions of this project are underway, 2021-2022, pursuing digital development of the theatre’s stage house with propositions on staging and dramaturgy. The inter-disciplinary research team comprises John Senczuk (scenographer), Dr Zi Siang See (VR specialist), Dr Prue Sailer (natural history illustrator), and Jean-Luc Schmid (3D modeller and PhD candidate).

Research highlight: AusStage: Gateway to the Australian Performing Arts (e-Research and the Digital Humanities). I have been a CI (chief investigator) on four Australian Research Council (ARC)-funded LIEF grants for AusStage: 2010 ($650,000), 2014 ($325,000), 2017 ($465,000), 2021 ($562,532). Maintaining a focus on the histories of live performance in the Hunter region of New South Wales, my research outcomes include visualisation and mapping of research data. Since 2017, my focus for the AusStage project has been on the Victoria Theatre in Perkins Street, Newcastle.

Click here: Virtual reality project bringing lost theatres back to life

Publication summary: 5 books, 30 peer-reviewed scholarly articles and book chapters, 19 unclassified research outputs, 50 conference papers

International Fellowships: Harvard Visiting Fellowship 2018-19 (US$4,000); National Library of Australia Fellowship 2017 ($20,400); University of Texas Visiting Fellowship, Ransom Centre for the Humanities 2014-15 (US$3,500)

Prizes and Awards: 2018: Joanne Tompkins Prize for Journal Editing; 2018 Marlis Thiersch Prize for excellence in a research article; 2013 Mid-career research fellowship ($15,000); 2004 Australian Post Graduate Award, PhD scholarship.

Reviewing expertise: I regularly review Australian Research Council (ARC) grant applications for the national Discovery Project (DP), Discovery Early Career Research Award (DECRA), Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities (LIEF), and Future Fellowship grant rounds. I also review grants for The Research Foundation – Flanders (FWO).

Peer review of scholarly articles and manuscripts: for international and national journals such as Early Popular Visual Culture, Australasian Drama Studies, a|b: Auto|Biography Studies, Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film, Journal of Intercultural Studies, Participations: Journal of Audience and Reception Studies, Journal of Occupational Science, Journal of Australian Studies, Gender and History, on research spanning theatre and performance studies, and circus studies from the 19thC through to the present day. I also review book manuscripts and book proposals for publishers including Palgrave Macmillan and Brill.

Examiner: of Honours, Masters and PhD theses

Journal Editor: Popular Entertainment Studies: I am the co-founder and co-editor of this scholarly journal and since 2010 have reviewed many submissions in the course of producing 17 issues and 75+ published articles.

Applied performance: Two Teaching and Learning Research Project Grants (University of Newcastle, 2012 $10,000 and 2013 $10,000) funded creative practice-led research into role-play simulation and professional communication with an interdisciplinary team of researchers drawn from Creative and Performing Arts, Pharmacy, Nursing and Midwifery, Communication, Occupational Therapy, and Physiotherapy.