Postdoctoral Research Associate (The Europe That Gay Porn Built, 1945-2000)

This AHRC-funded post is available from 1 November 2024 to 31 August 2027.

Summary of the role
The Faculty wishes to recruit a Postdoctoral Research Associate to support the work of Professor Jana Funke and contribute to the collaborative AHRC-funded “The Europe That Gay Porn Built, 1945-2000” project.

"The Europe that Gay Porn Built, 1945-2000" examines, for the first time, the ways in which postwar gay erotica and porn magazines helped forge a pan-European gay male constituency build on processes of identification, solidarity and subcultural distinction that we proposed to call "homoeuropeanism": a specifically homosexual and sexualised form of European identification that developed in the context of postwar geopolitics. It will tell a unique new history of "Europe," one capable of decentring its hegemonic narratives by means of identifying and mappings its subcultural homosexual enunciations in postwar gay erotica and porn magazines, and its dissemination via the latter's transitional networks of production, circulation, and consumption.

You will join an international team of researchers on “The Europe that Gay Porn Built, 1945–2000” project, co-led by Professor Funke, Professor John Mercer (Birmingham City University), and Professor João Florêncio (Linköping University, Sweden).

You will conduct archival research and oral history interviews in Poland and the United Kingdom, contribute to data processing and analysis, support project administration, and devise and write a research monograph on a topic of their choice relating to Cold War politics and aesthetics as mediated by postwar European gay porn magazines, drawing from the project’s data.

You will be expected to work closely with colleagues at the University of Exeter, Birmingham City University, and Linköping University.

About you

You will:

• Be able to present information on research progress and outcomes, communicate complex information, orally, in writing and electronically and prepare proposals and applications to external bodies.
• Possess a relevant PhD (or be nearing completion) in Art History and Visual Culture, Media and Communications, Cultural Studies, or History, Languages and Cultures/Modern Languages, or possess an equivalent qualification/experience in a related field of study.
• Be able to demonstrate sufficient knowledge in the discipline and of research methods and techniques to work within established research programmes.
• Be able to insert skills and knowledge required.

Please ensure you read the Job Description and Person Specification (available on the university's website, accessed by the 'Apply' button) for full details of this role.

What we can offer you

• Freedom (and the support) to pursue your intellectual interests and to work creatively across disciplines to produce internationally exciting research.
• Support teams that understand the University wide research and teaching goals and partner with our academics accordingly.
• An Innovation, Impact and Business directorate that works closely with our academics providing specialist support for external engagement and development.
• Our Exeter Academic initiative supporting high performing academics to achieve their potential and develop their career.
• Sector leading benefits around maternity, adoption and shared parental leave (up to 26wks full pay), Paternity leave (up to 6wks full pay), and a Fertility Treatment Policy.
• A beautiful campus set in the heart of stunning Devon.

Further information
For an informal discussion about the role, please contact Professor Jana Funke, Associate Professor of English and Sexuality Studies, j.funke@exeter.ac.uk.

Interviews are expected to take place mid July.

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