SIGN benefits from a committed team of staff across the broad spectrum of business development, admin and professional services, skills and training, and academic research, as well as industry partners and collaborators. The majority of the team are based at The University of York.
Professor Duncan Petrie is Head of the Department of Theatre, Film, Television and Interactive Media at the University of York and is the acting Director of the Screen Industries Growth Network (SIGN).
He began his career at the British Film Institute and has worked at the Universities of Exeter, Auckland – where he ran the Department of Film, Television and Media Studies, before coming to York in 2009, Duncan’s research has engaged with various aspects of the British, Scottish and New Zealand Film and Television industries.
Most recently, he was the PI on the AHRC funded research project ‘Transformation and Tradition in Sixties British Cinema: Production Cultures, Cross Media Relations and National Branding.’
Emma has operational oversight for the day-to-day running of SIGN and the associated project, XR Stories. Emma leads planning, and oversees that SIGN meets defined goals on time and within budget. Emma has worked at the University for over a decade, and in her previous role supported academics to engage with industry, and to understand what external organisations need from academic research. She has supported the transfer of academics’ knowledge and research through spinning out, licencing, collaboration and networking. Emma has also worked with numerous academics to frame the benefits their research can bring and to figure out the best route to engage external organisations with this research.
Damian is a leading researcher in Audio and Music Technology at the University of York, with his work on virtual acoustics, auralisation and audio signal processing placing him in over a hundred leading journals and conferences. His creative work has appeared in galleries and festivals of international reputation: these specialisms combine in his role as the University of York’s Research Theme Champion for Creativity. Damian is also the Director of XR Stories, which is closely aligned with SIGN.
Anna is the academic lead for the equality, diversity and inclusion workstream for SIGN and a Senior Lecturer in Critical Diversity Management at the University of York. Her research concerns workplace experiences of LGBT+ employees and how employee networks can be mobilised to build a more inclusive working environment. With a longstanding commitment to EDI matters and substantial experience of working with public, private and third sector organisations on this topic, Anna now chairs a European COST Action network focusing on LGBTI+ social and economic (in)equalities and is a member of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee for the Chartered Association of Business Schools.
Jon is the lead for SIGN’s research work stream. In this role, Jon oversees the development and implementation of SIGN’s research strategy which will help inform both the other work streams and academic outputs from the project. The research work stream will help us to identify and understand screen industries in Yorkshire and the Humber, and to design interventions for developing them.
Jon is an economic geographer with an expertise in cultural and creative industries, and local and regional development. He has worked on and researched various parts of the creative industries, predominantly film and TV, heritage, and immersive media and technology. Jon is also a research fellow on XR Stories, which is closely aligned with SIGN.
During his time as a researcher, Jon has spent time examining processes of creativity, mapping the creative industries and looking into how creative industries develop through funding and policy regimes. He specialises in a range of research methods, from quantitative approaches such as social network analysis, to qualitative methods such as interviews, visual methodologies and participatory approaches.
Bethan was awarded her PhD by Published Works from Cardiff University in 2021, where her work focused on gender, anti-fandom and popular culture. She has been published in Sexualities, Intensities, and Transformative Works and Cultures, as well as edited collections for Routledge, Bloomsbury and NYU Press among others. She is also co-editor of Crowdfunding the Future: Media Industries, Ethics and Digital Society published by Peter Lang (2015). Before joining SIGN Bethan worked on the skills, higher education and lifelong learning portfolio for Welsh Government where her responsibilities included WorldSkills, the Inspiring Skills Excellence in Wales project and the Young Person’s Guarantee.
Jude is a Senior Lecturer in Audio and Music Technology at the University of York with research interests in interactive acoustic environments for musical performance. She is a strong advocate for gender equality, serving as UK Athena SWAN panel member and chair. She is dedicated to promoting inclusive engineering, through innovative, creative approaches to teaching, which are grounded in interdisciplinary research and sit at the boundary between arts and technology. Before beginning her academic career, she worked in arts and music administration, and is still active in promoting research-inspired music and theatre performance events combining art and science for public engagement and outreach.
Sue is a marketing and communications professional with experience working in the higher education and private sectors. As Communications Coordinator for XR Stories and SIGN, Sue is responsible for creating accessible and compelling communications across multiple channels. Sue enjoys collaborating with internal and external stakeholders to devise and deliver high-quality communications campaigns.
Sophie is the Administration Manager for SIGN, and for the closely aligned XR Stories project. Sophie leads a team of four administrators in the support of the two projects. Applying skills and knowledge from six years of experience in University project support, her role at SIGN is to create, manage and review administrative systems for recording and maintaining project data, and to manage expenditure in line with University and funding body policies. She enjoys providing admin support to project stakeholders and using cloud-based technology to implement administrative systems which facilitate collaborative working by the project teams.
