MaoHui Deng

I am a Lecturer in Film Studies.

Prior to starting my post in Manchester, I also did a BA in Drama and Screen Studies, an MA in Screen Studies, and a PhD in Drama, all at Manchester.

My research is interested in the interdisciplinary conversations between cinema, ageing and dementia, and I tie these different discourses together through the examination of time. I am also interested in Southeast Asian cinemas, and am currently developing a temporal approach towards the examination of the regional cinema.

Between 2021 and 2023, I was an elected member of the Executive Committee of the British Association of Film, Television and Screen Studies (BAFTSS). From 2015 to 2019, I was also the postgraduate rep for BAFTSS.

I enjoy working with and learning from students. In 2020-21, I was fortunate enough to receive the Faculty of Humanities Outstanding Teaching Award.

Research interests

My research is deeply interdisciplinary and draws from the fields of film and performance studies, and gerontology and dementia studies.

Broadly speaking, I am interested in four areas:

1. Cinema and time

2. Cultural narratives about ageing in later life, care, and dementia

3. Modernity and decoloniality

4. Film distribution, exhibition and reception

My first monograph is titled Ageing, Dementia and Time in Film: Temporal Performances. The monograph is published by Edinburgh University Press, and it is an examination of the intersecting temporalities of cinema and dementia in the new millennium. The book won Runner-Up for the 2024 BAFTSS Best First Monograph category.

My first journal article, 'Singapore as Non-Place: Nation Cinema through the Lens of Temporal Heterogeneity', was published in Asian Cinema in 2020. The article was awarded the Best Doctoral Student Article at the 2021 BAFTSS Annual Conference.

I am currently working on a project on dementia and modernity.