Skip to main content

Staff profiles

Photo of Dr Aidan Power

Dr Aidan Power

Lecturer in Film

7046

01392 727046

Email: a.power3@exeter.ac.uk

Office: Queen's 254

I am primarily a film and television scholar, with a specialisation on the relationship between visual media and crises (socio-political, economic, ecological).

My most recent articles "Keep Your Dreams Alive: Lazzaro felice, Authoritarian Liberalism, and the Slow Death of Progress in the Italian Second Republic" and "Eurocentrism, The Anthropocene and Climate Migration in Aniara" were published in respectively, The Italianist (2023) and Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction (2021).

My first monograph Contemporary European Science Fiction Cinemas was published by Palgrave in 2018, and I co-edited the books Reality Unbound: New Departures in Science Fiction Cinema and Die Zukunft ist jetzt: Science-Fiction-Kino als audio-visueller Entwurf von Geschichte(n), Räumen und Klängen with Winfried Pauleit and Delia González de Reufels.

I have also written articles on the films of Michael Haneke and John Ford (Studies in European Cinema), European film funding (Film Studies), and tourism and sf cinema (Science Fiction Film and Television), and have published book chapters on late capitalist dating apps and Black Mirror, patriarchy and nationalism in Catalan sf, modernist European cinema, and nationhood in British dystopian cinema.

My research has been funded by the German Universities Excellence Initiative, the Irish Research Council, and the British Academy. 

I am a co-founder of Alphaville: Journal of Film and Screen Media and have worked as a peer-reviewer for Academic Quarter, Journal of Scandinavian Cinema, Paradoxa: Studies in World Literary Genres, Studies in European Cinema, Utopian Studies, and Routledge books.

External impact and engagement

Invited Talks

2022

“Some Thoughts on Futurity and Film”, Communications, Drama and Film Studies Research Seminar Series, University of Exeter, December 14th.

2021

“Consume, Destroy, Evacuate: Aniara in the Anthropocene”, Film and Television Screen Studies Research Seminars, University of Exeter, November 24th.

2020   

“In Our Immense Sarcophagus We Lay: Charting the Anthropocene in Aniara”, Environmentalism, Fantasy and Intersectionality Conference, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, November 6th.

Watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlvvup5U4AA

2018    

“The Overlords Have Landed: Science Fiction Cinema and the European Project”, Centre for Interdisciplinary Film Research, University of Exeter, November 21st.

2017    

“Night Watch/Nochnoy dozor”, From Russia With Film, Irish Film Institute, Dublin, April 11th.

“Future Imperfect: Science, Fiction, Film”, Berlin Film Festival Retrospective, Deutsche Kinemathek, Berlin, February 11th.

“The Camel and the Hippopotamus: Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Lobster and the European Project”, Film and Screen Media Invited Research Seminar Series, University College Cork, January 30th.

2014   

“Tempering Dystopia: Science Fiction Film and the European Union”, Zemki Invited Speakers Series, Universität Bremen, Jan 9th.

Conference Presentations

2023

"Meet the new boss, same as the old boss: Authoritarian liberalism and precarious witnessess in Lazzaro Felice", The Many Faces and Spaces of Precarity in the Moving Image, Cinematic Precarity Network, December 14th.

2018    

“Nation, Patriarchy and the Capitalist Death Drive in Catalan Science Fiction Cinema”, Bremen International Film Conference, City 46 Bremen, April 27th.

2017

“There Once Was a Dream That Was Rome: The European Union and the Creation of the Future”, Science Fiction Research Association Conference, University of California, Riverside, July 1st.

2016

“Utopia Interrupted: Connecting Science Fiction and European Integration”, NECS: In/Between Cultures of Connectivity, The Brandenburg Center for Media Studies, Potsdam, July 28th.

2015

“Eurimages and the Funding of European Cinema”, Research Colloquium: Film Media Art and Popular Culture, Universität Bremen, Oct 27th.

“Why Science Fiction? A Historical Overview”, University of Bremen Internal Research Workshop, Universität Bremen, July 6th.

“Science Fiction as Creative Unit: Film Studies, Linguistics and Computer Science”, Film Media Art and Popular Culture, Universität Bremen, May 11th.

“The Future is Now: An Introduction”, The Future is Now: Science Fiction Cinema as Audio-visual Blueprint of Histories, Spaces and Sounds, 20th International Bremen Film Conference, City 46 Bremen, May 7th.

2014    

“Vacations in Dystopia: Tourism, Culture and Authenticity in Science Fiction Cinema”, NECS: Creative Energies, Creative Industries, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore Milan, June 21st.

“Reworking the Foundational Myths: Some Thoughts on Richard Fleischer’s Soylent Green”, Research Colloquium: Film Media Art and Popular Culture, Universität Bremen, May 26th.

“Tourism and Science Fiction: Exploring a Novel Perspective”, Research Colloquium: Film Media Art and Popular Culture, Universität Bremen, April 29th.

“Charting the End Times: ‘Authenticity’ in 21st Century European Science Fiction Cinema”, Society for Cinema & Media Studies, Seattle, March 21st.

2013    

“Crises and Beyond: Science Fiction and the European Union”, European Film Cultures: ECREA Film Studies Section Interim Conference, Lunds Universitet, Nov 9th.

“Charting Filmic Responses to the Economic Crisis”, Research Colloquium: "Film, Media Art and Popular Culture", Universität Bremen, Oct 29th.

“Science Fiction Cinema and the European Union”, Excellence Series, Universität Bremen, June 25th.

“Community and Contemporary European Science Fiction Cinema”, Excellence Series, Universität Bremen, April 23rd.

2012    

“Ragnarök Now: Moving Through the Interstices of Le temps du loup”, Cinema in the Interstices: Alphaville Inaugural Conference, University College Cork, Sep 7th.

“Clementine Wore a White Ribbon: Collective Memory in Michael Haneke’s Das Weiße Band (and John Ford’s West)”, NECS 2012: Time Networks: Screen Media and Memory, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, June 22nd.

2010    

“A Microcosmic Look at Travel and Diaspora in French Cinema”, Italian Research Seminar Series 2010-2011, University College Cork, Oct 29th.

"The Last Tourist Office in Dystopia: Surveillance and the Metropolis", Transnational, Transcultural, Transmedial: European Cinema Today, University College Cork, May 14th.

“Fallujah: East London. Terror, Order and the Digital Panopticon”, Irish Postgraduate Film Research Seminar, Trinity College Dublin, April 22nd.

2009   

“Darkness on the Edge of Town: Borders and Peripheries in Contemporary Westerns”, The Graduate School: Annual Conference, University College Cork, Nov 19th.

“A Weekend Break in the Country … with Zombies: Contrasting Space in 28 Days Later”, NECS 2009: Locating Media, Lunds Universitet, June 27th.

“Echoes from Elsewhere: Diasporic Journeys through Contemporary French Cinema”, Anthropological Association of Ireland Conference, Queens University Belfast, May 1st.

“Overheating the Melting Pot: Cultural Compositions in the Cinema of Michael Haneke”, Graduate Centre for Europe Conference, University of Birmingham, April 17th

2008   

“Strangers in Dystopia: Identity and Nation in Contemporary English Science Fiction Cinema”, College of Arts, Celtic Studies and Social Sciences Interdisciplinary Conference, University College Cork, Nov 8th.

“Spatial Relationships: Women in the Cinema of David Lean”, David Lean: 100th Anniversary Conference, Queen Mary, University of London, July 24th.

Conference Organisation

2015    Co-organiser: “The Future is Now: Science Fiction Cinema as Audio-visual Blueprint of Histories, Spaces and Sounds”, 20th International Bremen Film Conference, May 6th-9th. *part-funded by the German Research Council.

2012    Co-organiser: “Cinema in the Interstices: Alphaville Inaugural Conference”, University College Cork, Sep 7th-9th. *part-funded by The Irish Tourist Board. 

2010    Co-organiser: “Transnational, Transcultural, Transmedial: European Cinema Today”, University College Cork, May 14th-15th.

Biography

I grew up in West Cork in Ireland. After finishing my PhD at University College Cork in 2012, I worked for three years as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Bremen. I returned to Ireland in 2016 where I took up a two year Government of Ireland Research Fellowship before moving to Exeter in 2018. Following a series of temporary contracts I became a permanent member of staff in 2021.

 Edit profile