Dr Anna Claydon

I have been working at the University of Leicester since January 2006. I predominantly teach film within the Media and Communications team but have also contributed to or lead modules teaching methodology, adaptation, broader cultural studies, globalisation and media, fan cultures, postmodernist theory, digital storytelling, representation of science, music as communication, audience studies, digital media and media and the body.

I am currently CSSAH, that is the College of Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities, Director of EDI (Equity, Diversity and Inclusivity) and School of Arts, Media and Communications Co-Director of EDI. I also co-lead the Master's Dissertation module for Media and Communication students with Dr Victoria O'Meara and co-lead a Year 2 module, Global Film Culture(s) with Dr Katie Moylan. 

Previous roles include: CSSAH PGT Manager (and previously CSS PGT Director); MA Mass Communications and BSc Media, Communication and Society (now the BA Media and Communication) Course Directors; Director and Deputy-Director of Studies; Admissions Tutor (UG and PGT); Employability Officer; Senior PGT Tutor; module leader for courses on film and music at all levels.

I currently have five PhD students working on a wide variety of topics with common threads amongst these and those I have previously supervised being: identity, industry, media forms, audiences, film, cultural studies and cross-arts themes.

My research focusses on an interdisciplinary approach to film and music but fundamentally is interested in questions of how identity is framed, theorised and represented. As such, I have also worked on disability on TV and in photography, faith and social media, family photograph and memory, representing the mind in film, the South-Asian diaspora in the films of Gurinder Chadha and what a crisis of masculinity meant in 1960s British Cinema (my PhD). I am currently working on music across TV and film series and sonic branding. 

I also engage in pedagogical (teaching-related) research and have conducted projects on the teaching of history within disciplines, postgraduate students experiences and concerns, and teaching film music analysis without a musicological training. I am currently working on the use of differentiation techniques in postgraduate teaching and curriculum design.

This publications list focuses on chapters, articles and books (with one exception as it is one of most cited works, on CGI from 2005). I have also presented many conference papers and guest talks or lectures during my career. 

CURRENTLY COMPLETING

Claydon, E.A  'Scoring the Paratext: A Deleuzian Analysis of the Soundtrack across Psycho (Hitchcock, 1960) and Bates’ Motel (Universal/A&E, 2013-17)'. SUBMISSION 2025 

Claydon, E.A & Johnson, C.G 'PGT as a Strategic Priority in the 21st Century University' SUBMISSION end 2025, early 2026.

Claydon, E.A ‘Deliciously Dreadful: The Culinary Delights of Hannibal Lecter’ SUBMISSION 2026

Whitehouse-Hart, J & Claydon, E.A ‘Hermeneutic Anxiety and Faith Online’ (holding title). SUBMISSION 2026

Claydon, E.A ‘The Creative Other: Music and Disability in Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll. SUBMISSION 2026-27

Claydon, E.A ‘Disability, Identity and Sexuality: Examining Ray (Hackford, 2004) within the context of the civil rights movement’. SUBMISSION 2027

Claydon, E.A ‘Scoring the Post-human: The Use of Music in Science Fiction Film to Characterise the Bio-Mechanical Other’  SUBMISSION 2027

Claydon, E.A ‘Dum di dum dum, Dum di dah’: The Iconicity of the IndianaJonesSoundtrack’ 

UNDER REVIEW

Claydon, E.A  ‘When Johnny Comes Marching Home from all Work and no Play, he is a Bad, Bad Boy: Kubrick’s Palimpsests in Dr Strangelove and The Shining’

IMMINENT

Claydon, E. A (2025) 'A Man for All Seasons? Civil Disobedience and the Timeliness of the Soundtrack in the Story of Thomas More'. The Soundtrack Vol 17. 

PUBLISHED

Claydon, E. A & Johnson, C.G (2025) How to Get a Master's Degree: Everything You Needs to Know about Postgraduate Study. London: Open University Press-McGraw Hill 

Claydon, E. A & Whitehouse-Hart, J (2018) 'Overcoming 'the Battlefield of the Mind': A Psycho-linguistic Examination of the Discourse of Digital-Televangelists Self-Help Texts', Language and Psychoanalysis. Vol. 1 (2):29-56.

Claydon, E.A (2018) ‘#Me Too: What Does it Mean to be a Woman in Academia? A Global Perspective,’ Vision for an Inclusive Society: A Feminist Perspective. Ed. Sudeshna Mukherjee. Mumbai, India: Himalaya Publishing, 191-198. 

Claydon, E.A (2017) ‘British South-Asian Cinema and Identity I: ‘Nostalgia in the Post-National: Contemporary British Cinema and the South-Asian Diaspora’ in the films of Gurinder Chadha’. Reissued journal articles in South Asian Diaspora: Literature, Theater and Cinema Ajay K Chaubey and Ashvin I. Devasundaram. Rawat Publications: India,  71-88

Claydon, E.A (2017) 'British South-Asian Cinema and Identity II: When did Mr Collins become the ‘Ugly American’? Representing America in the films of Gurinder Chadha’. Reissued journal articles in South Asian Diaspora: Literature, Theater and Cinema Ajay K Chaubey and Ashvin I. Devasundaram. Rawat Publications:India, 89-105.

Claydon, E. A (2016) 'Bonded to the series: Musical style, performance and the 007 theme song' The Soundtrack. Vol 7 (2): 105-118. Officially dated 2014 but published in 2016.

Claydon, E. A (2015) 'Framing the Difference(s): Analysing the Representation of the Body of the Athlete in the 2012 Olympics' and Paralympics' Official Programmes' Reframing Disability? London: Routledge, 79-93. Officially dated 2014 but published in 2015.

Claydon, E. A; Reilly, P & Gunter, B (2015) 'Dis/Enablement?: An Analysis of the Representation of Disability on British Terrestrial Television Pre-and Post-Paralympics'. Reframing Disability? London: Routledge, 36-65.  Officially dated 2014 but published in 2015.

Claydon, E. A (2011/2019) 'National Identity, the GPO Film Unit and Their Music' in Mansell, JG and Anthony, S eds. The Projection of Britain: A History of the GPO Film Unit. London: BFI-Palgrave MacMillan (1st and 2nd editions), 179-187.

Claydon, E. A (2012) 'Cultural Cross-Over: Multiculturalism in British Film' in Bell, E & Mitchell, N eds. Directory of World Cinema: Britain. London: Intellect, 35-42. 

Claydon, E. A (2011) 'Film Music, Musicology and Semiotics: Analysing The Draughtsman's Contract', Journal of British Cinema and Television Vol 8 (1): 62-80.

Claydon, E. A (2011) 'Social-cultural Engagements with Landscape: Why do we Visit Locations?', International Journal of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences Vol 5 (8): 179-192. 

Claydon, E. A (2010) 'Masculinity and deviance in British cinema of the 1970s: Sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll in The wicker man, Tommy and The Rocky Horror Picture Show' in Newland, P (ed) Don't Look Now? British Cinema in the 1970s. London: Intellect, 131-142.

Claydon, E.A (2009) ‘When did Mr Collins become the ‘Ugly American’? Representing America in the films of Gurinder Chadha’. South Asian Cultural Studies Vol 2. No. 2 (2009): 27-58.

Claydon, E.A (2008) 'Nostalgia in the post-national: Contemporary British cinema and the South-Asian diaspora' South Asian Cultural Studies. Vol 2 (1): 26-38.

Claydon, E.A (2007)‘Analysing Film Through Music: How Musicology Can Aid in the Analysis of Film Sound and Narrative’. International Journal of the Humanities Vol. 4 No. 7 (2007), 99-105. 

Claydon, E.A (2007) 'The Projected Man: The B–Movie and the Monstrous–Masculine', Extrapolation 48 (3): 482-492.

Claydon, E.A (2005) 'CityScope: The cinema and the city' Global Built Environment Review 5: 57-68. 8 citations

Claydon, E.A (2005) The representation of masculinity in British cinema of the 1960s: Lawrence of Arabia, The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, and The Hill London: Edwin Mellen. 

Claydon, E. A (2005) 'Wanting to believe: CGI animation and the dilemmas of verisimilitude' Cinema and Technology Conference Proceedings. Lancaster University.

Claydon, E. A (2003) 'Masculinity, fantasy and Bhaji on the Beach', Picturing South Asian Culture in English: Textual and Visual Representations. Liverpool: Open House Press, 149-161.

I currently have five students working on:

First Supervisor

1) The Development of a New Saudi Film Industry and the Role of Media Platforms; and 2) Celebrity Endorsements in Advertising (AI Celebrities)

Second Supervisor

1) Poetry Recitation in Contemporary China; 2) A Cross-Cultural Investigation of Female Artists' Expression in Digital Media.

Third Supervisor

Desi-Hegemony: How Inter-Generational Conflict Among South-Asian Americans Find Expression in Diasporic Film

Previous Supervisees Projects Concerned:

1) Chinese Spectatorship, Digital Media and Audiences Practices; 2) Narratology and Musical Meaning in The Lords of the Rings Trilogy; 3) Disability in Nigerian Film; 3) Algerian Children and Perceptions of Disability in Animation; 4) Orientalism to Islamophobia in US Film; 5) Posthumanism in Films and Games; 6) Trans-identities in Thai Cinema; 7) Transmedia Narratology in German TV; 8) Comedic Sarcasm and Comprehension by Second-Language Students; 9) Hungarian Tweens and Disney Princesses. 

Currently:

MS2012 Global Film Culture(s) - a Year 2 module which gets students to think about the construction and questioning of the concept of a global film culture. Assessed by a portfolio with a scene analysis, impact on industry analysis and either a theory or methodology analysis.

MS7012 Dissertation - the Master's level final project across all Media and Communications MA programmes. This consists of ten weeks of dissertation training classes followed by five months of assigned dissertation supervision by colleagues across the Media and Communications teams. I am also co-author of How to Get a Master's Degree (McGraw-Hill, 2025) which was inspired by our students experiences and needs. 

I further guest on modules concerning research methodologies and audiences and supervise undergraduate and postgraduate dissertation projects.

Past Module Leadership (modules no-longer extant):

MS1000 Introduction to Cinema

MS3005 Music as Communication

MS3014 The Media on Film

MS7010 Film as Mass Communication

MS7011 Postmodernism on Film (replaced by the below)

MS7011 Global Film Culture(s)