Four more speakers from our training event: Dr Agata Lulkowska https://www.staffs.ac.uk/people/agata-lulkowska Agata is Senior Lecturer in Film Production at Staffordshire University where she specialises in practice-based PhD supervision in filmmaking. With a background in film practice, photography and installations, her PhD “The Arhuacos, film, and the politics of representing the ‘Other’ in Colombia” was undertaken at Birkbeck. It was unfunded and took her eight years part-time. She had to keep working but also attended and organised conferences and festivals and published. Agata’s tips: do something you enjoy, be patient for the right opportunities, and network! She is also co-founder and director of international interdisciplinary Conference and Art/Film Festival, Communities and Communication https://www.agatalulkowska.com/communitiesandcommunication Dr Nina Perry https://www.ninaperry.co.uk/ Nina is an artist and researcher whose interests lie in sound, storytelling, voice and music. She has taught at several universities, most recently as senior lecturer in audio production at Bournemouth University, where she remains as visiting fellow, which means she submits her work to the REF. She misses academia for the opportunities to explore but is really enjoying freelancing. Nina did her PhD by publication, reflecting on a body of audio productions and projects she had already created. Titled "Music, Narrative, Voice and Presence: Revealing a composed feature methodology", her mission was to find the original contribution to knowledge through her practice. She feels the PhD improved her writing, helped unleash her creativity and she developed her ability to critically reflect on her own creative practice. Nina now runs workshops for professionals and community groups, and enjoys guest speaking when invited. Dr Emile Devereaux https://profiles.sussex.ac.uk/p335881-emile-devereaux (See also Episode 4 in this series) Emile is Senior Lecturer in Digital Media at University of Sussex. With two US degrees already - anthropology and art practice - these combined into an MFA and later a PhD in Europe. Emile's research expertise lies across visual culture and media arts, combining film, video, 2D/3D animation, performance and interactive/digital media. Outputs combine these media forms in socially engaged practices through site-specific installations, media art interventions and tactical media. Other works draw upon the histories and spaces of media technologies. Emile is fascinated by the impact of technological developments, economies, and systems of distribution on bodies and environments. Doing practice opens doors and widens horizons and the PhD provided Emile with more flexibility on an international scale, especially as a trans non-binary scholar. Through collaborative working and media interventions you don't have to rely on just the book/printed word to connect with audiences. Dr Golnoosh Nourpanah https://www.gnour.com/ Golnoosh is a writer, poet and educator from Tehran. Her creative work focuses on queer desire and sexualities. She did her PhD at Birkbeck in creative writing exploring the work of (and as) queer writers in post-revolutionary Iran. She found the critical component - 30,000 words - complicated yet enlightening: challenging for the rules she needed to abide by and the academic language which she found dry. She didn't enjoy that aspect but was delighted when the external examiner commended her on how well the PhD was constructed. Golnoosh is glad that it's over but doing the PhD has been liberating. She has come to accept that we have to survive in a hierarchical capitalist society, so the PhD helps. She has been published widely since and is now engaged in teaching at universities and a range of other contracts and performances in the UK.