Professor Susan Kerrigan

Biography

Susan began the role as Department Chair for Film, Games and Animation in 2023. As a Professor in Film and Television, she is an expert in Creative Practice and Screen Production Research and is a qualitative researcher who investigates regional Creative Industries in Australia. Appling the creative (eco)system in action approach, she has been Chief Investigator on two Australian Research Council Linkage Grants examining regional creative industries. Her research highlights creative agents and how their practices produce creative products that are culturally consumed. Having worked in Australian Television as a producer/director her research is attuned to bettering workforce opportunities for the creation of Australian creative content. The Creative Industries reserach has resulted in these books co-written with Professor Phillip McIntrye, a Creative (Eco)systems Researcher from the University of Newcastle and Dr Janet Fulton Independent researcher. 

- Creativity and Creative Industries in Regional Australia: Interconnected Networks, Shared Knowledge and Choice Making Agents (2023)
- Entrepreneurship in the Creative Industries: How Innovative Agents, Skills and Networks Interact, Entrepreneurship in the Creative Industries: How Innovative Agents, Skills and Networks Interact (2023)

Susan's reserach can also be read in these books Educating for Creativity within Higher Education: Integration of Research into Media Practice (2018) co-written with Professor Phillip McIntyre, Dr Janet Fulton, Dr Elizabeth Patton and Dr Michael Meany and it outlines a creative curriculum approach to media production in Australian Universities. As a co-editor, Kerrigan has produced Screen Production Research: Creative Practice as a Mode of Enquiry (2018) with Professor Craig Batty, and she has also co-edited The Palgrave Handbook of Screen Production (2020). Susan was on the editorial board for The Journal of Media Practice and Education and has co-edited multiple Special Issues of Journals on the topics of filmmaking, practice-led research and Screen Production Research. 

Research Grants:
2017-2019: ARC LP160101724 'Australian cultural & creative activity: A population & hotspot analysis', S. Cunningham, Hearn, P. McIntyre, S. Kerrigan, T. Flew 

2017: Department of Education and Training Higher Education Participation and Partnership Programme 'Creative Industries Careers: Re-imagining Regional and Remote Students opportunities' K. Grushka, M. Lawry, S. Kerrigan, M. Gruppetta, J. Shadbolt,

2013-2016: ARC LP130100348 'Creativity and Cultural Production in the Hunter: An Applied Ethnographic Study of New Entrepreneurial Systems in the Creative Industries', Phillip McIntyre, Mark Balnaves, Susan Kerrigan, Claire Williams, Evelyn King.

Susan worked for the University of Newcastle for 18 years before joining Swinburne in 2022. As a University Lecturer Susan has successfully developed and delivered more than 50 subjects in Filmmaking, Short Film, Television, Documentary, Screenwriting, Media Production, Creativity Practice and Theory. She has also delivered Honours subjects in Communication, Media and Creative Industries. In 2013 she lead the AQF 6 program review for the Bachelor of Communication at the University of Newcastle, and oversaw the curriculum and content for the Bachelor of Communication for 4 years.