Dr Paul Atkinson
Lecturer in Communications & Writing
Dr Paul Atkinson joined HUMCASS in 2005 having previously taught Cinema Studies at the University of Ballarat. In addition to his work in cinema, he has lectured in a wide range of areas including critical theory, media studies, visual aesthetics, gender studies and comic book culture.
Classes taught by Paul include:
- Contemporary Fiction
- Authorship and Writing
- Introduction to Communication Studies
- Research Methods
- Popular Writing and Criticism
Research Interests and Publications
Paul's research follows two main lines:
- the relationship between materiality and corporeality in Henri Bergson's writings on science, with particular emphasis on the relationship between immanent change and extended movement;
- time and visual narration in comics books, painting and film.
Published articles explore a range of topics including Bergson's vitalism, cinema and foreseeability, time and recognition, the durational limits of affect, futurism, 9/11 comics and the implied movement in still images. He is currently working on a series of articles that explore the relationship between processual theories of time, aesthetics and narrative. This involves the examination of the importance of rates of change in understanding how the visual surface is conceived in different media.
Book Chapters
(2009) “Henri Bergson.” Deleuze’s Philosophical Lineage. Ed. Jon Roffe and Graham Jones. Edinburgh University Press.
(2008) “The Time of Heroes: The Still Image and the Construction of an Epic Past. Miracleman . Men in Tights: Comic Book Superheroes ” . Ed. Angela Ndalianis. Duke Univ. Press.
(2008) “The Movement of Dissolution: Bergson and the Aesthetics of Durational Difference.” Sensorium. Ed. Felicity Colman et al. Cambridge Scholars Press.
(2008) Atkinson, Paul and Simon Cooper. “Graphic Implosion: Politics, Time, and Value in Post-9/11 Comics.” Literature after 9/11. Ed. Ann Keniston and Jeanne Follansbee Quinn. New York: Routledge.
(2007) “Dynamic Sensation: Bergson, Futurism and the Exteriorisation of Time in the Plastic Arts.” Art and Time. Ed. Susan Tridgell. Australian Scholarly Publishing.
Journal Articles
“The visualisation of Utopia in Recent Science Fiction Film.” Colloquy 2007.
Atkinson, P. & Yell, S. “Affect, Time and the Enunciative Body.” Southern Review 38.2 (2006).
“Picturing movement and Moving Pictures: Towards a Pragmatics of Pictorial Perception.” Southern Review: Communication, Politics & Culture 33.3 (2000):
“The Morphology of Time: Sheldrake's Theory of Formative Causation.” Antithesis, July, 8.2. (1997).
Conference and Seminar Presentations
“The Graphic Novel as Metafiction” The New Narrative? Comics in Literature, Film, and Art.
University of Toronto, May 2008
Technology and the Vision of Utopia. Imagining the Future: Utopia, Dystopia and Science Fiction.
Monash University, December 2005.
The Time of Articulation: Bergson's Philosophy of Art.
Art and Time. ANU, November 2005.
The Time of Heroes: The Still Image and the Construction of an Epic Past in Miracleman
Holy Men in Tights. Melbourne University, June 2005.
The Movement of Dissolution: Bergson and the Aesthetics of Durational Difference.
Sensorium. Melbourne University, June 2005.
With Simon Cooper. Comic Books after 9/11.
HUMCASS Seminar Series, semester 2, 2006.
With Sue Yell. Affect, Time and the Enunciative Body.
HUMCASS Seminar Series, semester 1, 2006.
The Irreversibility of Irreversible: Material, Phenomenological and Narrative Irreversibility in Film Time.
HUMCASS Seminar Series, semester 2, 2005.
Outlining the Limits of a Bergsonian Science.
Critique Today, Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy Conference, Macquarie University, December, 2004.
Is there Anything Living beneath the Surface?
Australasian Society for Process Thought conference November, 2001.
Flexible Surfaces/Flexible Concepts: Between Science and Metaphysics.
Bergson and the Social Sciences Conference, Northumberland, UK, April, 2000.
The Surface of Time.
Topologies. Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy conference,July, 1997
Process Epistemology in the Work of Henri Bergson.”
Australasian Society for Process Thought conference, May, 1997.
The Theory of Formative Causation: Peirce, Sheldrake, Bergson.
Time and Memory. Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy conference, September, 1996
The Logic of Solid Bodies. Paper given at the September, 1997
Australasian Society for Phenomenology and Social Philosophy conference.
Bergson's Theory of Perception.
Centre for Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies seminar series, July, 1995.
The Pragmatics of Perception.
Centre for Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies, September, 1994.
Reviews and Magazine Articles
Jacques le Goff, History and Memory.
Review in Autumn, 1995 issue of Exegesis.
Journal Editorial
Paul was a member of the editorial committee on two issues (38.3 and 40.2) of the Melbourne based media journal Southern Review. He is also the co-editor of issue 40.3 on the subject of Testimonial Limits.
Conference Organisation
1997 conference for the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy "Topologies."
1996 conference for the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy "Time and Memory."
1994 workshop "When Worlds Collide: Science Fiction meets Theory."
Contact Details
- Phone:
- +61 3 990 26385 or +61 3 512 26385
- Fax:
- +61 3 990 26359 or +61 3 512 26359
- Office:
- 2W270
- Email:
- Paul.Atkinson@arts.monash.edu.au
- Address:
- School of Humanities, Communications & Social Sciences
Monash University, Gippsland Campus
Northways Road,
Churchill, Victoria 3842