Dr Sarah Gilligan

Dr Sarah Gilligan is an Assistant Professor in Fashion Communication in the School of Design. Her research and publications centre on clothing and identities on and beyond the screen - particularly the distinct, yet symbiotic relationships between costuming, fashion and star-celebrity culture in film, TV drama and photography. 

She has published articles in Fashion Theory, Film, Fashion and Consumption and the Journal of Asia Pacific Popular Culture, together with contributions to a range of edited collections. Sarah's article, ‘Fashion forward killer: Villanelle, costuming and queer style in Killing Eve’ (co-authored with Dr Jacky Collins), was recently published in Film, Fashion and Consumption 10.2. Sarah has also guest edited special issues of Clothing Cultures (6.1), Queer Studies in Media and Popular Culture (5.2-3), and Critical Studies in Men's Fashion (7.1-2).

As part of her ongoing collaborative research with Jacky Collins (Stirling University), their article 'Growing old (dis)gracefully: Spanish masculinities and contemporary star-celebrity culture', is currently in press for the Fashion & Style special issue of Journal of Bodies, Sexualities and Masculinities guest edited by Vicki Karaminas and Joseph Hancock. Additionally, her article 'Fashioning masculinities: critical reflections on curation and future directions in masculinity studies', is currently in press for Critical Studies in Fashion and Beauty. Both articles are due to be published in June 2023. 

Sarah’s current research on fashioning ageing star-celebrities focuses on Keanu Reeves, and Tilda Swinton. She recently presented aspects of this research at the Fashioning Masculinities symposium at the V&A, and as a keynote speaker for the European Popular Culture Association conference. Additionally, building on their previous research on ageing Spanish masculinities (Gilligan and Collins 2019; 2023), Sarah's next co-written article currently in preparation is: 'Owning the space like a boss: gender, costume and performance in El buen patrón (2021) and Competencia oficial (2021)'. Sole authored and co-written articles tied to this research strand on ageing star-celebrities will be submitted for peer reviewed publication in 2023-24. 

Sarah is also undertaking exploratory visual and material cultures practice-based research. Building on her modified books (including those presented at FCVC2019), she is currently working on Down to Earth. This will be the focus of an invited visual essay for a special issue of literary journal Lighthouse in 2023, and will be exhibited in 2024 as part of the group work-in-progress shows tied to the research themes of Design + Wellbeing, and Design + Making in the School of Design.

Building on her existing research, Sarah is in the early stages of planning her large-scale interdisciplinary project: Contemporary Clothing Contexts: Images, Objects and Experiences. This international project will include research, publications and symposia in collaboration with members of FCVC Network, together with Sarah's intersecting forthcoming book project Tactile Transmediality: Surface Pleasures and the Fashioned Body. This project examining fashion, screen costuming and everyday dress, will form the central focus of Sarah's research trajectory between 2024-2027. It adopts a multi-modal approach combining textual analysis, object-based research and creative explorations.

Sarah is the co-founder (with Dr Petra Krpan, Zagreb) and chair of the Fashion, Costume and Visual Cultures (FCVC) Network for which she received a British Academy Rising Star Engagement Award. She has co-organised international conferences in Croatia (FCVC2018) and France (FCVC2019) together with in-person and online events, and mentoring for researchers in the UK and internationally. Sarah is Reviews Editor for Film, Fashion and Consumption journal and is a member of the editorial boards of Fashion, Style and Popular Culture, Critical Studies in Fashion and Beauty, and the International Journal of Sustainable Fashion and Textiles.  She is a member of the Critical Costume steering group and the European Popular Culture Association, and will be convening FCVC Network strands in collaboration with the forthcoming EUPOP2023 conference at Stirling University in Scotland.

Sarah joined Northumbria University as a Senior Lecturer in 2020, following a career in further and adult education. Sarah remains highly committed to widening participation in education, and currently teaches and supervises student projects across BA, MA, MRes and PhD levels. She also mentors staff at and beyond Northumbria who are at different stages of their careers with their research and teaching. In 2021, Sarah became a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA), and she holds BA and MA qualifications in Media, Film and Cultural Studies, a Cert.Ed, together with a PhD in Media Arts from Royal Holloway, University of London. Sarah's thesis Transforming Identity: Gender, Costume & Contemporary Popular Cinema (supervised by Prof. Stella Bruzzi), was funded by a Thomas Holloway scholarship, and passed with no corrections.