Stephen Maddison is Principal Lecturer in Cultural Studies, and Field Leader for Cultural Studies and Creative Industries in the School of Arts and Digital Industries.

Cultural Studies and Creative Industries is a diverse Field that offers an innovative range of programmes in the culture and creative industries, humanities, and media. Our diversity arises out of the interdisciplinary nature of own work, and the collegial and friendly working and teaching environment we offer. All of our programmes have a commitment to critical practice. That means that we deliver cutting edge teaching in each subject (as recognised by the Academic Review of the Field in 2009), and the opportunity to develop crucial skills and confidence in problem solving, analysis and the presentation of ideas.

The Field is comprised of young and energetic academics with cutting edge ideas as well as internationally renowned scholars. And our range of programmes extends from those that offer pre-degree preparation, through access courses, to BA Honours programmes, and postgraduate taught and research programmes. We offer a unique environment for study that is responsive to student needs and has a deserved reputation for the excellence of our teaching. All of our programmes offer production and placement opportunities, and employability modules, as well as the chance to develop a year-long final project. Cultural Studies and Creative Industries at UEL offers an exciting combination of world-class scholarship and outstanding student focus.

BA Cultural Studies has been on offer at UEL for over 25 years, making it the most established programme in the subject worldwide, and one of only two in the UK where it is offered as a single honours degree. The programme has a reputation for teaching quality and innovation, and has recently achieved 100% student satisfaction rating in the NSS; three successive Academic Reviews over the last decade have drawn attention to our highly interactive and student-centred approach to teaching and learning, and our excellent track record in offering research-informed teaching. We give students the opportunity to develop analytical perspectives on contemporary culture through the study of theory, and also offer media production modules that put theory into practice and foreground employability skills. Notable BA Cultural Studies alumni include journalist and former Heat and Smash Hits editor Mark Frith, rap star Samson ‘Cadet’ Mpendo, novelist Scarlett Thomas, and documentary film maker Jez Lewis (Ghosts). Many of our graduates have gone on to postgraduate study and several have become successful academics.

The programme has a world-leading reputation for research, with the staff team featuring prominently in three successive 5-rated RAE submissions. The programme has a close association with the Centre for Cultural Studies Research. Our research work demonstrates social and cultural impact in policy-making and national debate, and continuously informs development of the programme’s teaching content. We maintain excellent relations with international partners and in particular run a successful exchange programme with Columbia College Chicago.

Stephen is a member of the Centre for Cultural Studies Research at UEL and of the On/Scenity AHRC-Funded Research Network, and co-runs the website OpenGender where you can read many of his articles and chapters, as well as writing by colleagues on sexuality, gender and neoliberalism.

Stephen's research addresses questions of sexuality and gender, cultural politics and popular culture. He is currently working on two major projects, one on the materialism of pornography, and one on the author Philip Pullman. Pornography is the world's most prolific and profitable culture industry, with a social impact beyond the tens of thousands of porn films and sites produced each year. Stephen's work on pornorgraphy has appeared in several major collections, including Mainstreaming Sex (2009), Porn.com (2010) and Hard to Swallow (2011). Philip Pullman is the hugely successful author of the His Dark Materials Trilogy, and is a prominent cultural commentator. My research, undertaken collaboratively with Dr Christine Butler, addresses notions of childhood, education, agency and bourgeois dissent in the context of neoliberalism.

• Cultural Studies
• English
• Creative Writing
• Advertising
• cross-field teaching

• CC1201 Reading Cultures
• CC1202 Cultural Politics
• CC3000 Dissertation
• CC1305 Approaches to Shakespeare

• 'The Good Liberal and the Scoundrel Author: Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials, Bourgeois Dissent and Neoliberal Subjectivity', forthcoming.

• 'A School of Morals: Fantasy and Reality in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials', forthcoming

•  'Immaterial Sex: Pornography, homo oeconomicus and care of the self', forthcoming.

• 'Now that's solid evidence! Hard-core porn and the biopolitical penis' in Sarikakis & Tsaliki (eds) In Dialogue: Cultures of Pornography, Regulation and Political Economy, publisher to be confirmed. [Greek translation] (forthcoming 2011)

• ‘Pornodarsteller_in'. In:  What can a body do? Praktiken und Figurationen des Körpers in den Kulturwissenschaften, ed. by Netzwerk Koerper in den Kulturwissenschaften; publisher to be confirmed. [German translation] (forthcoming 2012)

• 'Pornographic Mythologies and the Limits of Pleasure' in Hard To Swallow, Claire Danes & Darren Kerr (eds) Wallflower Press, 2011.

• 'Is the rectum still a grave? Anal sex, pornography and transgression' in Transgression 2.0: Cultural Opposition in a Digital Age, Ted Gournelos and David J. Gunkel (eds), SUNY Press, 2011.

• “It’s gonna hurt a little bit. But that’s okay – it makes my cock feel good.” Extreme Porn, Max Hardcore and the Limits of Pleasure in Feona Attwood (ed.) Controversial Images, Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.

• ‘Online Obscenity and the Myths of Freedom: Dangerous Images, Child Porn and Neoliberalism’ in Feona Attwood (ed.) Porn.com: Making Sense of Online Pornography, Peter Lang 2010.

•  'Now that's solid evidence! Hard-core porn and the biopolitical penis' in Sarikakis & Tsaliki (eds) In Dialogue: Cultures of Pornography,

• Regulation and Political Economy, publisher to be confirmed. [Greek translation] (forthcoming 2011)

•  ‘Pornodarsteller_in'. In:  What can a body do? Praktiken und Figurationen des Körpers in den Kulturwissenschaften, ed. by Netzwerk Koerper in den Kulturwissenschaften; publisher to be confirmed. [German translation] (forthcoming 2012)

• 'Pornographic Mythologies and the Limits of Pleasure' in Hard To Swallow, Claire Danes & Darren Kerr (eds) Wallflower Press, 2011.

•  'Is the rectum still a grave? Anal sex, pornography and transgression' in Transgression 2.0: Cultural Opposition in a Digital Age, Ted Gournelos and David J. Gunkel (eds), SUNY Press, 2011.

•  “It’s gonna hurt a little bit. But that’s okay – it makes my cock feel good.” Extreme Porn, Max Hardcore and the Limits of Pleasure in Feona Attwood (ed.) Controversial Images, Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.

•  ‘Online Obscenity and the Myths of Freedom: Dangerous Images, Child Porn and Neoliberalism’ in Feona Attwood (ed.) Porn.com: Making Sense of Online Pornography, Peter Lang 2010.

• ‘”The Second Sexual Revolution”: Big Pharma, Porn and the Biopolitical Penis’, Topia: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies, 22, Fall 2009.

•  ‘Choke on it, bitch! Porn Studies, Extreme Gonzo and the Mainstreaming of Hard-Core’ in Feona Attwood (ed.) Mainstreaming Sex: The Sexualisation of Western Culture, IB Tauris, 2009.

•  ‘The Biopolitics of the Penis’ Cultural Studies Now Conference Journal, 2007, http://www.uel.ac.uk/ccsr/documents/TheBiopoliticsofthePenisCSNowweb.pdf

•  ‘Pornography Now’ Soundings, 30, Summer 2005. ISBN 1-905007-22-1.

• ‘The Edge of Reason: the Myth of Bridget Jones’in Joss Hands & Eugenia Siapera (eds) At the Interface: Continuity and Transformation in Culture and Politics, Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2004

•   ‘From Porno-topia to Total Information Awareness. Or, what forces really govern access to porn?’forthcoming Spring 2004, New Formations.

• ‘Small Towns, Boys, and Ivory Towers: A Naked Academic’in Jan Campbell & Janet Harbord (eds) Temporalities: Autobiography and Everyday Life, Manchester University Press, 2002.

•  All About Women: Pedro Almodovar and the Heterosocial Dynamic’ Textual Practice, 14, 2, 2000, pp.265-284.

•  Fags, Hags and Queer Sisters: Gender Dissent and Heterosocial Bonds in Gay Culture, Macmillan & St. Martin’s Press, 2000.

•  ‘Gay Men and Female Identification: Pathology or Cultural Dissent?’ in Jan Campbell & Janet Harbord (eds) Pyschopolitics and Cultural Desires (London & Bristol, Pensylvania: UCL Press, 1998).