dr. ES (Emiel) Martens

Biography

Dr. Emiel Martens (1980) is a media lecturer, researcher, programmer, and producer. He graduated cum laude in both Media Studies and Human Geography at the University of Amsterdam, was a visiting scholar at the Caribbean Institute of Media and Communication (CARIMAC) at University of the West Indies, Mona, and holds a Ph.D in Media Studies from the University of Amsterdam. His dissertation, entitled ‘Welcome to Paradise Island: The Rise of Jamaica’s Cine-Tourist Image, 1891-1951’, marked the first study of Jamaica’s early film history and its connections with the island's early tourism history. 

Emiel joined the Department of Media Studies of the University of Amsterdam as a lecturer and researcher in 2004, where he is now working as Assistant Professor in Film and Visual Culture. In 2016, he also joined the Erasmus School of History, Culture and Communication (ESHCC) to become a team member of the research project 'Worlds of Imagination' (ERC Consolidator Grant), a comparative study of film tourism in non-western societies. His research interests span the fields of Postcolonial (Media) Studies, Media Geography, Popular Geopolitics, Migration and Diversity Studies, Creative Industries, Film (and) Tourism and Alternative Media, with a particular focus on the history, theory and praxis of the (Anglophone) Caribbean film and visual culture.

Besides his posts at the University of Amsterdam and Erasmus University Rotterdam, Emiel is also the founding director of  Caribbean Creativity, a non-profit organization committed to the promotion of Caribbean and Caribbean-themed cinema, board member of NALACS, the Netherlands Association of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, film review editor at ERLACS, the European Review of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, text editor at the Dutch Film Festival, board member at IDleaks, a non-profit organization aimed at better communication about international development, co-organiser of the Ammehoela Film Festival, and one of the dudes of media and communications agency Dudes in your Face (Dutch: Gasten in je Gezicht).