Dr. Skadi Loist is Professor for Production Cultures in Audiovisual Media Industries at the Film University Babelsberg KONRAD WOLF in Potsdam, Germany, researching, teaching, and leading the research project “Film Circulation on the International Film Festival Network and the Impact on Global Film Culture” funded by the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF, 2017-2021).

Skadi held prior positions as lecturer and postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Media Research at the University of Rostock (2014-2018) and as part-time lecturer and PhD candidate at the University of Hamburg (2008-2013).

Generally, her research is concerned with recent developments in film and media industries, cultural studies and  gender/queer studies with a focus on film festivals and queer cinema. Recent projects include “Who directs German feature films: Gender report 2009-2013” (with Elizabeth Prommer, 2015). Together with Deb Verhoeven (University of Alberta, Edmonton), she established the International Screen Industries Consortium (ISICon), an international network of screen industry researchers and organizations to analyze the relative position of women in film industries across the globe.

Her work has been published in German and English in Screen, NECSUS, Zeitschrift für Medienwissenschaft, Scope, Diogène, Alphaville and numerous edited volumes. Skadi has edited a dossier on “Teaching European Cinema: The European University Film Award (EUFA) Project” (in Alphaville 14/2017), co-edited the textbook Film Festivals: History, Theory, Method, Practice (with Marijke de Valck & Brendan Kredell, Routledge 2016), Sexy Media? Gender/Queertheoretische Analysen in den Medien- und Kommunikationswissenschaften (with Sigrid Kannengießer & Joan K. Bleicher, transcript 2013) and Bildschön: 20 Jahre Lesbisch Schwule Filmtage Hamburg (with Dorotheé von Diepenbroick, Männerscharm 2009).

Together with Marijke de Valck she founded the Film Festival Research Network (FFRN) in 2008, which connects more than 600 researchers and practitioners in the field.  She serves as member of the Steering Committee of the European Network for Cinema and Media Studies (NECS), is a founding member of the NECS workgroup “Film Festival Research” (2008-), was inaugural co-chair of the “Film & Media Festivals” Scholarly Interest Group at SCMS (2011-2013), is inaugural co-chair of the “AG Medienindustrien” of the Gesellschaft für Medienwissenschaft (GfM) (2012-), and serves as Editorial Board member of NECSUS_European Journal of Media Studies.

Outside the academy, Skadi works with the Lesbisch Schwule Filmtage Hamburg | International Queer Film Festival and was board member of QueerScope e.V., the association of Independent German Queer Film Festivals.