Amanda Egbe

Research interests

My research explores the intersections of Black innovation, British Black filmmaking, and archival recovery, and how these histories can be reactivated through creative and digital methods. I examine how technologies from digitisation workflows to AI and interactive systems shape access, description, and representation within cultural memory.

As an artist researcher, I use making as a mode of enquiry: immersive, interactive, and moving image works allow me to test ideas materially and experientially. These outputs function as research artefacts, generating insights into race, representation, and the politics of archival infrastructures. I work in partnership with archives, museums, and heritage organisations, advising on digital platforms, co-production models, and ethical approaches to collection care and access.

My research is published through leading academic presses and contributes to national and international debates on digital heritage, archival justice, and media futures.

Challenges in academia

My academic career has developed within a sector where Black women remain significantly underrepresented at senior levels. This context shapes access to sponsorship, visibility, and networks of recognition. While these structural conditions do not diminish the quality or ambition of my work, they have influenced the pace and pathways through which leadership opportunities have emerged.

Working across practice, research, and consultancy often means translating between different disciplines, cultures, and expectations. At times, the labour of this translation is invisible. My commitment to inclusive, justice-oriented practices stems from lived experience of navigating spaces not designed with people like me in mind, and from understanding how representation – both on screen and within institutions – structures who feels able to belong.

Hopes for completing the programme

Through the 100 Black Women Professors NOW programme, I aim to refine and strengthen my leadership practice, deepen connections with peers across the sector, and further articulate the strategic direction of my interdisciplinary work.

Over the next two years, I plan to advance my research on Black innovation in British media and archival practice, lead further regional and national collaborations through UnMuseum and beyond, and continue shaping UWE Bristol's contributions to digital heritage, creative technologies, and inclusive cultural transformation.

Ultimately, I want my presence and leadership to signal possibility to demonstrate that Black women and non-binary people can transform not just what we study, but how institutions imagine expertise, care, and creative futures. The programme offers a vital space of community, development, and solidarity to support this next stage of my career.