Christine Becker, PhD

Christine Becker received her B.A. in Humanities from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1993 and Ph.D. in Communication Arts: Film Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2001. She has been in the Department of Film, Television, and Theatre at the University of Notre Dame since 2000, specializing in film and television history, critical analysis of film and television, and media industry studies. She also teaches courses for the Sports, Media, and Culture Minor.

Specialties:
Film and television history
Critical analysis of film and television
Media industry studies
TV narrative and Aesthetics
British television
Sports and television
Stardom and celebrity
History, Theory, and Criticism

Research Interests:
media industries, television history, TV narrative and aesthetics, British television, sports and television, stardom and celebrity

Representative Publications, Performances, and Creative Works
It’s the Pictures That Got Small: Hollywood Film Stars on Fifties Television. (Wesleyan University Press, 2008).

“BBC America: Cloning Drama for a Transnational Network,” in Michele Hilmes, Roberta Pearson, and Matt Hills, eds., Contemporary Transatlantic Television Drama: Industries, Programs and Fans. (Oxford University Press, 2019), 69-86.

"Accent on Talent: The Valorization of British Actors on American Quality Television,” in Christopher Hogg and Tom Cantrell, eds., Exploring Television Acting. (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2018), 140-153.

“Off Goes the Telly: Writer Discourse on the Life on Mars Franchise Finales,” Journal of Screenwriting (Vol 6 Num 2: 2015): 173-188.

"Paul Newman: Superstardom and Anti-Stardom,” in Pamela Robertson Wojcik, ed., New Constellations: Movie Stars of the 1960s, Star Decades: American Culture/American Cinema series, Adrienne L. McLean and Murray Pomerance, eds. (Rutgers University Press, 2011), 14-33.