Rakesh Sengupta

Rakesh Sengupta’s research and teaching focuses on South Asian cinemas, film history, media archaeology, critical theory and global media cultures. His current book project, An Archaeology of Screenwriting: Archives, Practices and Epistemes of Indian Cinema, 1930-1960, plots the history of screenwriting in South Asia outside Western epistemological frameworks of cinema. His work interrogates universalist ideas of film archives, aesthetics and audiences to imagine an alternative history of the medium and offers a decolonial model of film historiography from the Global South. His research is based on historical materials in four languages across formal and informal archives in several countries, as well as interview-based fieldwork in Mumbai.

Rakesh’s article in BioScope was awarded the Best Journal Article by Screenwriting Research Network and received High Commendation for Screen’s Annette Kuhn Debut Essay Prize. His research has also been published in Theory, Culture & Society and Literature/Film Quarterly, among other journals and edited volumes. His public writing on South Asian cinema and culture has appeared in The Wire, Dawn and Indian Cultural Forum.

Rakesh has previously taught at the University of Amsterdam and holds a PhD from SOAS, University of London.