Dr Emma Whittaker

Dr Emma Whittaker is the Creative Industries Research Fellow for the EDRF funded project, Low Carbon Devon at the University of Plymouth where she researches and supports Devon’s creative and cultural sector. She has instigated the Green Maker Initiative, hosted by MAKE Southwest, co-designed the Creative Commissions Programme with Green Minds project, and is currently co-investigator of the AHRC Net Zero Visions project.

She is a creative producer and lectures in arts, media, and design, practice, theory and history. Her research is concerned with the philosophies and practices of expanded narrative, experience, and perception. Her academic writing, published by Oxford University Press, University of Nebraska Press and Palgrave Macmillan, covers topics including, aesthetics, ambient literature, narrative complexity, sound design for narrative worlds, pilgrimage routes and traditional knowledge and engagement with the Earth. 

Whittaker's work in narrative and world-making operates across disciplines from printing, drawing, performance to sound, mixed reality and XR. Recent collaborative projects include the smartphone apps: 'Immersive Explorations' (2018), 'The Cartographer's Confession' (2017) - Winner of the New Media Writing Prize 2017, 'Journeyer's Guidebook' (2016) at Jubilee Library Brighton, 'The Lost Index: NATMUS' (2015), at The National Museum of Denmark, Copenhagen, 'The Lost Index, No.2: The Turning' (2014) at Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery, nominated for a Media Innovation Award, 'LociOscope, The Letters' (2014) at Dartington Hall Gardens, Devon and 'The Lost Index, No.1: Landscape with Figures' (2013), at Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery.

Qualifications

PhD, Plymouth University, 2017

P.G.C.E. Art and Design in Post-Compulsory Education, Northbrook College, 2000

MA Fine Art, UCE Birmingham, 1998

BA (Hons) Fine Art, Staffordshire University, 1996

Professional membership

Teaching interests

Dr Emma Whittaker lectures in arts, media, and design. Her research informs teaching in practice, history, theory, critical thinking and knowledge exchange/working with creative industries and communities.

BA Graphic Design (Dissertation supervision)

Previous teaching:

BA Media Arts/Creative Media (Dissertation supervision, Independent Practice and Media and Mass Communication modules)

Previous teaching - various institutions:

BA Experimental Music (Spatial Sound Design)

FdA Creative Digital Media (Module leader for Approaching Texts, Negotiated Research and Work-based Learning)

BA and FDA Multi-Media (Module Leader for Critical and Cultural Studies and Professional Development)

BA Fine Art & HND Fine Art (Module Leader for Contextual Studies)

Teaching Qualifications and Awards:

P.G.C.E Art and Design in Further and Higher Education (2000)

University of Plymouth Teaching Fellowship (2011-12)

HELP CETL Teaching Fellowship (2010-11)

Research interests

Dr Emma Whittaker has a particular interest in story worlds, narrative, designing experience and the creative industries. Her multidisciplinary, collaborative, practice-led research investigates the potential for the narrative to create tangible imaginary worlds. She uses a range of materials and skills from drawing to printmaking, from low-tech and digital technologies, together with performance, sound, smartphone, sensor technologies and the collaborative development of XR and situated narrative. She utilises grounded approaches and a combination of qualitative methods, including ethnographic, phenomenological and iterative design.

Research 

ERDF Creative Industries Research Fellow - Low Carbon Devon, Sustainability Hub, University of Plymouth (2020 - ). Research in how the creative and cultural sector in Devon and beyond is engaging in the low carbon agenda and supporting and developing these activities, as part of the ERDF funded Low Carbon Devon project at the University of Plymouth. Whittaker has instigated the Green Maker Initiative, hosted by MAKE Southwest, co-designed the Creative Commissions Programme with Green Minds project, and is currently co-investigator of the AHRC Net Zero Visions project.

Co-investigator for AHRC Net Zero Visions for Devon's Climate Emergency (2022 - ). 'Net-Zero Visions for the Devon Climate Emergency’ is bringing communities together with creative professionals and net-zero transition experts to produce positive ‘Visions’ of seven Devon locations as carbon net-zero in 2050.

AHRC NPIF Creative Economy Engagement Fellow, Discriminate AR, Falmouth University (2018 - 2019). This project investigated immersive experiences in heritage, landscapes and pilgrimage.

AHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Ambient Literature Production, UWE, Bristol (2016 - 2018). AHRC Ambient Literature project was a two-year collaboration between the UWE Bristol, Bath Spa University, and the University of Birmingham, that investigate the locational and technological future of the book. Whittaker investigated the role of the producer, writing situated narratives and aesthetics.

Whittaker, E. (2017) Transitions-Felt: William James, Locative Narrative and the Multi-Stable Field of Expanded Narrative. PhD Thesis.  The PhD investigated the American philosopher and psychologist William James, pragmatism, expanded, and locative narrative practices. It investigated narrative and experience, exploring intersections between contemporary and 19th-century science of perception.

Book chapters

Whittaker, E. 2021. ‘Sound Art as Locative Narrative’. In. The Oxford Book of Sound Art. Grant, J., Matthias, J., and Prior, D., Eds. Oxford: Oxford University Press https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-sound-art-9780190274054?cc=gb&lang=en&#

Whittaker, E. (2020) ‘An Aesthetics of Ambient Literature: Experience, Narrative, Design’. In. Ambient Literature, Towards a New Poetics of Situated Writing and Reading Practices. Abba, T., Dovey, J., and Pullinger, K. eds. London: Palgrave https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9783030414559. 

Whittaker, E. (2019) ‘The Wave Crest: Narrative Complexity and Locative Narrative’. In. Narrative Complexity, Cognition, Embodiment, Evolution. Grishakova, Marina and Poulaki, Maria. eds. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. University of Nebraska

Narrative projects for smartphone

Attlee, J. & Whittaker, E. (2017) ‘The Cartographer’s Confession’ [iOS & Android Application]. Retrieved from: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/the-cartographers-confession/id1263461799?mt=8 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.calvium.apptrails.ambientliteraturejames&hl=en (Winner of the New Media Writing Prize 2017 )

Whittaker, E. & Brocklehurst, J. (2016). Journeyer’s Guidebook. [iOS Application]. Retrieved from: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/journeyers-guidebook/id1146283679?mt=8

Whittaker, E. & Brocklehurst, J. (2015). The Lost Index: NATMUS. [iOS Application]. Retrieved from: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-lost-index-natmus/id1058419473?mt=8 

Whittaker, E. & Brocklehurst, J. (2014). The Lost Index, No. 2: The Turning. [iOS Application]. Retrieved from: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/lost-index-no.2-turning/id911182235?mt=8 (Nominated for Media Innovation Award 2015 in the Installation/Exhibition/Live Event category) 

Whittaker, E. & Brocklehurst, J. R. (2014). LociOscope, The Letters (Version 1.0) [iOS Application]. Apple Inc. Retrieved from https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/locioscope-the-letters/id778929957?mt=8

Whittaker, E. & Brocklehurst, J. R. (2013). The Lost Index, No. 1: Landscape With Figures (Version 1.0) [iOS Application]. Apple Inc. Retrieved from https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/lost-index-no.1-landscape/id730623803?mt=8

Whittaker, E. & Brocklehurst, J. R (2011). ColdCase 1866 (Version 1.1) [iOS Application]. Apple Inc. Retrieved from http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/cold-case-1866/id428238003?mt=8

The research Developing Interactive Locative Narratives for Mobile Technologies Within Arts Education was funded by a HELP CETL Teaching Fellowship (2010-11). 

She curates Expanded Narrative, an online resource for interactive narrative practitioners and a repository of practitioner interviews, funded by a Teaching Fellowship Award (2011-12) 

www.expandednarrative.org 

Conferences organised

The Expanded Narrative Symposium, Plymouth University 2-3 November 2013 http://www.expandednarrative.org/symposium/

Links

Expanded Narrative

http://www.expandednarrative.org

She jointly runs Expanded Narrative with James Brocklehurst. They make imaginary worlds that are experienced in existent places using a mobile devices, in collaboration with arts and heritage organisations.

The Expanded Narrative Research Network 

http://www.expandednarrative.org/archive/

The Expanded Narrative Research Network is located at Plymouth University with an international membership. The network is concerned with exploring the multidisciplinary field of narrative practices that reconfigure the form and expand the experience of storytelling.

This site offers news, reviews, resources and and a space for exchange of ideas with practitioners, educators and researchers, concerned with pervasive games, interactive, locative and transmedia narrative and storytelling.

@ExpNarrative