Media and English blog

Hello! I’m Suzie Williams and I am your Academic Liaison Librarian.

I work with your lecturers to ensure we have the right resources for you in the University Library (in print and online) and help you to develop the skills to use these resources when doing research for your assignments.

Did you know that as well as having library sessions in your module teaching, you can request an individual appointment with me to help you with your research? I can help you you with finding resources for your studies, and share hints and tips to search effectively for the resources you need.

If you'd like to book an appointment, complete our short form to let us know what support you'd like. 

Come and explore these lovely books all about film!

• Irving and Rea (2025) Producing and directing the short film and video
• McQuail et al (2020) McQuail's media and mass communication theory
• Mirvish (2021) The cheerful subversive's guide to independent filmmaking
• Wright (2024) Digital compositing for film and video: production workflows and techniques

The Rebel Women of Sunderland is a project that shines a light on the lives of Rebel Women from Sunderland with specially commissioned artworks, stories and podcasts. 

This podcast takes inspiration from the women through conversations with modern-day remarkable Sunderland women including those in community organisations that represent some of the contemporary themes raised through the podcasts - for example women’s writing and creativity, women and the music industry , women’s mental wellbeing and creativity , women and sports. 

You can explore the Rebel Women on Sunderland on the Sunderland Culture web site along with artwork by Kathryn Robertson and stories written by Jessica Andrews. 

Head over to the podcast now and pick an episode to start listening!

Discover the latest crop of new books in the library in the field of journalism:

• Briggs (2019) Journalism next: A practical guide to digital reporting and publishing.
• Filak (2024) Convergent journalism: an introduction.
• Freberg (2023) Discovering public relations: an introduction to creative and strategic practices.
• Morrison (2025) Essential public affairs for journalists.
• Verdegem (2024) Understanding data, culture and society.

The Carnegies are long-running UK children’s book awards – they recognise outstanding reading experiences for writing and illustrating in books for children and young people. The Carnegie Medal for Illustration is the award for an outstanding book in terms of illustration for children and young people. More information is available on the Carnegies web page.

This year's winner was Clever Crow written by Christine Butterworth and illustrated by Gill Lomenech. We now have a copy of this book in our library, so do come and borrow it to see the fabulous illustrations!

In the library we are fortunate to have a number of the books which have won this illustration award in previous years.

• Becker, A. (2023) The tree and the river (winner of the 2024 prize)
• Nguyen, T. and Zdung, J. (2023) Saving Sorya: Chang and the sun bear
• Pinfold, L. (2011) The black dog
• Reynolds, J. and Novgorodoff, D. (2020) Long way down: the graphic novel
• Smith, L (2017) There is a tribe of kids
• Smith, S. (2019) Small in the city

We encourage all illustration, design and creative writings students to borrow and read the books.  Explore them to discover the style of illustration, how the stories have been written and how the illustrations enhance the stories. 

…. and who knows, you could be a winner in future years!

We run a range of study skills events to help you complete your assignments and support your research. Keep an eye out throughout the year on our events page to keep up to date with the Masterclass workshops on offer. 

The Carnegies are long-running UK children’s book awards which recognise outstanding reading experiences for writing and illustrating in books for children and young people. The Carnegie Medal for Illustration is the award for an outstanding book in terms of illustration for children and young people. The Carnegie Medal for Writing is awarded for an outstanding book written in English for children and young people. 

The winner's of the 2025 competition have been announced! More information is available on the Carnegies web page. 

• Margaret McDonald was announced as the Carnegie Medal for Writing winner, the youngest in its almost ninety-year history for her “life changing and emotional” novel Glasgow Boys. This “honest” and “hopeful” story explores mental health, trauma, inequality and identity through the friendship between two boys who have grown up in foster care. 
• The winner of the Carnegie Medal for Illustration is Olivia Lomenech Gill for Clever Crow, written by Chris Butterworth. This “innovative” and detailed non-fiction picture book illustrated in “earthy” watercolours, charcoal, gouache and collage encourages readers to look afresh at a fascinating, but often maligned, bird. 

The Carnegies celebrate achievement in children’s writing and illustration and are unique in being judged by a panel of children’s and youth librarians, including 14 librarians from CILIP: the library and information association’s Youth Libraries Group. 

[Text and images sourced from The Carnegies web site with permission. More details about the prizes, authors and illustrators are available on the Carnegies web pages]

Box of Broadcasts is a brilliant resource which all our students and staff have access to through the library. 

For anyone who hasn’t discovered it yet, Box of Broadcasts (often know as BoB) is an on-demand TV & radio streaming service, giving you access to programmes from over 65 free-to-air channels from the UK and beyond. You can also to be alerted when programmes in the next two weeks are ready to watch - a great tool for your time management!

This series of short videos will help you get the most out of this resource for your studies and research including:

• How to access and search BoB.
• Using the programme guide.
• Using your own personal area of BoB.
• How to make a playlist and clips.
• How to request a programme.

If you're not a big reader but are keen to learn about your subject, this is a really good way of developing your knowledge and helping with your research.

We have some beautifully visual books in the library which are part of the Portrait of Humanity and Portrait of Britain series:

• Portrait of Humanity volume 4
• Portrait of Humanity volume 5
• Portrait of Humanity volume 6
• Portrait of Britain Volume 7

Johannah Churchill is a lecturer in Contemporary Photographic Practice at the university and she says: “For photography students the books are something to aspire to and something to draw inspiration from. Each of the books showcase 200 new portraits from national and international photographers, selected from thousands of entries, allowing the privilege of a glimpse into the lives of their subjects, and celebrating what connect us.  They’re such a valuable resource for students to draw upon - a wide selection of contemporary photographers and subject matters – I think what I like most is when students find an image in there and then do a deep-dive into favourite photographers’ work.”

Thanks to Johannah for sharing her insights into how these books are useful for our students studying photography. Do pop into our St Peter's Library to discover the delights of these books and the photographs included in them.

You can now learn about the people of the BBC through the Connected Histories of the BBC. The Arts and Humanities Research Council funded a six-year oral history project where the majority of recordings are from 1972-2001. The interviews are a mixture of video and audio-only and are normally accompanied by transcripts. Topics covered include the history of broadcasting at the BBC, the evolution of job descriptions and programme content. 

For themed guides to the collections explore the Voices of the BBC - for your convenience, the themes are listed here:

• Inventing the future
• Entertaining the UK
• The BBC and the Cold War
• The BBC and World War Two
• Pioneering women
• People, nation and empire
• Radio reinvented
• The birth of TV
• Elections
• BBC memories