From the Faculty: Dr Paul Flaig
Dr Paul Flaig is a lecturer in the Department of Film Studies at the University of St Andrews and teaches across undergraduate and postgraduate courses, covering topics from screen comedy and animation to ecocinema. Here, he shares an insight into his teaching and research interests, as well as his work as Co-Director of the German Screen Studies Network.
Please introduce yourself and your role at the University.
I am a lecturer in the Department of Film Studies. I started working at St Andrews in 2017, and before that, I taught at the University of Aberdeen. Although I’ve lived and worked in Scotland for a long time now, I am originally from the USA, having split my childhood between Brooklyn and Milwaukee. I then studied and worked in Chicago, Ithaca and Berlin.
What’s your area of teaching and/or research?
I have been lucky to be able teach at all undergraduate and postgraduate levels, including sub-honours lectures and tutorials devoted to film history and film theory, as well as honours courses on screen comedy and animation, both of which depart from my own research interests.
I’ve also worked with my wonderful colleagues on team-taught courses devoted to ecocinema, feminist film, cinema and politics, and silent cinema. I have just introduced a new Masters course on futures and fundamentals of film theory, which we explore through a diverse range of 21st-century films, from Mulholland Drive to The Gleaners and I to Goodbye Dragon Inn.
What are your current priorities in your role?
I have recently published a book entitled Weimar Slapstick and Hollywood Comedy Transformed (Bloomsbury 2025), which I am now happily sharing with fellow researchers and the wider public. Based on both recent and doctoral research, the book explores the extraordinary impact and transformative appropriation of American slapstick, cartoon and screwball film comedies during and after Germany’s Weimar Republic (1918-1933), bridging Charlie Chaplin and Bertolt Brecht, Buster Keaton and Berlin Dada, Frank Capra and Walter Benjamin, among other German-American comic duos.
Having finally shared this work with the world, I am now excited about pursuing several new projects, including the establishment of a new journal devoted to German Screen Studies, to be published by Berghahn Books in 2027, as well as a new book provisionally titled Permanent Déjà vu.
Tell us about your proudest achievement.
I have been especially proud to work with my colleague Dr Dora Osborne of the School of Modern Languages as Co-Director of the German Screen Studies Network (GSSN), the most important Anglophone forum for promoting knowledge about German film and television in the UK.
Since bringing the GSSN to St Andrews from its original base at King’s College, London in 2022, we’ve secured two rounds of generous support from the German Academic Exchange (DAAD) totalling over £150,000 to fund numerous activities, including conferences, screenings, teacher workshops and subtitling films.
What’s the best thing about teaching at St Andrews?
The best thing about teaching at St Andrews is working with such wonderful students and inspiring colleagues, bridging world-class scholarship with fantastic discussions in the classroom and dynamic student work.
This semester, I have been teaching a new honours course on animation. Each week I have looked forward to seminar discussions, where students have consistently provided fantastic insights and wonderful examples in dialogue with films, readings and their own complex personal relationship to animation, whether it be drawn by Disney, Ghibli or Aardman.
The students have had the opportunity to not only write about the animated films that most interest or excite them but have also made their own animated shorts in a technique of their choosing. We have watched their animations as a class, and it has been a joy to see their creativity, both intellectual and practical, in action. It was such a treat to have students applaud and support each other.
What’s your top recommendation for families visiting their students at St Andrews?
As a parent of two small children, I have loved exploring St Andrews and the wider East Neuk with my family. We especially enjoy cafes at the Balgove Larder, Bowhouse and Cambo Gardens as well as walks in town along the Lade Braes or at the St Andrews Botanic Gardens, not to mention further afield along the Fife Coastal Path, from Elie to St Monans. As a film scholar, I would be remiss not to mention the wonderful cinema at Dundee Contemporary Arts!
This article first appeared in LINK – the newsletter for members of our Family Programme.