Department of Film and Multimedia Studies
Department of Film and Multimedia Studies
- Details
- Published: 15 March 2024
Department of Film and Multimedia Studies
List of Academic Staff Members
- Dr Emily Oghale God'spresence – Ag Head of Department ( +234 8064361241)
- Prof. Femi Okiremuette Shaka
- Prof. Innocent Ebere Uwah
- Prof. Nwafor Friday
- Dr Nkechi Asiegbu Bature-Uzor
- Dr Chioma Deborah Ekhaeyemhe
Profiles of Academic Staff Members
Profile of Prof. Femi Okiremuette Shaka
BA (Benin), MA (Ibadan), PhD (Warwick, UK)
Professor Femi Okiremuette Shaka was born on 11th May, 1957, to the family of late Chief Bethel Shaka Omoshue of Arhavwarien Kingdom, in Ughelli South LGA, Delta State, Nigeria. He attended Saint Ambrose College, Usiefrun, and after that proceeded to the University of Benin, Benin City, where he earned his BA degree in Theatre Arts (Second Class Honours, Upper Division) in 1984. That year, he was Best Graduating Student in his Department and at the then Faculty of Creative Arts, University of Benin. In 1986, he joined the teaching staff of the Department of Creative Arts, University of Port Harcourt, based on the recommendations from the Head, Department of Theatre Arts, University of Benin. Professor Ola Rotimi recommended him for employment in Uniport because the University of Benin, which had a tradition of employing its Faculty Best Graduating Students, refused to employ Femi Okiremuette Shaka because he was considered a very close student associate of Dr Festus Iyayi and Dr Tunde Fatunde, ASUU Branch Chairman and Secretary, respectively at the University of Benin. When Professor Ola Rotimi, who was External Examiner to UniBen was told why the Department couldn’t employ its Best Graduating Student, he told the HOD, Dr Atiboroko Uyovbukerhi, to send Femi Shaka to him in Uniport. The rest they say is history. Having taught in Uniport under Professor Ola Rotimi, between 1986-1990, he was recommended by his boss for his MA programme at the Department of Theatre Arts, University of Ibadan. After his MA degree, he won the prestigious Commonwealth Scholarship for his doctorate degree in Film Studies at the University of Warwick, Coventry, England. After his studies in the U.K., he returned to the University of Port Harcourt in November, 1995, where he helped to pioneer the Film & TV Studies programme of the of the Department of Theatre Arts, which name was later changed to the Department of Theatre and Film Studies, as a result of the curriculum changes introduced by Professor Shaka, to enrich the programme of the old Department of Theatre Arts. In 2001, he won the prestigious Fullbright Senior African Fellowship which enabled him to teach and conduct research at the Africana Studies Program, New York University. The fruit of that one year residency was the publication of his book, Modernity and the African Cinema: A Study in Colonialist Discourse, Post-Coloniality and Modern African Identities (2004), Lawrenceville, N.J: African World Press. He is also the co-editor [with M.A. Omibiyi-Obidike] (2012) of the book, Music and Theatre Arts in Africa, Ojo: Centre for Information, Press and Public Relations, Lagos State University. When the time came for the upgrading of the Nigerian Film Institute to a degree awarding institution, he helped to design the film production curriculum before the Institute was affiliated to the Department of Theatre Arts, University of Jos. He also participated in drawing up the NUC BMAS for the BA/BSc Degree in Film Production, together with Prof. Hyginus Ekwuazi, Prof. Umar Faruk Jibril and Prof. Abdalla Uba Adamu. He equally featured on the NUC accreditation team, with Prof. Umar Faruk Jibril, to the MSc Film Programme at the Pan-Atlantic University, Lagos.
Prof. Shaka is a widely traveled and widely read scholar whose articles have been published in reputable international and local scholarly journals, and a well-known strong advocate of the cinema as a tool for national development. In this respect, he has regularly mounted campaigns for the establishment of Departments of Film & TV Studies across the six geopolitical zones of the country to help professionalize the teaching and practice of both sectors of the creative industries. He has served twice as Head, Department of Theatre & Film Studies; Dean, Students Affairs; a two tenured Dean, Faculty of Humanities; as well as two tenured member, Governing Council of the University of Port Harcourt.
As a strong advocate of the cinema as a tool for national development, he has dedicated the better part of his career to training manpower for the Nigeria movie industry. In this regard, he has supervised 22 PhD degree holders and 28 Master degree holders in his discipline of Film & TV Studies/Production. Among the PhDs which he supervised, 5 are already full Professors, of which one, Professor Barclays Foubiri Ayakoroma, is the Acting Vice Chancellor of the University of Africa, at Toru-Orua, Bayelsa State. Two of the PhDs are Associate Professors on their way to becoming full Professors. The choice to stay in Nigeria and train manpower for the movie industry has been a challenging one full of personal professional and financial sacrifices. But two incidences helped to mitigate the regret of this choice. The first was when he was appointed Nigeria’s first Professor of Film Studies in October 2009, and the second occurred in 2019, when his former students gathered together and published a Festschrift in his honour, appropriately titled, Nollywood Nation: On the Industry, Practice and Scholarship of Cinema in Nigeria, edited by the world renowned Nigerian film scholar, Onookome Okome, and Innocent Uwah and Friday Nwafor. Professor Nwafor, my former student became the pioneer Head, Department of Film and Multimedia, University of Port Harcourt. A thing of great pride to me. Besides being a renowned film scholar, he is also already building up a rich portfolio in the practice of documentary production. In 2023, he was appointed Chairman of Jury, Zuma International Film Festival, FCT, Abuja. Zuma International Film Festival is the official Film Festival of the Federal Government of Nigeria, hosted by the Nigerian Film Corporation.
Professor Shaka is happily married to his lovely heartthrob, Dr. Esther Uchenna Shaka, a specialist in Corporate Accounting, and the marriage is blessed with three kids, two young men and a young lady.
Profile of Prof. Innocent Ebere Uwah
DEPT: Film And Multimedia Studies
FACULTY: Communication And Media Studies
ROLE: Academic Staff
University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria
EMAIL: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Academic Biography
Innocent Ebere Uwah earned his PhD from Dublin City University, Ireland. He is a professor of Film Studies at the Department of Film and Multimedia Studies, Faculty of Communication and Media Studies, University of Port Harcourt, Nigeria. His books include The Rhetoric of Culture in Nollywood (2013, Reprinted 2019) and Nollywood Nation (On the Industry, Practice and Scholarship of Cinema in Nigeria) (2019, co-edited). He has published many book chapters and peer reviewed journal articles on film but more specifically on Nollywood - the Nigerian cinema industry. He is a recipient of the 2010 Global Partners’ Award in Communications (USA), a 2013 African House fellow of the University of Cape Town, South Africa and currently a 2024 Combe Trust fellow of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Humanities (IASH), University of Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. He was the Head, Department of Theatre and Film Studies (2020–2022), University of Port Harcourt and has completed authoring a forthcoming book titled - Social Dilemmas in Discourse of Cinema, Ethics & Society. His research interest revolves around Film, Theology and Ethics as he continues to explore the intersections between cinema, ethics, and society. He is also interested in biopics in Nollywood and identity construction in movies.
Profile of Prof. Friday Nwafor
Friday Nwafor is a Professor of Documentary Film in the University of Port Harcourt. He holds a Ph. D in Film Studies – Documentary. He was the Pioneer Head, Film and Multimedia Department, University of Port Harcourt. He was the Director, Institute of Arts and Culture (2019-2023). He has successfully supervised 4 Ph. D and is currently supervising 5 Ph.Ds. He was appointed a full professor in 2020. He has taught full-time for 15 years. His email address is This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. His telephone number is 08053277794. He is widely published in reputable journals and books. He is currently working on documentation and critical presentations of the practice of documentary filmmaking in Nigeria. Some of his publications include:
“Inter-Ethnic Marriage as an Ingredient for coexistence in a multi-cultural society: Elechi Amadi’s Woman of Calabar as a paradigm”.
“Stage interpretation of Spenser Okoroafor’s “Battle of Wit and Will” An adaptation of Achebe’s Arrow of God”.
“Meta-Cinematic Narrative Pattern in African Documentary Films: Ola Balogun’s The Magic of Nigeria as Paradigm”.
“The Theme of Historical Authenticity in Femi Odugbemi’s Documentary Film: Ibadan: cradle of Nigerian Literati”.
“African Diaspora and Religious Cult Worship: A Filmic Reading of Ola Balogun’s “African God in Brazil”.
“Chinua Achebe’s Chike and the river as a vector of the Igbo world vision”.
Profile of Associate Professor Emily Oghale God'spresence
DESIGNATION: Associate Professor
DEPARTMENT: Film And Multimedia
FACULTY: Communication And Media Studies
ROLE: Academic Staff
University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria.
EMAIL: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Academic Biography
Dr Emily Oghale God'spresence earned her Masters and Doctorate degrees in Film Studies from the University of Port Harcourt with specialization in Feminist Film Criticism and Gender Studies. She is currently the Acting Head, Department of Film and Multimedia at the University of Port Harcourt, Nigeria. Her research on the representation of the female gender in Nollywood Films has earned her a plethora of articles published in reputable national and international academic journals. Emily's interest in the development of the Female person is evident in her annual gender workshop tagged: Being A Woman workshop, The Emily God'spresence Project.
Dr God'spresence is a recipient of the prestigious Fulbright Junior Staff Development programme (2011-2012) which enabled her to complete her PhD research at Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, USA as a Visiting Student Researcher.
Some of her works include: Beyond the Boundaries (a plat text on female leadership), Promoting Decent Dressing in Society, etc. She has taught several courses such as Gender, Arts and Development; Gender, Society and Cinema; Feminist Theater; Women in African Theater; etc.
Profile of Dr Nkechi Asiegbu Bature-Uzor
Nkechi Asiegbu Bature-Uzor is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Film and Multimedia Studies, Faculty of Communication and Media Studies, University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria. She holds BA and MA Degrees in Theatre Arts from University of Port Harcourt and University of Ibadan, Nigeria respectively with special leaning to film arts. Subsequently, she obtained MA and Ph.D Degrees in Film Studies from University of Port Harcourt. Her research interests include semiotics, costume and make-up arts, mise-en-scene and visual communication. She had worked in the Nigerian Film Industry (Nollywood) as a freelance Costume Designer and Make-up Artiste with over forty movie credits as Costumier and Make-up Artiste. She also has stage credits of play productions as costume and make-up artiste.
Her most recent publications analyze the use of costumes and make-up as communication tools in film narratives and also considers the use of non-textile materials as fabrics for film costumes. Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. +234 8033193142. www.researchgate.net; rah-net.com>rah; camerooncommonwealthjournal.com; https://doi.org/10.15640/rah.v7n2a1
Profile of Dr Chioma Deborah Ekhaeyemhe
NAME: Chioma Deborah Ekhaeyemhe
EMAIL: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
PHONE: 08035081503
RANK: Senior Lecturer
DEPT: Film and Multimedia Studies FACULTY: Communication and Media Studies
INSTITUTION: University of Port Harcourt.
Dr Chioma Deborah Ekhaeyemhe is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Film and Multimedia Studies, Faculty of Communication and Media Studies,, with emphasis on Internet Communication. She joined the University of Port Harcourt as a lecturer in 2011. She is a member of many academic societies like the society of Nigerian Artists (SONTA), Association of Communication Scholars and Professionals (ACSPN), West African for Commonwealth Literature and Language Studies, to mention a few.
She has served as a member of various committees within the University of Port Harcourt and have attended many national and international conferences where she presented papers and has written scholarly articles in notable Nigerian and international journals. Her area of special interest is on internet, media studies and psychology. She is a hard-working and dedicated lecturer, who aspires to get the best out of her students.
