“A Micro-History of World Cinema: The Global Routes of the Lumière Brothers”
Michael Allan, Comparative Literature and 2023–24 OHC Ernest G. Moll Research Fellow in Literary Studies. 

Between 1896–1903, the Lumière Brothers commissioned camera operators to traverse the globe with their newly invented cinematograph. My project tracks the voyage of one of these operators, Alexandre Promio, who traveled across North Africa and the Middle East. Drawing from histories of colonialism, race, and visual culture, I connect formal principles from film theory to the various sites at which they are made visible, part of a broader endeavor to rethink the grounds of world cinema.