Originally from the United States, I came to Griffith University in 2011. As a Senior Lecturer in Sociology, I specialize in youth culture history. My work examines young people’s experiences with popular music, style, and various leisure pursuits from the 1960s through the 1990s. I am a member of the Griffith Centre for Social and Cultural Research, the Subcultures Network, and the International Association for the Study of Popular Music. I have presented my scholarship at international conferences, symposia, and workshops in Australia, the US, the UK, and Portugal. Before coming to Griffith, I was a Lecturer in Communication at the University of New Hampshire from 2009 to 2011. I earned an MA in Communication, Culture and Technology from Georgetown University in 2003 and then, a PhD in Communication and Cultural Studies from the University of Pittsburgh in 2009, where I was supervised by the noted media historian Ronald J. Zboray. During my doctoral studies, I was a 2006-2007 Fulbright Scholar at the University of Hamburg’s Research Center for Contemporary History, where I had the pleasure of being supervised by historian Axel Schildt. My latest book, A Women’s History of the Beatles (Bloomsbury Academic, 2021) has been favorably reviewed in the academic journals Popular Music and Rock Music Studies and was featured in the Washington Post, the Guardian, and ABC Radio Australia. It was awarded the 2022 Open Prize by the Australia-New Zealand branch of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM). In late 2021, I was invited to join the editorial board of the Journal of Beatles Studies (Liverpool University Press). My first monograph, “We are the Mods”: A Transnational History of a Youth Subculture (Peter Lang, 2009), was also a landmark publication as it was the first academic book to examine this British-born phenomenon. I edited the collection Lost Histories of Youth Culture (Peter Lang, 2015) and, with Gina Arnold, John Dougan, and Matthew Worley, I have co-edited The Life, Death, and Afterlife of the Record Store: A Global History (Bloomsbury Academic 2023). My work also is published in edited collections as well in academic journals such as Popular Music and Society, the Journal of Youth Studies, Feminist Media Studies, and Space and Culture. Additionally, I have been featured as an expert commentator on ABC Radio Australia, BBC Culture, and in the BBC documentary Mods and Rockers Rebooted (2014). In my twenties, and prior to embarking on an academic path, I flirted with musical ambitions – first as bassist and back-up singer for Bellingham, Washington’s riot grrrl band Hussy (1992-1993) – and then as Portland, Oregon’s so-called “Mod Chanteuse” Christine Darling (1999-2001). This is important to share, as my own lived experiences as a participant in youth subcultures and music scenes during my teens and twenties eventually prompted – and continues to inform and influence – my intellectual journey and choice of research projects.
Keynote title
Rocking the Archive: Archival Research and the Pursuit of Youth Culture History
Publications
Feldman-Barrett, C. (2021). A Women’s History of the Beatles.
Feldman-Barrett, C. (2018). Back to the future: mapping a historic turn in youth studies. Journal of Youth Studies, 21(6), 733-746.
Feldman-Barrett, C. (2014). From Beatles Fans to Beat Groups: A historiography of the 1960s all-girl rock band. Feminist Media Studies, 14(6), 1041-1055.
Feldman-Barrett, C., & Bennett, A. (2016). “All that Glitters”: Glam, Bricolage, and the History of Post-War Youth Culture. In Global Glam and Popular Music (pp. 11-24). Routledge.
