Dr Diwas Bisht
Faculty of Social Science, Humanities and the Arts for People and the Economy (VA)
Current positions
Lecturer in Animation
Biography
Dr Diwas Bisht is a researcher and animation filmmaker, currently Lecturer in Animation and Programme Leader for BA (Hons) Animation at the Faculty of Social Science, Humanities and the Arts for People and the Economy, University of Salford. Prior to this appointment, he was Lecturer in Animation at the School of Digital Arts, Manchester Metropolitan University (2022–2023), and Research Associate on the British Academy project Digital Media, Participation and Political Culture at Loughborough University (2021–2023).
His Leverhulme Trust-funded PhD research (2017–2021) at Loughborough University examined intergenerational memories and identities in the British Bangladeshi community through participatory animation methodologies. This work culminated in his first monograph, Animating British Bangladeshi Memory (De Gruyter, 2024), which brings together practice-based methods and postcolonial memory studies. He is currently co-authoring a second monograph, Mixed Signals: British Television, South Asian Identity, and the Politics of Belonging (Bloomsbury, forthcoming), with Aswin Punathambekar and Sim Gill (University of Pennsylvania) and Julia Giese (University of Derby). The book examines how British television has shaped, contested and negotiated South Asian identities in Britain, and what these representations reveal about the politics of belonging in postcolonial Britain.
His research has been published in leading journals across media, cultural and animation studies, including work on diasporic worldmaking in streaming media (European Journal of Cultural Studies, 2026), the role of women in shaping new ethnicities through digital media (International Journal of Cultural Studies, 2022), and the intersections of public service broadcasting and race relations in postcolonial Britain (Media, Culture & Society, 2023). His practice-led research on postcolonial memories and identities in the British Bangladeshi diaspora appeared in Animation Practice, Process & Production (2023). He has also contributed the chapter “Remembering 1971: Contested Nationalisms, Memories and Identities in the British Bangladeshi Diaspora” to the Routledge Handbook of Asian Diaspora and Nationalism (ed. Ajaya K. Sahoo, 2025), which examines how memories of 1971 shape competing nationalisms and identities across generations of British Bangladeshis.
Before pursuing doctoral research, he worked in the Indian animation industry for over five years, particularly in the e-learning sector with various ed-tech and gaming start-ups. He holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) from Delhi University (2010) and a Master of Design (MDes) in Animation from the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad (2013).
His wider research interests include diaspora and cultural identity, transcultural memory, postcolonial studies, media studies, audience reception, and animation-based research methodologies. Through his creative practice, he bridges academic inquiry with collaborative, community-led film projects, working with organisations such as Swadhinata Trust, King’s College London, the University of Liverpool and Loughborough University. These collaborations have explored themes such as the lived experiences of the coronavirus pandemic, disaster heritage and environmental awareness, with particular attention to amplifying the marginalised voices of the British South Asian diaspora.
Areas of Research
Postcolonial Studies, Memory Studies, Media and Memory, Media Studies, Animation based research, Participatory research, Diaspora and cultural Identity
Qualifications
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PhD
2017 - 2021
Publications
- Animating British Bangladeshi Memory
- Streaming video and diasporic worldmaking: Race, ethnicity, and religion in the Anglophone West
- Curating new ethnicities in a digital era: Women and media work in the British South Asian diaspora
- Animating memory: Creative explorations of postcolonial memories and identities in the British Bangladeshi diaspora
- Public service media and race relations in postcolonial Britain: BBC and immigrant programming, 1965–1988