Asya Draganova
Dr Asya Draganova is a Lecturer in Media and Popular Music Culture and a researcher co-leading the Popular Music Research Cluster based at the Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research. Asya is the Course Director for MA Media and Cultural Studies and teaches across all MA programmes at the School of Media within the Birmingham Institute of Media and English. She is an integral part of the pedagogical team leading the BA (Hons) Music Industries. Asya is also the school academic lead for Study Abroad student exchanges.
Asya’s research interests include contemporary East European subcultural scenes, popular music heritage, and the relationships of identity, place, and myth in popular music culture in styles such as heavy metal and the Canterbury Sound. She engages actively in publishing research and is the author of the monograph Popular Music in Contemporary Bulgaria: At the Crossroads (2019). Asya works with multiple peer-reviewed journals and is part of the editorial team for Riffs and a member of the advisory board for Metal Music Studies. She also writes new music reviews for The Arts Desk and the I newspaper. Asya draws inspiration for her work from her related artistic explorations as a guitar player, singer, poet and painter.
Current Activity
Asya is the Course Director for MA Media and Cultural Studies. She is also an integral part of the teaching team for BA (Hons) Music Industries. She also teaches and contributes to BA (Hons) Media and Communications, MA Global Media Management, MA Public Relations, MA Data Journalism, MA Multiplatform and Mobile Journalism, MA Media Production, and MA Events and Exhibitions Management.
Asya is committed to internationalism in education and the value of cultural and knowledge exchanges. This is central to her role as an international exchange academic lead for media students via Study Abroad.
Current research and publications for Asya include studies around heavy metal in popular music heritage, folklore influences in contemporary Bulgarian popular music, and the Canterbury Sound as an opportunity to study aesthetic, continuity, place and myth in popular music cultural identities. Asya co-leads the BCMCR Popular Music Research Cluster and is involved with a range of journals, edited collections, and projects.
Areas of Expertise
Areas of research interest and expertise:
- Popular music culture
- Ethnography
- Subcultural music scenes
- Music industries
- Media and creative Industries
- DiY and Independent Music Cultures
- Post-communist transitions
- Balkanism
- Politics of cultural identities
- Popular music and heritage
- Youth studies
- Rituals of resistance
Qualifications
2019 – PGCert Higher Education (Birmingham City University)
2016 – PhD, Media and Cultural Studies (Canterbury Christ Church University)
2011 – 1st Class BA (Hons) Media and Cultural Studies (Canterbury Christ Church University)
Memberships
Selected ongoing memberships
2019 - Member of the Higher Education Academy
2019 - Adjunct member of the Griffith Centre of Social and Cultural Research, Griffith University, Brisbane
2019 - Advisory Board Member of Metal Music Studies Journal (Intellect)
2017 - Editorial board member of Riffs journal
2017 - Co-lead of Popular Music Research Cluster at the Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research (BCMCR), with Professor Nicholas Gebhardt
2017 - Dissemination Committee Board Member for the international project and biannual conference Keep It Simple, Make It Fast (University of Porto)
2016 - Member of BCMCR
2014 - Member of IASPM
2013 - Journal of Youth Studies (Taylor & Francis), as peer-reviewer
2013 - YOUNG: Nordic Journal of Youth Research (Sage), as peer-reviewer
Teaching
Asya is the Course Director for MA Media and Cultural Studies. She is also an integral part of the teaching team for BA (Hons) Music Industies. She also teaches and contributes to BA (Hons) Media and Communications, MA Global Media Management, MA Public Relations, MA Data Journalism, MA Multiplatform and Mobile Journalism, MA Media Production, and MA Events and Exhibitions Management.
Asya works with students at all levels within Higher Education – from Level 4 or Year 1 of a standard undergraduate degree, through MA, to PhD. She is committed to exploring co-creative, empowering and inclusive student-centred teaching and learning practices. Asya supervises Major Projects at BA and MA levels as well as PhD research projects.
While her research is mostly in popular music culture, Asya has developed a broad teaching portfolio which includes areas such as:
- Research methods
- Popular music cultures
- Music Industries
- Media and creative industries
- Media theory
- Youth cultures
- Design and visual theory
Asya has also participated in international teaching exchanges such as the International Teaching and Staff Exchange Week at the Oulu University of Technology, 2018 and 2019.
Research
Asya’s PhD, supervised by Professor Shane Blackman at Canterbury Christ Church University and supported by full scholarship, was an ethnographic study into the creation and articulation of popular music within the social and political contexts of contemporary Bulgaria. Asya’s doctoral research became the basis for the monograph Popular Music in Contemporary Bulgaria: At the Crossroads (2019). This strand of her research – concerned with East European post-communist contexts and popular music – has produced a series of new research, especially around subcultural scenes in Eastern Europe.
Since completing her PhD, Asya has also been involved with research dedicated to the value of popular music for the heritage and contemporary identity of places and their communities. For example, Asya has been working on developing a study in collaboration with Professor Paul Long, focusing on the local and international significance of heavy metal. Working with Professor Andy Bennett (Griffith University) and Professor Shane Blackman (Canterbury Christ Church University), Asya is the first editor of a collection on the Canterbury Sound in popular music.
Asya has been actively involved in organising research and impact events such as the one-day festival Canterbury Sound: Music, Place and Myth (2017) in collaboration with the Canterbury Festival, and the Home of Metal Symposium at Birmingham City University (2019). She is also part of the dissemination committee of the international project Keep It Simple, Make It Fast: a biannual conference with a leading role for popular music, youth studies research, and cultural activism. Asya also engages with outward-facing, research informed activities as part of events such as Flatpack Festival and XChange Festival.
Asya is involved as an editor, advisory board member, and reviewer for multiple peer-reviewed journals with international following such as Riffs, Metal Music Studies, YOUNG, and Journal of Youth Studies. As a co-lead of the BCMCR Popular Music Research Cluster she is committed to nurturing the collective intellectual project of the cluster, the development of impactful projects, ideas, and publications.
Publications
Selected research publications
Draganova, A. Blackman, S. and Bennett, A. (eds) (2020, forthcoming) The Canterbury Sound in Popular Music: Scene, Identity and Myth, Bingley: Emerald
Draganova, A. (2020, forthcoming) “Pop-Folk, Traditional, and Popular Music in Bulgaria" in Beissinger, M. (ed.) Oxford Handbook of Slavic and East European Folklore, Oxford: Oxford Press
Draganova, A. (2019) At the Crossroads: Popular Music in Contemporary Bulgaria, Bingley: Emerald
Draganova, A. (2020, forthcoming) “The ‘New Flowers’ of Bulgarian Punk: Subcultural scenes, rituals of resistance, and social change” in Arnold, G. and McKay, G. (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Punk, Oxford: Oxford Press
Draganova, A. and Blackman, S. (2018) “A howl of the estranged: post-punk and contemporary underground scenes in Bulgarian popular Music” in Guerra, P. and Bennett, A. (eds.) Underground scenes and DiY cultures, London: Routledge, Preview: https://www.routledge.com/DIY-Cultures-and-Underground-Music-Scenes/Bennett-Guerra/p/book/9780415786980
Draganova, A. and Blackman, S. (2018) “In the Land of Grey and Pink: Popular music alternativity in the lived and imagined city of Canterbury” in Spracklen, K. and Holland, S. (eds.) Alternativity and Marginalisation, Bingley: Emerald, Preview: https://books.emeraldinsight.com/page/detail/Subcultures-Bodies-and-Spaces/?k=9781787565128
Draganova, A. and Nedeva-Voeva, N. (2018) “A New Generation Forever: The (Bulgarian) Revolution Goes On” in Riffs, Vol. 2(1): 38-48, Available at: http://riffsjournal.org/2018/07/31/volume-2-issue-1-neli-nedeva-voeva-and-asya-draganova-a-new-generation-forever-the-bulgarian-revolution-goes-on/
Draganova, A. (2015) “Book Review: Irving Seidman, Interviewing as Qualitative Research: A Guide for Researchers in Education & the Social Sciences” in Qualitative Research, Vol. 15 (3)
Popular publications, zines, reviews, and blogs by Asya available online at:
Selected conference papers and invited guest talks
Draganova, A., with Bennett, A. (2019) Music scenes, Memory and Emotional Geographies (Conference Panel), IASPM 2019, The Australian National University, Canberra
Draganova, A. (2019) “The Canterbury Sound: Constructing Narratives of Place and Scene in Popular Music”, IASPM 2019, The Australian National University, Canberra
Draganova, A. (2019, invited speaker) “Progressiveness and Alternativity in Popular Music: The Canterbury Sound”, Griffith Centre for Social and Cultural Research, Brisbane
Draganova, A. (2019, invited speaker) “The New Mob Rules”, guest speaker at panel at the World Metal Congress, Shoreditch, London.
Draganova, A. (2019) “To Break a Wall”: On the genealogy and heritage of subcultural scenes in Eastern Europe, Home of Metal Symposium, Birmingham City University
Draganova, A. (2019) “From a Postgraduate Research Thesis to a Published Monograph”, Canterbury Christ Church University, Canterbury
Draganova, A. and Long, P. (2018) “Gotta let go? Women and Popular Music Heritage”, Keep it Simple, Make it Fast International Conference, University of Porto, Portugal, July 2018
Draganova, A. (2017) “Home of Metal, Homes of Metal”, Boundaries and Ties ISMMS International Conference, University of Victoria, Canada, June 2017
Draganova, A. (2017) “Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard, But I think…”: Women and the contradictions of rock music’s gendered cultural identities, Guest Lecture by Invitation of Birmingham Rock Society, University of Birmingham
Draganova, A. and Blackman, S. (2016) “In the Land of Grey and Pink”: Popular music in the lived and imagined city of Canterbury", Keep it Simple, Make it Fast: DIY Cultures, Spaces and Places, international conference. University of Porto. 17 - 21 July 2016
Draganova, A. and Blackman, S. (2016) “Sounds like Canterbury: Ethnographic observations on the local music scenes within a social, economic and cultural community”, MeCCSA Annual Conference 2016 – Communities, Canterbury Christ Church University
Draganova, A. (2015, invited speaker) “For every action – a counter action’: Post-punk, power, and resistance in Bulgarian Popular Music”, Power and Resistance conference, Griffith University, Australia
Draganova, A. (2015, invited speaker) “So we pose our questions to a whole nation forever” The genesis of youth cultures and resistance in contemporary Bulgaria, Youth Histories symposium, Griffith University, Australia
Draganova, A. and Blackman, S. (2015) “Rituals of ‘misrule’ within Bulgarian popular music”. Keep it Simple, Make it Fast: Underground Music Scenes and DIY Cultures, international conference. University of Porto. 15-17 July 2015
Draganova, A. & Blackman, S. (2014) “A howl of the estranged: Post-punk and contemporary underground scenes in Bulgaria.” Keep it Simple, Make it Fast: Underground Music Scenes and DIY Cultures, international conference. University of Porto. 9-11 July 2014
Links and Social Media
Twitter: @AsyaDraganova
Instagram: @asyadraganova
Popular publications, zines, reviews, and blogs by Asya available online at: