Duncan Wheeler

Professor Duncan Wheeler is Chair of Spanish Studies at the School of Languages, Cultures and Societies, Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures, University of Leeds. He completed his undergraduate, master's, and doctoral studies at the University of Oxford and has been at Leeds since 2009, promoted to Professor in 2017.

His research focuses on the interrelationship between cultural institutions, art, politics, and memory in Spain, particularly during the Golden Age and the post-Franco transition. Key areas include Golden Age drama, Spanish cinema, popular music, gender and sexuality, and contemporary Spanish culture. He is the general editor of the Modern Language Review and a trustee of the Modern Humanities Research Association.

Wheeler’s recent scholarly output spans Golden Age theatre adaptations, bullfighting in media, Almodóvar’s cinema, and the political dimensions of Spanish popular culture. His work reveals a consistent interest in how cultural forms negotiate national identity, historical memory, and social change across centuries.

• Recipient of the 2023 Tecmerin Medal for Services to Spanish Cinema
• Inducted into the Spanish Academy of Stage Arts (2016)
• Leverhulme Research Fellow (2010–2012)
• Special Award from Anglo-Spanish Society (2012)

He has advised and mentored numerous PhD students on topics ranging from traumatic pasts and cosmopolitanism to Hispanic women’s literary responses and exile narratives. He has led major research grants, including Marie Curie and British Academy projects, often addressing cultural memory and transnational performance.

Wheeler is actively engaged in public scholarship, contributing to media outlets such as The Guardian, BBC, The Economist, and The Conversation, and giving keynote lectures internationally. He has also organized major academic conferences and serves on editorial boards for several leading journals.