Leonie Zilch (Dr. phil) has been a staff member and lecturer in Film Studies in the Department of Film, Theater, Media and Cultural Studies at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz since October 2020. Her research and teaching focuses on images of sexuality in feature films and pornography, on documentary films and media, feminist film theory and film and media education from an anti-discriminatory perspective. She’s the coordinator of the scientific network “Interdisciplinary Pornography Research” funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG). From 2016 to 2020, she was a doctoral researcher in the DFG Graduate Research Training Group “Documentary Practices. Excess and Privation” at the Ruhr University Bochum. Within this framework, she completed her PhD entitled Arousing Documents. Pornography and Documentary Authority (published in German in 2025 as Erregende Dokumente. Pornografie und dokumentarische Autorität). From 2010 to 2016, she studied Theater, Film and Media Studies (B.A.) as well as Philosophy and German Literature (Exam.) at the Goethe University Frankfurt.

Academic Advisor for B.A. Film Studies

Person of trust for students in FTMK

Member of the working group on anti-discrimination

Coordinator of Course Planning in Film Studies

Society for Media Studies (GfM)

• Working Group Gender/Queer Studies and Media Studies
• Working Group Film Studies
• From 2023-2025: part of the jury for the Best Publication Award Gender/Queer & Media of the AG Gender/Queer Studies & Media Studies
• Commission for Media, Education, and Digitality

Gender Studies Association – FG Gender

Association for Antiracist, Decolonial, and Postcolonial Thought and Practice – FG DeKolonial e.V.

European Network for Cinema and Media Studies (NECS)

1. Einführungsveranstaltung für alle Studienanfänger*innen im BA Filmwissenschaft
   Instructor: Dr. Leonie Zilch
2. K. Kolloquium (FW) (2024)
   Instructor: Dr. Leonie Zilch
3. K. Kolloquium: Die Anmeldung erfolgt per E-Mail (Studierendenaccount) an das Studienbüro im Rahmen einer der Lehrveranstaltungsanmeldephasen
   Instructor: Dr. Leonie Zilch
4. MA PrS. Mediendramaturgisches Labor II: Bad Ems Moving Images: Bewegte Bilder diskriminierungskritisch vermitteln
   Instructor: Dr. Leonie Zilch
5. MA S. Einführung in die filmwissenschaftliche Praxis: Bad Ems Moving Images: Bewegte Bilder diskriminierungskritisch vermitteln
   Instructor: Dr. Leonie Zilch
6. PrS. Perspektiven einnehmen: Bad Ems Moving Images: Bewegte Bilder diskriminierungskritisch vermitteln
   Instructor: Dr. Leonie Zilch
7. Übung zur Vorlesung (Sommer): Filmische Realismen
   Instructor: Dr. Leonie Zilch

SoSe 2026

Porn Studies

Images of Sexuality in Feature Films

Film and Media Education from an Anti-discriminatory Perspective

Body genres

Feminist Film Theory

Documentary Film and Media

Supervisor of the scientific network “Interdisciplinary Pornography Research” funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) together with Friederike Nastold

Co-host of the podcast “Gender, Gossip und Gehirn – der Gender Medien Podcast” together with Julia Bee, Jennifer Eickelmann and Elisa Linseisen, https://soundcloud.com/gendergossipundgehirn