James Kendrick is professor and director of undergraduate studies in the Department of Film and Digital Media at Baylor University, where he teaches classes on film theory/aesthetics, the history of motion pictures, film genres, and media and society.

He earned a Ph.D. in Communication and Culture from Indiana University, Bloomington, and also holds a B.A. in English and an M.A. in Journalism, both from Baylor University. His primary research interests are post-Classical Hollywood film history, violence in the media, the films of Steven Spielberg, cult and horror films, media censorship and regulation, and cinema and new technologies.

He is the author of three books: Darkness in the Bliss-Out: A Reconsideration of the Films of Steven Spielberg (Bloomsbury Academic, 2014), Hollywood Bloodshed: Violence in 1980s American Cinema (Southern Illinois University Press, 2009) and Film Violence: History, Ideology, Genre (Wallflower Press/Columbia University Press, 2009). He also recently edited an anthology on action films, A Companion to the Action Film (Wiley-Blackwell, 2019) and he is currently working on a book about Midnight Cowboy for the BFI Film Classics series. He has also published numerous book chapters and peer-reviewed journal articles in Film Criticism, The Velvet Light Trap, The Journal of Film and Video, and The Journal of Popular Film and Television, as well as presented papers at numerous conferences. In addition to his academic work, he is also the film and video critic for the web site QNetwork.com (where he has written more than 3,000 feature-length reviews). He is a member of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, the University Film and Video Association, the Popular Culture Association, and the Online Film Critics Society.

He lives in Waco, Texas, with his wife, Cassie, and their children, James and Lily.

Contact: James Kendrick, Professor, Department of Film and Digital Media, Baylor University, One Bear Place #97321, Waco, TX 76798-7321; (254) 710-6061; james_kendrick@baylor.edu