Meet Our Programming Committee 2024
John Affleck, Programming Committee
John Affleck is the head of the Journalism Department at Penn State, and sometimes works in the documentary space as director of the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism at Penn State. In collaboration with 2020 PSU alumnus Paddy Cotter, he’s made four short films, three sports documentaries and a narrative film. He’s happy to see the Centre Film Festival grow and thrive.
Catharine Axley, Programming Committee
Catharine Axley is an independent documentary filmmaker and professor of Film Production in the Bellisario College of Communications. Her most recent film, ATTLA, aired nationally on PBS’ Independent Lens series and screened at the Centre Film Festival a year prior to her joining Penn State!
Pearl Gluck, Co-Founder, Artistic Director
Pearl Gluck is the co-founder and artistic director of the Centre Film Festival. Gluck’s work has been part of the Sundance Lab, Cannes, PBS, and won prizes such as Best Actor, Best Film, Best Debut Feature and Best LGBT Short at festivals worldwide. Her first documentary feature, Divan (2004) opened theatrically at the Film Forum in NYC and premiered on the Sundance Channel. Her award-winning fiction feature, The Turn Out, (2018) as well as her short films, Castles in the Sky (2023), Summer (2018) and Write Me (2020) are screening at festivals and available on platforms such as Amazon, ChaiFlix, and Netflix. She continues to make both doc and narrative films that explore themes of faith, class, and gender. She teaches Screenwriting and Directing at Penn State University.
Kevin Hagopian, Programming Committee
Kevin’s been teaching film in college since he was 20 years old- and he’s loved the movies since he was a lot younger than that. He teaches film studies at Penn State, where his research specialties include the Hollywood cinema and the colonial & post-colonial cinemas of the world. He’s very proud to work with the Centre Film Festival team to bring the art, the ideas, and the community of film to Central Pennsylvania.
Dr. Yuliya V. Ladygina, Programming Committee
Yuliya V. Ladygina is assistant professor of Slavic and global and international studies at the Pennsylvania State University. Her research in Eastern European literatures and cultures, focuses on questions of cultural memory and cultural exchange. She is the author of Bridging East and West: Ol’ha Kobylians’ka, Ukraine’s Pioneering Modernist (Toronto UP, 2019), and she is currently working on her second book project, The Reel Story of Russia’s War against Ukraine, which examines the post-2014 cycle of Ukrainian war films. Her articles on related subjects appeared or are about to appear in East/West: Journal of Ukrainian Studies, East European Jewish Affairs, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, Journal in Cinema and Media Studies, KinoKultura, Slavic Review, Studies in World Cinema, and Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture.
Tracy R. Peterson, Programming Committee
Tracy is a citizen of the Diné (Navajo) Nation and serves as the director of student transitions and pre-college programs in the college of engineering at Penn State. He is responsible for coordinating transition programs for commonwealth campus students entering the college of engineering. He is also responsible for youth programs, policies, and collaboration geared towards pre-college students that will enhance college readiness and foster inclusion. Tracy maintains an interest and advocacy in media representation and the portrayal of Indigenous peoples in historical and popular culture. He is passionate about social justice, transformation, and being an instrument for social change.
David Sidore, Programming Committee
David Sidore has been teaching film studies for thirty years and recently joined the faculty at Penn State. His research focuses on Post-Cold War culture, especially as represented in the media of the period. He is looking forward to helping bring a diverse collection of films and voices to the communities of central Pennsylvania.
Lior Sternfeld, Programming
Lior Sternfeld is an associate professor of history and Jewish Studies. He is a social historian of the modern Middle East, with a focus on the Jewish communities and other minorities of the region. His first book, Between Iran and Zion: Jewish Histories of Twentieth-Century Iran (Stanford University Press, 2018), explores the development and integration of Jewish communities in Iran within the context of Iranian nationalism, Zionism, and constitutionalism. He is currently working on two book projects: The Origins of Third Worldism in the Middle East and a study of the Iranian-Jewish diaspora in the U.S. and Israel. He teaches courses on the modern Middle East, Iran, Jewish history, and Israel-Palestine.