Dr. Shannon Walsh is a filmmaker and writer whose award-winning films cover topics ranging from labour rights, to grief and climate change. Indiewire called her latest film Adrianne & the Castle (2024), an “exquisite” and “intoxicating story”, while The Gig is Up (2021) was hailed by Variety for being “galvanizing and moving,” and “a devastating reality check” according to The Hollywood Reporter. Her films have been theatrically released and broadcast globally, screening in festivals around the world such as SXSW, IDFA, Hot Docs, CPH:DOX, Doc NYC and many others, as well as playing art spaces, such as the Venice Biennale and the Pompidou Centre in Paris. In 2023, she executive produced the feature documentary about Dr. Gabor Maté, Physician Heal Thyself directed by Alden Penner. Adrianne & the Castle had its world premiere at SXSW 2024.

As a writer and researcher, she has published in a range of research areas looking at inequality, social justice and visual methods, largely focused on South Africa, where she has lived and worked. She has authored more than 40 journal articles and book chapters, & co-edited two books, and released The Documentary Filmmaker’s Intuition in 2024. She is a co-director on the multiyear SSHRC Partnership Grant “TRANSFORM: Engaging with Youth for Social Change.”

Currently, Dr. Walsh teaches film as an Associate Professor at UBC, and is a Research Associate at the South African Research Chair in Social Change at the University of Johannesburg. She was a Wall Scholar at the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies from 2017 and a Guggenheim Fellow in 2020.  In 2023, she was awarded the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts.

Feature Documentary Films

2024. ADRIANNE & THE CASLTE, 86 min

2021. THE GIG IS UP, 88 min

2019. ILLUSIONS OF CONTROL,  87 min

2013. JEPPE ON A FRIDAY, 87 min, with Arya Lalloo

2011. À ST-HENRI LE 26 AOÛT, 85 min

2009. H2OIL, 76 min

Screenplays

2018. Walsh, S., Unidentified Minor, Feature Drama (supported by SODEC)

2014. Walsh, S., Man Bitch, Feature Drama (supported by Canada Council)

Books

2024. Walsh, S. The Documentary Filmmaker’s Intuition: Creating impactful & ethical non-fiction films. London: Routledge.

Edited Volumes

2022. Walsh, S., Mitchell, C. & M. Oliphant. (Eds.) In My Life: Stories from young activists in South Africa 2002-2022, Johannesburg: Jacana Press.

2016. Walsh, S. and Soske, J. (Eds.) Ties that Bind: Race and the Politics of Friendship in South Africa. Johannesburg: WITS University Press / NYU Press.

Select Journal Articles

2019. Walsh, S. Under the Umbrella: Pedagogy, knowledge production, and video from the margins of the Movement. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 51 (2), 200-211.

2016. Walsh, S. “Critiquing the politics of participatory video & the dangerous romance of liberalism” Royal Geographical Society, Area.

2015. Walsh, S. “The Philosopher and his Poor: The Black as object of political desire in South Africa” Politikon. 42 (1), 123-127, 2015.

2015. Walsh, S. “Addressing sexual violence and rape culture: Issues and interventions targeting boys and men” Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equality. 29(3), 2015.

2013. Walsh, S. “We won’t move: The suburbs take back the center in urban Johannesburg.” CITY: Analysis of urban trends, theory, policy, action. Taylor & Francis. 17(3), 400-408, 2013.

2012. Walsh, S. “We are prepared to die on this land: Race and land occupation in Crossmoor settlement.” Oriental Anthropologist. Volume 12(2), 2012.

2012. Walsh, S. “‘We grew as we grew’: Visual methods, social change and collective learning over time.” Special issue, Visual Methodologies in Educational Research, South African Journal of Education. Volume 32(4), November 2012.

2009. Walsh, S. “The Smell of Money: Alberta’s tar sands”. The Commoner: A web journal for other  values. Winter 2009.

2008. Walsh, S. “Uncomfortable Collaborations: Contesting constructions of the poor in South  Africa”. Review of African Political Economy (ROAPE). London: Taylor & Francis.  Issue 116, June 2008, 255-279.

2006. Walsh, S., Mitchell, C. “‘I’m too young to die’: HIV, masculinity, danger, and desire in urban South Africa” Gender and Development. London: Oxfam. 14(1), March 2006, 57-68.

Select Book Chapters

2018. Walsh, S., In Defense of Forgetting, in P. Tortell, M. Turin, and M. Young (Eds) Memory. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.

2016. Walsh, S. and Wilderson, F., Afropessimism and Friendship in South Africa: An interview with Frank  Wilderson III, in S. Walsh and J. Soske (Eds) The Ties that Bind: Race and the Politics of Friendship in South Africa. Johannesburg: WITS University Press.

2016. Soske, J. and Walsh S., Thinking friendship and race in South Africa, in S. Walsh and J. Soske  (Eds) The Ties that Bind: Race and the Politics of Friendship in South Africa. Johannesburg: WUP.

2015. Walsh, S., Lalloo, A. and J. Mistry, On Collective Practices and Collective Reflections, in J. Mistry  and A. Schuhmann (Eds) Gaze Regimes: Film and Feminisms in Africa. Johannesburg: WITS

2014. Walsh, S., Speak for Yourself: The cultural politics of Participatory Video, in E. Winton and S.  Turnin (Eds) Screening Truth to Power: A reader on documentary activism. Montreal: Cinema Politica.

2014. Walsh, S., The Nomad, Refugee, the Developer, and the Migrant: Four stories of inner-city travelers in Johannesburg, in G. Lean, R. Staif, and E. Waterton (Eds) Travel and Imagination.  Surrey, UK: Ashgate.

2013. Walsh, S., Forced Integration: A Chatsworth Shack Settlement, in A. Desai and G. Vahed (Eds) Chatsworth: The making of a South African Township. Durban: UKZN Press.

2013. Walsh, S., Managing Crisis and Desire in South Africa in M. Dawson and L. Sinwell (Eds) Contesting Transformation: Popular Resistance in Twenty-first Century South Africa. London: Pluto Press.

2012. Walsh, S., Challenging Knowledge Production with Participatory Video in Milne, E-J, et al Handbook of Participatory Video. London: AltaMira Press.

2010. Walsh, S. and Desai, A., Knowledge and Power in South Africa: Xenophobia and survival in the post-apartheid state in Aziz Choudry and Dip Kapoor (Eds) Learning from the Ground Up: Global Perspectives on Social Movements and Knowledge Production. New York: Palgrave-MacMillan.

2010. Walsh, S. and Stainsby, M. The Smell of Money: Alberta’s Tar Sands in Kolya Abramsky, George Caffentzis, Sergio Oceransky, Ramon Fernandez Duran and Massimo De Angelis (Eds) Sparking a Worldwide Energy Revolution: Social Struggles in the Transition to a Post-Petrol World. Oakland, CA: AK Press.

2009. Walsh, S., Ethnography-in-Motion: Neoliberalism and South African shack dwellers’ movements in D. Kapoor and S. Jordan (Eds) Education, Participatory Action Research, and Social Change: International Perspectives. New York: Palgrave-MacMillan.

2008. Walsh, S. and C. Mitchell, I’m too young to die: HIV, masculinity, danger and desire in urban South Africa. In Welbourn, A., with J. Hoare (Eds) HIV and AIDS. Oxford: Oxfam.

2007. Walsh, S., Power, Race and Agency: Facing the Truth with Visual Methodologies in DeLange et al (Eds.) Putting People in the Picture: Visual methodologies for social change. Netherlands: Sense Books.

2006. Walsh, S., Mitchell, C., Weber, S., From Behind the Lens: Digital Data. in G. Knowles, L.  Neilsen, A. Cole and T. Luciani (Eds.) The Art of Visual Inquiry. Toronto: Backalong Books.