Jami L. Bennett hails from the mountains of East Tennessee where she grew up on a steady diet of sweet tea, Saturday matinees, and back issues of NatGeo magazine (which she occasionally “liberated” from the waiting area of her childhood dentist’s office). She first picked up a camera out of a desire to capture her Appalachian community’s stories and pursued anthropology to better understand the people telling them.

A 2021 graduate of the University of Manchester, Jami produced Ten by Ten as part of her MA in Visual Anthropology. This film was awarded the Best Student Documentary prize at the 2022 Grierson British Documentary Awards, in addition to several other honors along the international film festival circuit.

Jami is drawn to stories about outsiders, identity, and notions of belonging. And with her collaborative, intimate style of filmmaking (and a healthy respect for humor), she aims to craft narratives that resonate with a diverse audience both within and beyond the academic sphere. Based in the United Kingdom at present, she has several projects in development and continues to build a body of creative and academic work.