Member of the Writers' Guild of Great Britain
HELEN RANA
Writer - Researcher - Editor
for cultural, creative and academic organisations
I provide services including:
- Research – strategic planning, qualitative and quantitative academic research and analysis, stakeholder analysis, bid development
- Editorial – proof reading, copy editing
- Transcription
– high-quality English audio transcription
Writing:
Feature screenplays:
- Beastly Onslaught - Finalist, Cambridge Script Festival; Finalist, Best Script Awards; Quarter-Finalist, Scriptwriters & Co International Festival; Feature Script Gold Award, Hollywood Gold Awards; Feature Script Silver Award, Paris Film Awards (all 2025)
- Heist Counter Heist - Winner, Best Crime Screenplay at Best Script Award London Autumn 2024; Finalist, London International Screenwriting Competition; Finalist, Mad Wife 100 Scripts 2025; Semi-Finalist, Sunvale Screenplay Contest 2025; Semi-Finalist, No Boundaries Film and Screenwriting Festival 2024; Quarter-Finalist, Page Turner Screenplays 2025; 3rd place (Nominee) Best Feature Screenplay, Lonely Wolf Film Fest 2024
- A Good Return - Winner, Best Women’s Film, Dreamz Catcher International Film Festival 2024; Winner, Best Original Screenplay, Top Film Awards 2022; Finalist, Indiefare International Film Festival 2022; Gold Script Writing Award from WRPN Women's International Film Festival 2022
- One-Upmanship - Winner, Best Historical Screenplay, Berlin International Screenwriting Festival 2023; Winner, Best Feature Script, Royal Wolf Film Awards April 2022; Finalist, Hollywood International Cineverse Screenplay Awards Dec 2024; Finalist, No Boundaries Film & Screenwriting Festival 2024; Nominee, Digital Griffix Film Awards 2025; Feature Script Silver Award, New York Movie Awards 2025; Selected for Gloucester Independent Film Festival 2025; Selected for the Florence Film Awards 2025
- Shelley Can't Sing - Winner, Best Feature Screenplay, PyraMax Film Awards 2025; Finalist, Sunvale Screenplay Contest 2025; Semi-Finalist, Red Flight Pictures Screenplay Awards 2024; Semi-Finalist, NYC International Screenplay Awards March 2024; Semi-Finalist, Scriptmatix Fellowship Contest 2024; Semi-Finalist, 28th Annual Fade In Awards Drama Competition 2024; Quarter-Finalist, Reno Tahoe Screenplay Contest 2025; Quarter-Finalist, Inroads Screenwriting Fellowship 2024
- Desperate Measures - Finalist, Cambridge Script Festival 2025; Finalist, Independent International Festival 2022; Selected for the Austin International Screenplay Awards 2024; Selected for White Rose Film Festival 2023
- Saving Christmas at Crackenberry Castle - Nominee, Bonne Chance Film Festival 2025; Selected for Genre Celebration Festival Tokyo, 2024; Selected for Dialog Film Festival 2025
- Search and Rescue - Semi-finalist, 27th Annual Fade In Awards Drama Competition 2023; Selected for International World Film Awards 2024, Barcelona Indie Awards Summer Edition 2023, Scriptmatix Film Festival 2023
Short screenplays:
- The Trouble with Superpowers - Winner, Best Super Short Script, Barcelona Indie Awards Winter 2024; Finalist, Mad Wife 100 Scripts 2025; Finalist, Cineverse International Film Festival 2024; Honorable Mention, Tokyo Screenplay Awards 2025; Nominated for Best Short Script, Independent Horror Movie Awards 2024; Selected for Stage Script Film Competition 2025, for Prague Screenplay Awards and Paperscreenplay 2024
- A Proper Killing - Winner, Best Screenplay Short, San Diego Movie Awards 2024; Nominated for Best Short Script, Top Indie Film Awards (Winter Edition 2024); Selected byTop Indie Film Awards Winter 2024
- The Making Of... - Semi-Finalist, ScriptWrite Short Script Contest 2023
- Assumptions - Quarter Finalist, Kerry International Film Festival 2023; Selected, We Script Film Festival 2023
- Fewer Murders - Selected for Berlin International Screenplay Festival 2024; Selected for the Mediterranean Film Festival Cannes-Milan-Athens 2023
- Breathtaking - Winner, Best Short Script, Golden Nugget International Film Festival 2024
- Misplaced - Nominated, Unrestricted View Film Festival 2023
- Digging Up the Past - Selected for Paperscreenplay and for Oxford Script Awards 2023
Awarded a scholarship to work on my screenplays at the Rocaberti Writers’ Retreat in September 2023
Workplaces: The impact of workplace culture on individuals and organisations
This accessible romp through diverse workplaces reveals how their cultures have just as much, if not more, impact on the organisation than any strategic intent or managerial intervention.
It is an entertaining and informative book aimed at practitioners, academics and general readers.
Workplaces recounts episodes from the author’s diverse working life, including an Embassy, an international investment bank and an African non-governmental organisation, highlighting important points about the realities of work and the effect workplace culture has on strategy, leadership, individuals and outcomes.
Writer Associate in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University, 2017-2021.
Short stories published in anthologies.
Communications and press releases for Bristol Rock Centre and Downend Community History and Arts Project.
Bid development - helping clients to write bids for funding organisations including the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Arts Council England, the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Economic and Social Research Council, the British Academy, and the British Council.
Fundraising Consultant with Orchard Fundraising, which provides fundraising consultancy and support services to charities, educational institutions, and not-for-profits.
Board level experience:
I am a member of the
South West Museum Development Strategic Advisory Board and Grants and Fundraising Trustee for
The Alex Moulton Trust, Bradford on Avon. I am the Secretary of
Downend Community History and Art Project, wrote the story of my local area on our historical map, and write a monthly article in two hyperlocal newspapers. I am in the
London Screenwriters' Festival support team. I am also the Media and Company Development Adviser for
Bristol Rock Centre (an independent music school). I Chair the Strategic Plan Review Team of the
British Federation of Women Graduates, and was a Mentor for the Cherie Blair Foundation's Women in Business Programme. I have previously served as an executive and non-executive Board member for organisations including the West of England Design Forum, Jisc, Sheffield Chamber of Commerce, the Sheffield First Partnership, Zambia Association for Research and Development, and I was The Royal Commonwealth Society’s Honorary Representative in Zambia for two years.
Co-editor:
Created by Mercy Khozi and Helen Rana, this handy little book contains phrases, verbs and nouns for the seven local languages most widely spoken and understood in Zambia:
- Bemba
- Kaonde
- Lozi
- Lunda
- Luvale
- Nyanja
- Tonga
It is illustrated with black and white line drawings that show which area of Zambia each language is mainly used in and depict a costume or custom of the people who speak each language.
This phrase book will enable you to get by in the local language - wherever you are in Zambia!
Volunteer Tales: Experiences of Working Abroad
Foreword by Anita Roddick
A great number of people consider volunteering at some point in their life and this is a nuts and bolts guide to volunteering full of honest accounts from the people who know. These are true-life accounts from people of all walks of life and ages who decided to leave their 'normal' lives behind to take up the volunteer challenge overseas. Their stories include tales of travel and adventure, tales of hardship, tales of kindness, frustration and humour.
Reading them, you too will experience culture shock in Ghana, the fear of war in Sierra Leone, helplessness in the face of poverty in Cambodia, fishing for piranha in Suriname, the struggles of an outsider in China and much, much more. They will open your eyes to new worlds and may even change your outlook in the ways they changed the volunteers.
Copy editing:
Disability and Aid: An Ethnography of Logics and Practices of Distribution in a Ugandan Refugee Camp - MariaTheres Schuler
Africa-Europe Group for Interdisciplinary Studies series.
At a time when rights are increasingly placed on the humanitarian agenda, this book provides a unique ethnographic account of the dynamics of aid to disabled people in a Ugandan refugee camp. By unraveling the complexities of social, material and institutional interdependencies, the author invites us to rethink conventional notions of dependence and vulnerability. Exploring issues of personhood as they relate to the exchange of material goods and care, the book offers a thought-provoking perspective on the seemingly promising shift towards a rights-based approach. A compelling read for anyone seeking to reshape the humanitarian agenda.
Dobrivoje Beljkasic
140-page catalogue for the major retrospective of this Bosnian painter's life and work, held at the National Gallery of Bosnia and Herzegovina in October 2023.
'A Painter with a Vivd Imagination' - an exhibition celebrating the 100th anniversary of the artist's birth, 1923-2023.
This project explores the material, technological, and cultural aspects of the most iconic artifact of the COVID-19 crisis—the face mask. Historians of science, technology, medicine, and the environment unmask in short essays the complexity of a seemingly simple object and unveil its many layers and different usages in both material and non-material terms.
The project is hosted by Department III (Artefacts, Action, Knowledge) of the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG) and is inspired by the department’s unique perspective on on studying the history of science that considers the changing role of artefacts: texts, objects, and spaces.
Exhibition display texts at the Ethnographic Museum of the University of Zurich
Exhibition display texts at the Strauhof Museum, Zurich - for LITAR
Rural-Urban Migration and Agro-Technological Change in Post-Reform China
How do rural Chinese households deal with the conflicting pressures of migrating into cities to work as well as staying at home to preserve their fields? This is particularly challenging for rice farmers, because paddy fields have to be cultivated continuously to retain their soil quality and value.
Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and written sources, this book describes farming households' strategic solutions to this predicament. It shows how, in light of rural-urban migration and agro-technological change, they manage to sustain both migration and farming. It innovatively conceives rural households as part of a larger farming community of practice that spans both staying and migrating household members and their material world.
Encountering - Retracing - Mapping: The Ethnographic Legacy of Heinrich Harrer and Peter Aufschnaiter
For 40 years, the Ethnological Museum of the University of Zurich has preserved collections of cultural and historical significance by Heinrich Harrer (1912 - 2006) and Peter Aufschnaiter (1899 - 1973): with a focus on Tibet, New Guinea, Brazil, Suriname and French Guiana.
For the first time, this volume presents the extensive ethnographic heritage of the two Austrian travellers and mountaineers in excerpts from all the collections. Based on the artefacts, we ask about the scientific, idealistic and ethical value of such histroric collections today - for us as for the descendants of the former manufacturers and users of the objects.
Animals through Chinese History: Earliest Times to 1911
This thoughtfully edited collection offers rich and varied work by an interdisciplinary community of scholars thinking with and about animals over the longue durée of Chinese history. Drawing on an extensive array of primary sources, the essays explore not only developments in the human-animal relationship but the ways in which the Chinese have thought about the world with and through animals.
It reveals the profound material and symbolic influence of animals on state and society, and offers fresh insights into the impacts of four thousand years of human activity on zoological China. The volume demonstrates the value of ranging broadly across region, time period, and source, and readers will find exciting new work on animals in agronomy, ritual practices, consumption of all sorts, literature, ethics, material culture, and much more.
Museum Cooperation between Africa and Europe
At a time of major transformations in the conditions and self-conceptions of cultural history and ethnological museums worldwide, it has become increasingly important for these museums to engage in cooperative projects.
This book brings together insights and analyses of a wide variety of approaches to museum cooperation from different expert perspectives. Featuring a variety of African and European points of view and providing detailed empirical evidence, it establishes a new field of museological study and provides some suggestions for future museum practice.
Research:
Helen Rana, Arun Sukumar, Guru Prabhakar and Lotfi Hamzi (2025) Custodian entrepreneurship: an examination of entrepreneurial activities in English country house. International Studies of Management & Organization.
Helen Rana (2023) Community Building Through Local History Stories, The Regional Historian, Annual Journal of the Regional History Centre, University of the West of England, New Series No. 4.
Helen Rana, Dan Knox and Guru Prabhakar (2023) Entrepreneurial storytelling: Using a consistent story to create and sustain a business: Case studies of two migrant entrepreneurs, International Journal of Indian Culture and Business Management, 28(1).
Helen Rana and Guru Prabhakar (2022) Heritage Entrepreneurship, winner of best doctoral poster at Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (ISBE) Conference, York.
Senior Research Consultant for Tricolor Associates
Tricolor Associates is an award-winning change management consultancy for the heritage and cultural sectors, which delivers real impact to the world around us. We work with clients and projects as diverse as theatres, castles, cathedrals, museums, historic railways, ancient monuments, cemeteries, stately homes, historic ships, local museums, national museums, listed buildings, historic landscapes, archives, royal palaces and lidos, and help them ensure they have a future through organisational and project-driven change. We specialise in developing and delivering projects for the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Arts Council, Inspiring Science Fund, London Borough of Culture and others like the Towns Fund and UK City of Culture.
Qualitative research interviews for 'Beyond the Multiplex: Audiences for Specialised Film in English Regions'
'Beyond the Multiplex' is a three year project that seeks to understand how to enable a wider range of audiences to participate in a more diverse film culture. Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the project is driven by a fundamental belief in the cultural value of the moving image, and a desire to help to support our industry partners to develop sustainable, diverse audiences for films beyond the mainstream.
Publication: Tsitsou, L., Rana, H., and Wessels, B. 'The Formation of Film Audiences: Conference Proceedings'. University of Sheffield: The Digital Humanities Institute, 2022.
Blog post: 'Watching from the Audience's Perspective'
Transcription:
For the Universities of the West of England, Newcastle, Glasgow, and other academic institutions; The 'Decolonization in Action' Podcast.
Some of my current clients
- Ethnographic Museum
of the University of Zurich
- Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin
- University of Glasgow, School of Social & Political Sciences
- Cardiff University, School of Journalism, Media & Culture
- University of the West of England, Faculty of Arts, Creative Industries & Education
- Bristol Rock Centre – independent music school
- Litar Literary Foundation, Zurich
RegPress
Kalmar University, Sweden
Communicative Civic-ness
Glasgow University
Tibebe Terffa
Elisabeth Biasio & Peter R. Gerber
Devotion/ Painted Songs
Ethnographic Museum, ZurichTestimonials
"Helen is passionate and knowledgeable about the important contributions museums can make to society. She is utterly reliable and unfailingly cheerful, and always delivers high-quality work on time, even to tight deadlines"
- Prof. Dr. Mareile Flitsch, Director, Ethnographic Museum at the University of Zurich
“I highly recommend Helen. Her work in academic transcription, copy-editing and indexing is outstanding”
– Bridgette Wessels,
Professor in the Sociology of Inequalities, University of Glasgow
"I unrestrainedly vouch for the efficiency, accuracy and reliability of Helen Rana's copyediting, and have only
praise for the elegant style and intelligent suggestions of her English language polishing"
– Dagmar Schäfer, Director, Dept III, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin
My qualifications
- Master of Science (Merit): Strategy, Change and Leadership, University of Bristol
- Master of Philosophy: Historical Studies, University of Cambridge
- Postgraduate Diploma (Distinction): Diplomatic Studies, University of Westminster
- Master of Arts: Film and TV Studies, University of Westminster
- Bachelor of Arts (Hons): Media and Communication Studies, Bournemouth University
- Pitman: Level 2 Audio Transcription
(Distinction)
