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Professor Lynne Pearce

Professor of Literary Theory and Women's Writing

Associated research centres and groups: Centre for Gender and Women's Studies

Research Interests

Lynne Pearce arrived at Lancaster in 1990/1, having gained her PhD from the University of Birmingham in 1987. Whilst studying for her PhD, and in the years immediately following, she worked part-time across of wide-range of further and higher educational establishments in the West Midlands, and then - for one year - in the English Department at the University of Durham. This apprenticeship remains vitally important to the values she attaches to Higher Education (especially in terms of access to those from less privileged backgrounds) and to her recognition of the challenges faced by graduate students embarking on an academic career.

Lynne Pearce's teaching and research have been mainly in the field of feminist literary and cultural theory, but with wide-ranging historical and disciplinary interests. Particular thematic concerns have been in 'the politics of reading', feminist re-scriptings of romance, and national / regional literature(s) and identities within the UK. Her most recent books are The Rhetorics of Feminism : Readings in Contemporary Cultural Theory and the Popular Press (Routledge, 2004) and Romance Writing (Polity, 2007). The former explores the ways in which rhetorical and stylistic innovation in writers as diverse as Judith Butler and Germaine Greer has impacted upon contemporary thought-production; the latter surveys the changing nature of romance -- both as a literary genre and as a discourse -- from the seventeenth century to the present day.

Her principal publications include:

Feminist Readings / Feminists Reading (with Sara Mills), Harvester-Wheatsheaf, 1989/1996 (second edition)

Woman/Image/Text: Readings in Pre-Raphaelite Art and Literature, Harvester-Wheatsheaf, 1991

Reading Dialogics, Edward Arnold, 1994

Romance Revisted (ed. with Jackie Stacey), Lawrence and Wishart, 1995

Feminism and the Politics of Reading, Arnold, 1997

Fatal Attractions: Re-Scripting Romance in Contemporary Literature and Film (ed. with Gina Wisker), Pluto, 1998

Devolving Identities: Feminist Readings in Home and Belonging (ed.), Ashgate, 2000

The Rhetorics of Feminism: Readings in Contemporary Literary Theory and the Popular Press, Routledge, 2004

Romance Writing, Cultural History of Literature Series, Polity Press, 2007.

In terms of both teaching and administration, most of Lynne's activity in recent times has centred on the postgraduate community. From 1997-1991 she was Postgraduate Director in the English Department and, in that capacity, was responsible for initiating a good deal of the research methods training now available both within the Department and the Faculty (see Postgraduate pages). From 2001-2003 she was Associate Dean for Postgraduate Teaching in the Humanities and convenor of the Faculty's Research Methods seminar. This involvement with postgraduates, and their supervisors, over a number of years means that Lynne is committed to improving the standard of provision for graduate students both at Lancaster and beyond, and expects to continue her work in the field in the future. One immediate consequence of her recent involvement with issues/problems associated with the doctoral Viva is the commissioning of the handbook How to Examine A Thesis (published by Open University Press, December 2004).Intended for all those involved in the examining of PhDs and otherresearch-based degrees, this handbook offers a revealing insight into both the written and unwritten rulesof higher degree examination in the UK today.

Lynne is currently Principal Investigator for the AHRC-funded project 'Moving Manchester: How the experience of migration has informed the work of writers from Greater Manchester from 1960-to the present' (see website at www.lancs/fass/projects/movingmanchester). With other members of the project team -- Dr Robert Crawshaw (DELC), Dr Graham Mort (Creative Writing), Dr Corinne Fowler (Project Researcher) and Jo McVicker (administrator) - she has been involved in a number of outputs - e-catalogue, journal articles, conference papers, Writers Gallery, academic study - all of which can be viewed on the website. As the project enters its final year, the team is focusing its attention on the academic study (to be published, we hope, with Manchester University Press) and the end-of-project conference, Glocal Imaginaries, which will take place in Lancaster and Manchester on 9-12 September next year (2009). We have signed up a large number of exciting and well-known plenary speakers for this event and encourage those interested in issues of literature, diaspora and migration to visit the website for further details

Lynne Pearce has now supervised seventeen Ph.D. students to successful completion and is happy to receive enquires from prospective graduate students with interests similar to her own.

During her time at Lancaster, Lynne has also been centrally involved with the teaching, research and research activities emanating from the Institute for Gender and Women's Studies, and is co-editor, with Maureen McNeil, of the series Transformations: Thinking Through Feminism (see Routledge web-site for further details). She is more than happy to act as a point of contact for people interested in the work of the Institute or, indeed, in research projects which might involve colleagues in both English and Women's Studies.

Current postgraduate students:

Kim Wiltshire (PT), 'The "Male Loser" in Contemporary British and Anerican Literature' (includes creative writing component in the form of short stories), PhD, 2005-present, jointly with Jayne Steel.

Gail Crowther (FT), 'Syliva Plath as Secular Icon', PhD (co-supervised with Yoke-Sum Wong in Sociology), 2007- present.

Andrea Sillis (PT), 'Brodsky, Bakhtin and Toni Morrison', PhD, from 2006-present.

Eleanor Fitton (PT) , 'Male Subjugation in Contemporary Fiction and Feminist Thought', MA by Research, 2007-present

Rajeev Balasubramanyam (FT) 'Contemporary Black British Fiction' (includes creative writing component in the form of a novel), M.Phil / PhD Studentship attached to 'Moving Manchester' project, 2006-present.

Tariq Memhood (FT), Creative Writing PhD attached to 'Moving Manchester' project, 2006-present, jointly with Graham Mort.

Associated Keywords: English, Feminist literary and cultural theory, Feminist research methodologies, Feminist theory, Reader/reception theory, Regional identity, Regional writing, Romance (genre)

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