Trailblazer Katie celebrates book contract at third Salford graduation

Katie Barnes, who graduated last week at The Lowry, has secured a contract with Liverpool University Press for the book, which came about through the groundbreaking Trailblazers scheme.

Trailblazers is an open access initiative that was launched in 2024 to support early career researchers from the University of Salford, the University of Liverpool and Lancaster University to publish their first monograph open access with Liverpool University Press.

Katie is one of the scheme’s successful 2024 cohort, with her book, Rewriting the Irish Mother Figure: Dismantling Stereotypes of Motherhood and Maternity in Contemporary Irish Literature, set to be published next year.

The book investigates how developments in contemporary Irish feminism have coincided with and informed the depiction of ‘atypical’ mother figures in Irish literature.

It will argue that recent writing has shown a move away from the ‘Mother Ireland’ trope towards more complex representations of fertility and maternity within Ireland’s literature and culture.

For Katie, it brings her time at the university to a fulfilling conclusion as she has spent her entire higher education journey here at Salford, previously studying on our BA English and Creative Writing and our MA Literature and Culture programmes before she started her PhD in 2021.

She said: “Not in a million years did I think I would be getting to this point all these years later with a published book bringing an end to my studies here at Salford.

“I was very much over the moon when I got the news.”

Katie was supported throughout the Trailblazer scheme by Salford’s Library team, with one submission each from the School of Arts, Media and Creative Technology and the School of Health and Society taken forward in the scheme.

She received a proposal and manuscript peer review, editorial guidance from senior commissioning editors at Liverpool University Press, professional copyediting, typesetting and marketing, which culminates in the release of the book on open access.

Katie added: “The Trailblazers scheme is a real crash course in academic publishing. It’s gone into great depth about how the publishing industry works and has been really insightful.”

Caroline Magennis, Professor of Contemporary Irish Literature, who has supervised Katie’s BA dissertation, MA project and PhD proposal, said: “It has been my pleasure to mentor Katie through her BA, MA and PhD with us at Salford, during which time she has both taken up every opportunity for professional development that was offered and proactively worked to support her peers and our students.

“This book will be a remarkably strong addition to the field of Irish Studies and is the cherry on top of Katie’s years with us, I hope she inspires future students that with hard work and determination, so much can be achieved.”

Dominic Broadhurst, Head of Content and Discovery at the University of Salford Library said: “We are really pleased to see even more books contracted as a result of our Trailblazers collaboration.

“This initiative is central to our work in facilitating Open Research at the University of Salford and providing publishing opportunities for our early career researchers.”

Following on from the inaugural success of the Traiblazers scheme, the University of Wolverhampton, Liverpool John Moores University and the University of Reading joined the initiative for 2025.