Dr. Alicia Rouverol
School of Arts and Media
Current positions
Lecturer in Creative Writing
Biography
Dr Alicia J Rouverol is Lecturer in Creative Writing at University of Salford. Her fiction, non-fiction, poetry and reviews have appeared in streetcake magazine, Cicatrice, Route 57, The Wandering Bard, The Independent, The Monitor, Manchester Review and The Manchester Anthology, among others. She writes critically on globalisation in contemporary fiction and women’s experimental writing, with articles appearing in Contemporary Women’s Writing and The Poetics of Fragmentation in Contemporary British and American Fiction. Her first co-authored book, ‘I Was Content and Not Content’: The Story of Linda Lord and the Closing of Penobscot Poultry, was called ‘compassionate and sorely needed’ by The New York Times and nominated for the OHA Book Award. Her novel, Dry River, is forthcoming by Chapeltown Books in 2023.
Areas of research
Contemporary British and American Fiction, Women's experimental writing, Globalisation, Narrative and narratology, Creative industries
- Researching and Planning a Novel
- Final Portfolio
- Experimental Practice (MA)
- Writing Workshop (MA)
- Biography: Tradition and Innovation
- Introduction to Poetry
- Reading for Writers
- Theory, Text, Writing (MA)
My main academic interest remains in the fields of contemporary fiction (UK and US), women’s experimental writing and globalisation.
I am interested in forms of fiction that articulate the economic present and the effects of globalisation. I have recently completed two novels that critique neoliberalism and the impact of economic policy on place (the first, Dry River, is forthcoming from Chapeltown Books in April 2023). I recently completed a collection of short stories exploring migration and place that I began on my six-month post as an inaugural Artist in Residence at The John Rylands Library in 2019. My first co-authored book,‘I Was Content and Not Content’: The Story of Linda Lord and the Closing of Penobscot Poultry, chronicled one working woman’s experience of plant closure, examining issues of the local and global through a hybrid construct (oral history, photographs, historical essay, methodology and creative nonfiction). The book was called ‘compassionate and sorely needed’ by The New York Times and nominated for the OHA Book Award. That project awakened my interest in economic fictions (or ‘economising fictions’), which I am now writing on critically; it also drew on my long arc in the fields of oral history and folklore. I am keen for narrative and its uses—in application, in theory—including narratology and the role of time in narrative, the subject of my critical thesis (on Ali Smith and Jennifer Egan). Current projects include a ‘novel of globalisation’ (in development) and a return to my non-fiction roots, a book based on my three-year project using story to work with inmates at a rural correctional facility in the US, featuring a performance aimed at at-risk youth. My fiction, nonfiction, reviews and poetry have appeared additionally in streetcake, Cicatrice, The Manchester Review, Route 57, The Wandering Bard, The Puckerbrush Review, Dandelion Review, Island Journal, extimacy, The Independent, The Monitor and The Manchester Anthology.
Qualifications
- BA (Hons) in English with Creative Writing Concentration, University of Maine
- MA in Folklore, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- MA in Creative Writing, University of Manchester
- PhD in Creative Writing, University of Manchester
Memberships
- Society of Authors (UK)
- Authors Guild of America (USA)
- International Society for the Study of Narrative