Dr Alicia Rouverol
School of Arts, Media and Creative Technologies
Current positions
Lecturer in Creative Writing and English
Areas of Research
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, published by Bridge House Publishing in 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.
Areas of Supervision
I'm interested in supporting creative-critical projects in the following areas: contemporary British and American fiction, women's experimental writing, globalisation, narrative and narratology, creative industries. I am particularly interested in creative-critical projects exploring expressions of neoliberalism and the effects of economics in the novel.
Qualifications
-
Creative Writing
2013 - 2017 -
Creative Writing
2012 - 2013 -
Folklore
1991 - 1995 -
English with Creative Writing Concentration
1982 - 1986
Publications
-
Trying to be good : lessons in oral history and performance
Rouverol, A. (2015). Trying to be good : lessons in oral history and performance. In R. Perks, & A. Thomson (Eds.), The oral history reader (636-655). London: Routledge