AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award

The School of English at the University of Liverpool, in partnership with The Reader Organisation has been awarded an AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award. This project will explore the existing theoretical foundations for the practice of bibliotherapy, or reading as cure, in the English literary tradition and seek to translate theory into practice by using methods and materials suggested by the research base in shared reading groups in mental health contexts provided by Mersey Care NHS Trust.

The partnership with Mersey Care NHS Trust, which serves a population of one million across Merseyside, builds on a successful record of association with The Reader Organisation, which is now a nationally recognised centre for the promotion of reading as an intervention in mental health.

This PhD is likely to be the first if its kind to seek to reclaim English Literature as pivotal in relation to health and well-being, and, through a mix of practical and theoretical methods, to give the existing language of English Literature an equal place alongside social and biomedical sciences in the observation and analysis of human experience.

For more information on the PhD project and how to apply, please visit our website, or you can email Dr Josie Billington.