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This study addresses the impact of researchers in the Writing and Environment Research Centre who have pioneered the `environmental humanities', contributing to public debate in a field of acknowledged political and cultural importance. Neale's work has been used by trade unions in the UK and overseas. Garrard's book is used in HEIs in the UK and abroad. Evans reaches public audiences with his BBC radio work and Guardian column; Kerridge with literary nature writing. Kerridge and Garrard have influenced the teaching of ecocriticism in numerous universities. Collectively, the centre contributes to public awareness of the cultural aspects of environmental questions.
Research carried out at The University of Manchester by the award-winning author Maria (M.J.) Hyland has both illuminated and challenged cultural assumptions about Multiple Sclerosis. Hyland's autobiographical and self-reflective writings have impacted on the public sphere in two ways: 1) they have opened up an international debate in the mass media, literary magazines and among those suffering from the condition about its relation to the practice of writing; 2) they have been used to train future practitioners outside academia such as authors and editors, enhancing the public understanding of writing as a profession and contributing to the success of the editorial consultancy company Hyland & Byrne, which she established in 2011.
The Military Writing Network (MWN) was founded in 2009 by Siobhan Campbell, Principal Lecturer in the Department of English Literature and Creative Writing, Kingston University London. Drawing on research by Professor Rachel Cusk, Dr. Meg Jensen and Professor Vesna Goldsworthy into the interface between testimony, trauma literature, autobiographical fiction and recovery from trauma and related disorders, the MWN created and sustains partnerships with organisations working with veteran soldiers, sailors and airmen and their families toward investigating how creative writing practice can help them cope with issues relating to combat stress, both inside and outside mental health environments.
Tessa Hadley's, novels and stories have reached a public audience, been listed for prizes, and led to prominent literary journalism, public debate, and appointments to prize-awarding panels. Hadley's work is an example of the cultural and economic impact of the Creative Writing research community at BSU, which includes novelists, poets, dramatists and non-fiction writers, who have reached public audiences, contributed to public literary culture through journalism, broadcasting and award-judging, and contributed to the economic viability of publishing and related industries. Hadley exemplifies the strategy of using the research base to enhance the quality of published creative writing and literary debate.
Members of the University of Exeter's Programme for Creative Writing and Arts have translated their research-as-practice into regional, national, and international impact by introducing innovative forms of contemporary writing to a range of audiences through publications, several of which have had notable public acclaim; an events programme; and training workshops. Funded projects to develop new writing have strengthened relationships between academic and creative sectors and inspired new and successful writing careers. The main impacts of this research-as-practice have been to:
Making a major contribution to English recovery research in the Unit, work associated with this case study has brought to a wider public:
1) the works of writers whose livelihoods were principally earned through manual labour or craft skills;
2) radical and neglected writing across a range of periods, genres and cultural contexts.
This has led to impact through enhancement of public understanding of literary and cultural value.
Underpinning research began in 1994; subsequently three principal routes to impact have evolved:
1) the development of open access online resources, in particular, `Labouring-Class Poets Online';
2) NTU publishing imprint, Trent Editions, which combines scholarly research with dissemination of neglected radical writing;
3) engagement with literary societies and related organizations.
Dr Paul McDonald is an award-winning writer whose comic novels, short stories, and poetry have established him as a leading figure in the literature of the Black Country. His creative output is informed by scholarly research into humour and humour-writing that has national and international reach, and has contributed to the public knowledge of the history and cultural significance of humour. Specifically, he has:
Paul Farley's book Edgelands, co-authored with Michael Symmons Roberts, has changed attitudes to landscape in both cultural and utilitarian senses. Winner of the `Foyles Best Book of Ideas' Prize for 2012, Edgelands was extensively reviewed upon publication and its capacity for changing perceptions was widely remarked upon. Beyond its print and digital dissemination, it became a broadcast topic, both as an adaptation for BBC Radio 4's Book of the Week and also as a news feature on programmes such as BBC Radio 4's The Today Programme. As well as becoming a set text on many academic reading lists, Edgelands has influenced curatorial practice in the visual arts, opinion and policymaking bodies, practical approaches to engagement with landscape and also promoted widespread debate and active awareness at the grass roots level of weblogs and online journals. The book is part of a much wider body of research and writing on cognate subjects by Farley that includes award-winning collections of poetry and high-profile radio broadcasts. However, Edgelands is focused upon here as a concrete example of how a single publication can have a significant and wide-ranging impact.
The activities of Nottingham Trent's Centre for Travel Writing Studies influence learned societies' projects, museum exhibitions and universities' study of travel writing and culture. Our public engagements principally take the form of museum events, library talks and presentations, and media appearances.
Our pioneering research centre creates new understandings of travel writing, within and beyond academia, and produces a fresh appreciation of the centrality of travel to British history and culture. In partnership with institutions such as Coventry Transport Museum, the National Maritime Museum, the Joseph Banks Trust, the Hakluyt Society, and Nottingham's Bromley House Library, we organise exhibitions, arrange public events, and, through the publication of important historical travel accounts preserve, conserve and present cultural heritage.
Our collaborations impact on how museums and libraries view and present their collections and on societies' publications. Our research influences university syllabi. We provide specialist knowledge to media researchers, and other inquirers. Through broadcast interviews, podcasts, magazine and newspaper articles, introductions, textbooks, companions and encyclopaedias our work affects audiences' understanding of the written representation of travel.
Editorial and biographical research on the work of Virginia Woolf, carried out primarily by Susan Sellers, fed directly into the composition of Vanessa and Virginia, a novel by Sellers about Woolf's relationship with her sister. In 2008 Vanessa and Virginia was published by a small independent publisher set up in 2006 in the north-west Highlands of Scotland. It became the press's most commercially successful publication and ensured its early economic viability. The novel was subsequently published in North America and translated into more than a dozen languages. It was also turned into a successful, inter-nationally-staged play. This case study therefore claims several types of impact: (1) exporting the cultural heritage of the UK and stimulating international public interest in Woolf; (2) generating economic prosperity for a small entrepreneurial business in a remote part of Scotland, and for the creative industries (theatre and international publishing) more widely; (3) inspiring and facilitating the work of other cultural practitioners; (4) enriching cultural life in the UK and abroad. The users of this research are: the directors of an independent publishing company; translators and international publishing houses; the director, producer and actors of a touring theatre company; the reading and theatre-going public.