The English Literature team at De Montfort University is comprised of staff who are recognised for their world-leading research, teaching, and scholarship. In REF 2021, English Language and Literature was the top performing unit by GPA at De Montfort University, demonstrating that staff within the English team are producing work that is considered at the top of their field on an international level.
Additionally, the English Literature team provide undergraduate and postgraduate students unique teaching and research expertise that is not found in other universities, with staff who contribute to and help form the internationally-recognised Centre for Adaptations and the Centre for Textual Studies.
The Centre for Adaptations at De Montfort University has led the development of Adaptation Studies as a field of interdisciplinary research on an international scale. It hosts the journal Adaptation (published by Oxford University Press), and was the founding home of the Association of Adaptation Studies. Alongside colleagues across the university, English Literature staff members pursue world-leading research in adaptation and areas such as Shakespeare; social media; screenwriting; the creative industries; J.G. Ballard; Global franchises; screening the author and contemporary fiction; and the cultural role of women directors.
The Centre for Textual Studies (CTS) at De Montfort University is devoted to research in the fields of textual studies and history of the book. It has pioneered digital methods of analysing, editing and disseminating texts and specialises in the production of scholarly editions of literary and historical works for today’s readers. The CTS encourages research in textual criticism, genetic criticism, the sociology of bibliography and texts, and periodical studies, and work that draws on advanced electronic technologies that are at the forefront of the discipline of Digital Humanities.
Despite the English Literature team’s recognised profile, the university has chosen to consciously imperil its world-leading research and the student experience by citing financial pressures. Four full-time positions are proposed to be made redundant, amounting to a reduction of our teaching and research staff by 40%.
We contest this proposal, which, amongst other shortcomings:
1. Is short-sighted in outlook and does not allow time for the programme team to respond to the recent restructuring of our degree programme under the university’s ‘Education 2030’ strategy and its impact on recruitment.
2. Seeks to divorce research from teaching and does not recognise the value of English Literature at DMU, or the contribution that the team’s research-led teaching makes to the student experience.
3. Ignores the significant income generated by the English Literature team’s research activity, REF performance and external grant capture in its financial justification.
Call to Action - What you can do:
As the period of consultation of the proposed redundancies ends on 17 June
2022, please take action before this deadline.
As alumni, current students, family, friends and the wider public:
- Please sign this petition, and share it as widely as possible: https://www.change.org/p/save-58-jobs-and-support-dmu-s-teaching-and-research-staff
- Share our statement and call to action on social media and help us spread the word:
If you as alumni and members of our academic peer network want to support us even more, please consider:
Writing a letter of support addressed to our senior management. We call on sympathetic parties to write to our senior management to share their concerns:
· Professor Katie Normington, DMU Vice-Chancellor: katie.normington@dmu.ac.uk
· Simon Bradbury, Dean, Faculty of Arts, Design and Humanities: simon.bradbury@dmu.ac.uk
· Jill Cowley, Head of School, Humanities and Performing Arts: jcowley@dmu.ac.uk
This statement was written collectively by the English Literature team and members of the English Institute at De Montfort University.
