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Dr Penn Newell

Positions held:
  • Lecturer, School of Creative Arts, Culture and Communication
  • Lecturer in Creative and Critical Writing, School of Creative Arts, Culture and Communication
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  • Overview

    Overview

    Biography

    Penn Newell (they/them) is a Lecturer in Creative & Critical Writing at Birkbeck. Their research engages in critical ecologies and critical climate studies by way of a multidisciplinary writing practice in poetry, script, and experimental or creative critical essay. Penn was awarded a Northern Writers Award in 2019. Their poetry has been published or performed across the UK and US, in places such as The Poetry Review, Perverse, Hobart, Magma, Under the Radar, and London Magazine, and anthologised by Triarchy Press. They have published visual poems with 3:AM, experimental queer poetics with Cordite: Transqueer, and as a Lambda Literary Poetry Spotlight. With a strong relationship to visual art practice, they have worked on commission and produced work alongside or for The Courtauld Institute and Somerset House, Haarlem Artspace, Lakes Ignite Festival, The British Library, The Tate and Barnsley Civic, B-Side Festival, and elsewhere. Their review work has featured in The Times Literary Supplement, Modern Poetry in Translation, and Green Letters. 

    Penn's previous creative-critical projects and publications have put ecological forms and formations into conversation with late-twentieth century critical theories of the social, analysing the ontologising effects of clay, working eco-concepts in capitalist orchestrations, or weaponising the weather against migrants. These works have featured or are forthcoming with Textual Practice, Social Text, Performance Research, and elsewhere. Penn convenes the research network on Critical Poetics and Ecology, exploring poetry and poetics as an emancipatory methodology in ecological thought and relations. 

    Penn completed a PhD in English Research at King's College London under the title 'Tearing and Forming: A Conceptual History of Clouds'. They previously held research and teaching posts at Leeds Arts University and King's College London in Creative Writing, English, Comparative Literature, and Digital Humanities. They have convened multiple research programmes, workshops and live lectures on topics such as gender and sexuality, anomalies in art and modes of existence, collaborative research methodologies, urban studies and surveillance, and critical ecologies. 

    Penn is currently co-supervising a PhD on "Geopoetics and Denial of Justice in Ammonia-Related Disasters", within literary studies. Penn is on the steering committee of the Birkbeck Institute of Gender and Sexuality and is a member of the British Academy London Early Career Researcher Network. Penn is the Programme Director and Admissions Tutor of the BA in Creative Writing and English and is open to all queries relating to this degree.


    Highlights

    Office hours

    Penn is a full-time member of staff in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences. Please contact them if you require a meeting. 

    Web profiles

    Administrative responsibilities

    • Programme Director - BA Creative Writing and English

    Professional memberships

    • Fellow of Higher Education Academy (since 2022)

    • Member of ASLE-UK

    Honours and awards

    • Northern Writers Award New Writing North, June 2019
    • Flash Fiction (Shortlisted) Bridport Prize, June 2023
  • Research

    Research

    Research interests

    • Critical Ecologies
    • Creative Writing
    • Gender and Sexuality
    • Critical Race Studies
    • Modern and Contemporary Literature

    Research Centres and Institutes

    Research clusters and groups

  • Supervision and teaching

    Supervision and teaching

    Supervision

    "Geopoetics and Denial of Justice in Ammonia-Related Disasters", CHASE-funded doctoral project.

    Teaching

    Penn teaches across undergraduate and postgraduate creative writing and hybrid creative-critical forms of writing on the BA Creative Writing, BA Creative Writing and English, and MA in Creative Writing in the School of Creative Arts, Culture and Communication at Birkbeck. At postgraduate level, they also hold supervisory responsibilities in English and Gender Studies.

    Penn previously held positions at Leeds Arts University and King's College London in areas such as Cultural Studies, English Literature, Comparative Literature, and Digital Humanities.

    Teaching modules

    • The Creative Critical Seam
    • Production of the Human
    • Writing The Self
    • Writing and Reading Seminar
    • Writing the Planet