skip to content | Accessibility Information

Research

In the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, members of staff from the Department of Languages were submitted to Units of Assessment (UOAs) 50 European Studies.

The academic interests of researchers straddle a wide range of disciplines, including film and literature, culture and linguistics as well as economics and politics and extend beyond Europe to the French- and Spanish-speaking peoples worldwide. Particular research strengths exist in the following areas:

  • French: Contemporary French cinema; contemporary French fiction (especially the nouveau roman); autobiography; French popular culture, including Bande DessinĂ©e, crime writing and film; French literature and culture of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; French linguistics (particularly syntax and sociolinguistics) and translation studies.
  • German: Modern and contemporary German literature; German media and popular culture; German crime fiction.
  • Italian: modern Italian society and culture; Italian female-authored writing, twentieth century Italian fiction; Contemporary Italian cinema and Italian crime writing.
  • Spanish: Contemporary Spanish fiction and popular culture; Spanish cinema; Spanish and Portuguese history; Contemporary Latin American literature and film and immigration issues in Spain and Portugal.

Most of the staff belong to one of the three research centres located in the Department of Languages:

The centres are represented in the Manchester European Research Institute (MERI) which is one of the four Institutes within the Faculty of Humanities, Law and Social Science that coordinate research activities.

The centres incorporate researchers who employ a range of critical and theoretical approaches to study French and Francophone, Hispanic, Italian and German literatures and cultures, often in an interdisciplinary context.

Details of recent staff research and publications can be found on the staff link.