Clark Lawlor

Clark Lawlor is a Professor in the Humanities Department at Northumbria University, specializing in the intersection of literature, art, and medicine. His research focuses on how literary and artistic representations shape societal perceptions of diseases, particularly in the long 18th century and Romantic periods. He has led major projects such as the Leverhulme Trust-funded 'Writing Doctors' and 'Fashionable Diseases,' exploring the cultural history of illnesses like tuberculosis and melancholia. He holds a PhD in English from 1994 and has published extensively on topics including medical narratives, depression, and the role of literature in shaping medical identity.

Education: PhD in English (1994).

Research Interests: Literary representations of medicine, cultural history of disease, and the impact of medical narratives on societal perceptions. His work contributes to UN Sustainable Development Goals related to education and health.

Grants: Co-Director of the Leverhulme Trust's 'Before Depression' project (2006–2009) and Director of 'Writing Doctors' (2018–2021). These projects examined medical self-representation and the shift from Latin to English in medical writing.

Advising: Supervised PhD student Laurence Sullivan, who completed a thesis on lay women medical practitioners in 18th-century Britain. Collaborations include international research networks and publications on medical myths and cultural constructs.

Labs/Teams: Led interdisciplinary teams in Leverhulme projects, fostering collaborations between literature, history, and medical humanities.