معرفی
Leonie Rutherford is an Honorary Associate Professor at Deakin University's School of Communication and Creative Arts (Faculty of Arts and Education). With a PhD from the Australian National University and a BA from the University of Western Australia, her 30-year academic career includes roles as Senior Lecturer/Lecturer at the University of New England (1992–2008) and Deakin University (2008–present). She leads the Teenagers Reading and Digital Practices Research Group and collaborates with Crisis Energy Publication Syndicate and The Warrnambool Collective.
Her research examines:
- Children's/youth media and digital literacies
- Multiplatform storytelling and publishing history
- Social media reading cultures (BookTok/Bookstagram)
- Media impacts on health/educational outcomes
She has secured significant funding, including:
- ARC Linkage Grant: 'Discovering a good read' ($346K, 2019–2022)
- Copyright Agency grants for teen reading studies ($99K+)
- NHMRC funding for health interventions ($67K, 2013–2015)
Rutherford has supervised 11 PhD students to completion, focusing on YA literature, digital narratives, and literacy education. She leads the Teenagers Reading and Digital Practices lab (teenreading.net), which studies how Australian teens discover books and build digital reading communities.
