Liam Connell

Liam Connell is a Senior Lecturer and Subject Lead for History and Writing at the School of Humanities and Social Science, University of Brighton. His research interrogates the intersection of politics, economics, and culture through literary and visual texts, with a focus on globalization, precarious labor, and the political novel. He is a Co-Investigator on the Horizon 2020 grant CAPONEU, mapping political novels across Europe.

Connell holds a PhD in Rewriting the Nation: Nationalist Interventions in Literary History (University of Sussex, 2000), an MA in Culture and Social Change (University of Southampton, 1995), and a BA in English & Scottish Literature (University of Glasgow, 1992). His supervisory interests span 20th/21st-century literature, economic humanities, and political fiction.

Research interests cluster around:

• Political Fiction: Reconceptualizing the political novel's role in digital eras
• Economic Humanities: Labour regimes in fiction (precariousness, reproductive work)
• Globalization & Transnationalism: Cultural texts' engagement with national identities
• Migration Studies: Border securitization narratives

His 15 most recent publications reveal a trajectory from nationalist discourses in Scottish literature (1998-2010) to economic globalization critiques (2010-2017), culminating in digital political novel analysis (2025) and surrogacy in media (2024). A recurring theme: how labour, affect, and political consciousness are refracted through cultural forms.

Supervisory activity includes:

• Gavin Salvesen-Sawh: Pinter's exploration of mental disintegration and political activism
• Edward Wells: Unreadability in narrative fiction

Collaborative networks span institutions across Europe, India, and the UK, with particular emphasis on CAPPE ( Brighton's Centre for Applied Philosophy, Politics and Ethics).