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Graeme Harper (writer)

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Graeme Harper is a creative writer and academic, who writes under his own name and under the pseudonym Brooke Biaz.[1][2] In 1993, Harper received the degree of Doctor of Creative Arts, specializing in creative writing, at the University of Technology, Sydney. This was the first doctorate in creative writing conferred in Australia.[3]

Harper's fiction, which is often set in invented locations, on fictional islands, or in places resembling a combination of America, Australia and the United Kingdom, explores the evolution of characters faced with unusual situations or in historically challenging circumstances. He has won a range of literary and research awards, and his critical work is widely cited, particularly in relation to the development of the contemporary critical study of creative writing.

Education and academic career

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Following his award of the DCA degree at the University of Technology, Sydney, Harper sought further experience and, attracted by the work of Sir Malcolm Bradbury, headed to the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom, where he studied and taught in the creative and critical writing program, under the tutelage of Professor Jon Cook and connecting to Bradbury, as he had planned. He received a Ph.D. from the UEA School of English and American Studies in 1997.[4] During this time at UEA he began work with Multilingual Matters Publishers, who later would launch the now well-known journal New Writing: the International Journal for the Practice and Theory of Creative Writing.[5]

In 1997, he accepted a position at the University of Wales, Bangor, where he taught creative writing and developed the Centre for Creative and Performing Arts. While at the University of Wales he was a member of the European Commission's Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture Panel of Experts (DGX), from 1998-2001, assessing creative and educational projects across Europe. It was also while at the University of Wales that he began his appointment as panelist and assessor at Great Britain's Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), first as a panelist and then as a senior panelist and strategic committee member on practice-led creative research from 2003 until 2015.

In 2004, he was appointed as the founding chair of the School of Creative Arts, Film and Media at the University of Portsmouth, staying at Portsmouth from 2004-2006, and establishing the school, which contains cinema and media studies, creative writing, theatre and music studies. During his time at Portsmouth he began publishing with the emerging Parlor Press in the United States, whose focus on both creative and critical writing was of interest to him. His first work with Parlor was the collection of short stories and a novella, Small Maps of the World[6] (2006).

He returned to the University of Wales in 2007, having been invited to establish an initiative focusing on the development of creative and critical practices. There he created the inaugural National Institute for Excellence in the Creative Industries (NIECI), which afterwards became the School of Creative Studies and Media. Harper was later promoted to Director of Research for the College of Arts, Humanities and Education, while remaining involved as a doctoral supervisor of creative writing in the new creative studies school.

Completing his novel, Moon Dance, in 2010-2011, he was awarded fellowships to continue his writing, research and teaching, first at the University of Montevallo in Montevallo, Alabama, as a Distinguished Professor in the honors program, and later at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston (2010-2011) as a visiting Research Professor, where his focus was on creativity and environmental design in medical environments. It was while at the University of Texas Medical Branch that he wrote early drafts of the novel The Invention of Dying (2015)

In 2011 he moved permanently to the United States, becoming the Dean of The Honors College at Oakland University in Michigan, USA, a founding institution in US Honors colleges and programs. He wrote the novel The Japanese Cook during his first years at Oakland. There he also directs the Mid-West Center for Undergraduate Research (MCUR).[4] He is a past chair of the At-Large Division of the Council on Undergraduate Research.[7], the former inaugural chair of the Higher Education Committee at the National Association of Writers in Education (NAWE) in the UK, and the past chair of the Creative Writing Studies Organization in the USA. He is currently Director of the National Society for Minorities in Honors.[8] and of the Creative Writing Studies Center. He has been an honorary researcher and creative practice professor at Edge Hill University in the UK and at Emory University in the USA (MARBL Fellow) and at Shanghai University in China.

In 2005, Harper became an elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine (RSM), building on his involvement in the launch of the Medical Humanities in the United Kingdom, and on his exploration of medical environments during his fellowship time at the University of Texas Medical Branch. His interest in empathy in medicine and in medical science has seen him involved in the work of Leader Dogs for the Blind, an international guide dog organization. In 2018 he initiated (and currently advises) a university-wide student program to raise future leader dogs for the blind and sight-impaired. His novel, Releasing the Animals, while not about Leader Dogs, is an exploration of freedom and empowerment, set in the vicinity of a fictional zoo. He is also an elected Fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA), having been one of the founding members of RSA Cymru/Wales, of the Royal Anthropological Institute,[9] and of the Royal Geographical Society (RGS).

In addition to his work as Editor-in-Chief of the journal New Writing: the International Journal for the Practice and Theory of Creative Writing,[10] he is also the Editor of the Creative Industries Journal.[11] He is Co-Editor (with O. Evans) of Studies in European Cinema[12] and (with O. Evans and C. Johnston) of the Journal of European Popular Culture.[13]

Publications

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Fiction

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  • 1988: Black Cat, Green Field ISBN 9780947189143
  • 2000: Swallowing Film ISBN 0953534413
  • 2006: Small Maps of the World ISBN 9781932559569
  • 2008: Moon Dance ISBN 9781602350434
  • 2009: Camera Phone ISBN 9781602351622
  • 2013: Making Up ISBN 9781443844628
  • 2015: The Invention of Dying ISBN 9781602355392
  • 2018: The Japanese Cook ISBN 9781602355828
  • 2023: Releasing the Animals ISBN 9781643173092

Non-Fiction

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Selected awards and honors

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References

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  1. ^ Arnold, John; John A. Hay; Sally Batten (2001). The Bibliography of Australian Literature. Queensland, Australia: University of Queensland Press. p. 353. ISBN 9780702235009.
  2. ^ "The Writers of Wales Database". Cyngor Celfyddydau Cymru, Arts Council of Wales. Archived from the original on 2 March 2014. Retrieved 27 October 2013.
  3. ^ Krauth, Nigel (2011), Evolution of the exegesis: the radical trajectory of the creative writing doctorate in Australia, Australia: AAWP
  4. ^ a b "The Honors College". www.oakland.edu. Oakland University.
  5. ^ Routledge Publishers. "New Writing: the International Journal for the Practice and Theory of Creative Writing".{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  6. ^ Parlor Press. "Small Maps of the World".
  7. ^ "Council on Undergraduate Research".
  8. ^ "National Society for Minorities in Honors".
  9. ^ "Royal Anthropological Institute".
  10. ^ Harper, Graeme. New Writing: the International Journal for the Practice and Theory of Creative Writing. Routledge.
  11. ^ "Intellect Ltd". www.intellectbooks.co.uk.
  12. ^ Evans, O. and Harper, Graeme. Studies in European Cinema. Taylor and Francis Ltd.
  13. ^ Evans, O. Johnston, Cristina and Harper, Graeme. Journal of European Popular Culture. Intellect Ltd.
  14. ^ LinkedIn, Graeme Harper (8 August 2024). "Honors, Vogel Short list".
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