Dr Caitlin Stobie

Profile

I joined the University of Leeds as Lecturer in Creative Writing in 2022. My work brings together creative practice and critical research to examine how narrative shapes ethical questions across scientific, medical, and environmental contexts.

Previously, I was a Wellcome-funded postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford and the University of Leeds, where I also completed my PhD in English Literature.

Awards and nominations

• Authors’ Foundation Grant, Society of Authors
• Shortlisted for the University English Book Prize
• Shortlisted for the Ingrid Jonker Prize for English Poetry
• Shortlisted for the Morland African Writing Scholarship

Responsibilities

• Practice Research Lead
• Practice Research Group Leader

Research interests

I am a writer and scholar working across fiction, poetry, and criticism. My research examines how creative practice functions as a method of interdisciplinary inquiry in environmental and medical humanities, with a focus on how narrative engages questions of ethics, uncertainty, and responsibility. Recent work extends these concerns to questions of creativity, authorship, and emerging technologies.

I develop collaborations across the arts and sciences, including work with scientists through Leeds Creative Labs. My books include Abortion Ecologies in Southern African Fiction (Bloomsbury Academic, 2023), Thin Slices (Verve Poetry Press, 2022), and The Smell of Blood and Other Stories (Karavan Press, 2024, co-authored with Kharys Ateh Laue).

I am a member of the editorial team at Stand, Leeds’s international literary journal.

Qualifications

• PhD English Literature
• MA Critical Theory
• BA (Hons) English Literature

Professional memberships

• Society of Authors
• National Association of Writers in Education (NAWE)
• Association of Writers and Writing Programs

Student education

• Shortlisted for the AHC Partnership Award (Contribution to Student Experience), University of Leeds (2024)
• Associate Fellow of Advance HE

Research groups and institutes

• Medical Humanities Research Group
• Environmental Humanities Research Group
• Poetry@Leeds
• Creative Writing at Leeds

Current postgraduate researchers

• Kate Simpson