Kerri Betts

Profile

I joined the university as a postgraduate researcher in 2018, undertaking a Master of Arts by Research in the school of Languages, Cultures and Societies titled Reading Minds: Using French Literary Representations of Mental Illness to Explore Literature’s Therapeutic Potential. 

In 2020 I began my PhD - Literary and Linguistic Landscapes of Autism: Representations in Contemporary Fiction and Life Writing. My project explores the role autism plays in reformatting disability theory towards a more pluralistic, dynamic and nuanced approach. Using literary and linguistic theory, I use my notion of ‘autistic inflection’ to elevate the rich potential and diversity of autistic outlooks whilst also putting pressure on perceived binaries such as creativity/disorder.  .

I use a post-2015 corpus including Amy Arnold’s Slip of a Fish, Dara McAnulty’s Diary of a Young Naturalist and Katherine May’s The Electricity of Every Living Thing and Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times. This project sits at the intersection of Medical Humanities, Disability Studies and Critical Autism Studies. I use environmental theories to intervene in current conversations in Neurodiversity Studies. 

Qualifications

• BA Joint Honours French and Linguistics
• MAR French Literature