Harriet Earle

Dr Harriet EH Earle FHEA, PhD

Senior Lecturer in English and Creative Writing


Summary

I joined the Department of Humanities as a Lecturer in English and Creative Writing in 2017. I teach on the BA Creative Writing and BA English programmes. My research focuses on representations of conflict and trauma in visual culture, especially comics. I investigate the ways in which conflict and violence can be represented on the page and how this helps us to understand PTSD and trauma. I am the author of three books and have edited several more. 

About

I am a comics and pop culture scholar, with a special interest in representations of trauma, conflict, and violence. I have published a range of papers and books on the topic, including Comics, Trauma, and the New Art of War (2017), Comics: An Introduction (2021), and Silence in the Quagmire: The Vietnam War in US Comics (2025). I am the editor of Global Perspectives in Comics Studies, which publishes a broad sweep of books on comics as an international form. Since 2020, I have worked with the Centre for War, Atrocity, and Genocide at Nipissing University in Canada, where I am a research fellow.

Although I am primarily a theoretician, I teach on the Creative Writing BA and very much enjoy bringing my research into the practical arena. I’m interested in socially-engaged writing and the ways in which we can use our creative outputs as tools for social engagement and social change, a theme that comes through in all my teaching.

Specialist areas of interest

Writing with images
Socially-engaged writing
Comics studies
Representations of traumatic experience and violence
Science Fiction
Conflict and war narratives

Teaching

Subject area

English

Courses taught:

- BA Creative Writing  
- BA English

Modules taught:

 - Writing Live (Level 4)
 - Creative Non-Fiction (Level 5)
 - Counterculture and Creativity (Level 6)
 - The Contemporary Writer (MA)

Research

My current research brings fibre arts and needlework into conversation with comics. What connections can we make between these two artistic forms and to what end? If we broaden our working definitions of comics to include narrative needlework, how does our understanding of both fields change - who is included and what is gained? I consider the politics and poetics of the needle as a tool for creating narratives that give voice and power to previously silen[ced/t] communities. 

 

 

Publications

Journal articles

Earle, H. (2024). How do comics engage with the Vietnam War? Two photography case studies. Americana: The Institute for the Study of American Popular Culture, 22 (2). https://americanpopularculture.com/journal/articles/fall_2023/earle.htm

Earle, H. (2021). Traumatic Absurdity, Palimpsest, and Play: A Slaughterhouse-Five Case Study. Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics. http://doi.org/10.1080/21504857.2021.1951787

Earle, H. (2020). The Politics of Lace in Kate Evans’ Threads: From the Refugee Crisis (2017). The Comics Grid : Journal of Comics Scholarship, 10 (1), 13. http://doi.org/10.16995/cg.215

Earle, H., & Clark, J. (2019). Telling national stories in American Horror Story. European journal of American culture, 38 (1), 5-13. http://doi.org/10.1386/ejac.38.1.5_7

Earle, H. (2018). A new face for an old fight: Reimagining Vietnam in Vietnamese-American graphic memoirs. Studies in Comics, 9 (1), 87-105. http://doi.org/10.1386/stic.9.1.87_1

Earle, H. (2018). Conflict then; trauma now : reading Vietnam across the decades in American comics. European Journal of American Culture, 37 (2), 159-172. http://doi.org/10.1386/ejac.37.2.159_1

Earle, H. (2017). Epistemic Breaks, Post-9/11 Trauma, and Siri Hustvedt. ANQ: A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes and Reviews, 30 (3), 198-202. http://doi.org/10.1080/0895769x.2016.1273753

Earle, H. (2017). “A Convenient Place for Inconvenient People”: madness, sex and the asylum in American Horror Story. The Journal of Popular Culture, 50 (2), 259-275. http://doi.org/10.1111/jpcu.12508

Knowles, S., Peacock, J., & Earle, H. (2016). Introduction: Trans/formation and the graphic novel. Journal of Postcolonial Writing, 52 (4), 378-384. http://doi.org/10.1080/17449855.2016.1228513

Earle, H. (2016). Strange migrations: an essay/interview with Shaun Tan. Journal of Postcolonial Writing, 52 (4), 385-398. http://doi.org/10.1080/17449855.2016.1219139

Earle, H. (2016). Creating the traumatic body : female genitals as wounds in Antichrist. Film International, 14 (1), 35-43. http://doi.org/10.1386/fiin.14.1.35_1

Earle, H.E.H. (2014). My Friend Dahmer: the comic asBildungsroman. Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics, 5 (4), 429-440. http://doi.org/10.1080/21504857.2014.916329

Earle, H. (n.d.). ‘And Babies?’: The Representation of Mỹ Lai in Vietnam War Comics. Amerikastudien.

Book chapters

Earle, H. (2023). ‘Art Imitating Life: Affect and the Aesthetic of Trauma in Holocaust Comics and Cinema’. In Artful Breakdowns: The Comics of Art Spiegelman. Univ. Press of Mississippi

Earle, H.E.H., & Lund, M. (2023). Introduction. In Identity and History in Non-Anglophone Comics. (pp. 1-16). Routledge India: http://doi.org/10.4324/9781003386841-1

Earle, H.E.H. (2022). Series editor's preface. (pp. xvi).

Earle, H. (2021). 30 Marjane Satrapi: Persepolis. In Handbook of Comics and Graphic Narratives. (pp. 589-600). De Gruyter: http://doi.org/10.1515/9783110446968-034

Earle, H. (2019). Persepolis. In Handbook of Comics and Graphic Narratives. De Gruyter

Earle, H. (2019). Comics and Graphic Novels. In The Routledge Companion to Twenty-First Century Literary Fiction. Routledge

Earle, H. (2018). “The sky is darkened by gods”’: Spirituality, Strength and Violence in Gene Luen Yang’s Boxers and Saints. In Cultures of War in Graphic Novels Violence, Trauma, and Memory. Rutgers University Press

Books

Earle, H.E.H. (2025). Silence in the Quagmire The Vietnam War in U. S. Comics.

Earle, H.E.H. (2023). Aren't You Bojack Horseman? Critical Essays on the Netflix Series. McFarland.

Earle, H. (2020). Comics An Introduction. Routledge. https://www.routledge.com/Comics-An-Introduction/Earle/p/book/9780367322410

Earle, H. (Ed.). (2019). Gender, Sexuality and Queerness in American Horror Story Critical Essays. McFarland. https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/gender-sexuality-and-queerness-in-american-horror-story/

Earle, H. (Ed.). (2019). Gender, Sexuality and Queerness in American Horror Story Critical Essays. McFarland. https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/gender-sexuality-and-queerness-in-american-horror-story/

Earle, H. (2017). Comics, trauma, and the new art of war. Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi. https://www.upress.state.ms.us/Books/C/Comics-Trauma-and-the-New-Art-of-War2

Earle, H.E.H., & Lund, M. (n.d.). Identity and History in Non-Anglophone Comics. Routledge India. http://doi.org/10.4324/9781003386841

Other activities

Editorial Board - The Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics
Editor - Global Perspectives in Comics Studies

 

Postgraduate supervision

I am currently supervising doctoral students in comics, video games, and creative non-fiction. 

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