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  4. Alice Bell

Professor Alice Bell BA, MSc, PGcertHE, PhD

Professor of English Language and Literature

Summary

My research specialisms are stylistics/literary-linguistics (including empirical research), narratology, and digital fiction. Throughout my work I develop systematic approaches for the analysis of (mostly digital) texts, examine interactivity and immersion in digital literary environments, consider how digital technologies affect fiction and fictionality, and investigate how readers cognitively process digital fiction.  My teaching reflects my research interests and I teach on a range of undergraduate modules and supervise postgraduate students across the English programme.

alice bell

About

I am a literary-linguist and narratologist meaning that I am interested in how language and narrative structure work in fictional texts. My research focusses in particular on born digital fiction which is fiction that is written for and read from a computer and includes hypertext fiction, narrative videogames, app-fiction for mobile devices, augmented reality fiction, Virtual Reality fiction, and narratives produced in AI. I am interested in the relationship between interactivity and immersion in digital fiction as well as the way that digital technology can play with the boundary between reality and fiction. I have published research on possible worlds theory, unnatural narratology, metalepsis, second-person narrative, fictionality, and "post postmodern" narrative.

In my empirical work, I undertake reader-response research, collecting data to understand how digital literary reading works cognitively. This includes studies on immersion, ontological ambiguity, second-person narrative, and hyperlinks (in the AHRC-funded Reading Digital Fiction project, 2014-2017) and studies on the multimodal representation and transmedial use of digital media in contemporary print fiction (as part of the AHRC/DFG-funded 鈥淩eading Post-Postmodern Fictions of the Digital: Narrative, Technology and Cognition in the Twenty-First Century鈥 project, 2023-2026).

My research underpins engagement and impact. This includes introducing more readers to digital fiction via workshops, exhibitions, and reading groups; increasing the use of and expanding provision for digital fiction in galleries and libraries; preserving and archiving digital fictions at immediate risk of loss through technological obsolescence. Most recently, I collaborated with external partners One-to-One Development Trust and Dreaming Methods on the Digital Fiction Curios project which used VR to preserve some seminal works of digital fiction which became obsolete when Adobe Flash was removed from web browsers in 2020. We delivered workshops across England including at the New Media Writing Prize. My engagement and impact work formed an Impact Case Study for REF 2021 entitled 鈥淥pening Up Digital Fiction: Expanding creative practice, increasing participation, and preserving cultural heritage鈥.

Teaching

Sheffield Creative Industries Institute

College of Social Sciences and Arts

External Funding:

  • Sept 2023: 拢349,957 from AHRC/DFG 香蕉视频 Project scheme as PI for 'Reading Post-Postmodernist Fictions of the Digital: Narrative, Technology, and Cognition in the Twenty-First Century'. Co-PI: Prof Jan Alber, Giessen (Ref: AH/X001601/1)
  • June 2014: 拢243,159 from AHRC 香蕉视频 Grant scheme as PI for 鈥楻eading Digital Fiction鈥. Co-I: Prof Astrid Ensslin, Bangor (Ref: AH/K004174/1)
  • May 2010: 拢740 from the British Academy Small 香蕉视频 Grant scheme as PI for 'Metalepsis and Unnatural Narratology' with Dr Jan Alber (Univ. of Freiburg) (Ref: SG100637).
  • March 2008: 拢15,500 from The Leverhulme Trust Academic Collaboration scheme as PI for 鈥楧igital Fiction International Network鈥. CI: Prof Astrid Ensslin, Bangor (Ref: F/00455/E).

Subject area or group

English

Courses taught

  • BA (Hon) English
  • PhD English

I have taught across the English programme including:

  • Reading and the Mind
  • Language and Style
  • Digital Communication
  • How to be a Linguist
  • Describing Language
  • Language Dissertation

香蕉视频

Featured Projects

Link 1:
Link 2: Digital Fiction Curios project.
Link 3:
Link 4:

Collaborators and Sponsors

One-to-One Development Trust; Dreaming Methods.

Publications

Journal articles

Bell, A. (2024). . Anglica. An International Journal of English Studies, 33 (2), 31-50.

Ensslin, A., & Bell, A. (2024). . Anglica. An International Journal of English Studies, 33 (2), 51-70.

Bell, A. (2021). . Style (DeKalb), 55 (3), 430-452.

Alber, J., & Bell, A. (2019). . European journal of English studies, 23 (2), 121-135.

Bell, A., Ensslin, A., Van Der Bom, I., & Smith, J. (2019). . Language and Literature.

Ensslin, A., Bell, A., Smith, J., Van Der Bom, I., & Skains, L. (2019). . Participations, 16 (1), 320-342.

Bell, A., Ensslin, A., Van Der Bom, I., & Smith, J. (2018). . International Journal of Literary Linguistics, 7 (1).

Bell, A. (2016). . Narrative, 24 (3), 294-310.

Bell, A. (2014). . Style, 48 (2), 140-161.

Bell, A., & Alber, J. (2012). . Journal of Narrative Theory, 42 (2), 166-192.

Ensslin, A., & Bell, A. (2012). . Storyworlds, 4, 49-73.

Bell, A., & Ensslin, A. (2011). . Narrative, 19 (3), 311-329.

Bell, A., Ensslin, A., Ciccoricco, D., Rustad, H., Laccetti, J., & Pressman, J. (2010). . electronic book review.

Ensslin, A., & Bell, A. (2007). . dichtung-digital.

Bell, A., & Georgiou, N. (n.d.). Multimodality, Transmediality, and Ethics in Post-Postmodernist Fictions of the Digital. Narrative.

Bell, A., Alber, J., Georgiou, N., & Wong, D. (n.d.). . Narrative.

Book chapters

Bell, A. (2023). . In Ensslin, A., Round, J., & Thomas, B. (Eds.) Routledge Companion to Literary Media. Routledge:

Bell, A. (2022). . In Ich茅, V., & Sorlin, S. (Eds.) The Rhetoric of Literary Communication. From Classical English Novels to Contemporary Digital Fiction. Routledge:

Van Der Bom, I., Skains, L., Bell, A., & Ensslin, A. (2021). Reading Hyperlinks in Hypertext Fiction: an Empirical Approach. In Style and Reader Response: Minds, Media, Methods. (pp. 123-142). John Benjamins:

Bell, A., Browse, S., Gibbons, A., & Peplow, D. (2021). Responding to Style. In Style and Reader Response: Minds, Media, Methods. (pp. 1-20). John Benjamins:

Bell, A. (2019). . In Bell, A., & Ryan, M.-.L. (Eds.) Possible Worlds Theory and Contemporary Narratology. (pp. 249-271). Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press:

Bell, A., & Ryan, M.-.L. (2019). . In Possible Worlds Theory and Contemporary Narratology. University of Nebraska Press:

Bell, A., & Ensslin, A. (2018). . In Dinnen, Z., & Warhol, R. (Eds.) The Edinburgh companion to contemporary narrative theories. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press:

Bell, A. (2016). . In Gavins, J., & Lahey, E. (Eds.) World Building: Discourse in the Mind. (pp. 15-32). Bloomsbury

Bell, A. (2014). . In Bell, A., Ensslin, A., & Rustad, H.K. (Eds.) Analyzing digital fiction. (pp. 21-38). New York: Routledge:

Bell, A., Ensslin, A., & Rustad, H. (2014). . In Bell, A., Ensslin, A., & Rustad, H.K. (Eds.) Analyzing digital fiction. (pp. 3-17). New York: Routledge:

Bell, A. (2013). . In Alber, J., Skov Neilson, H., & Richardson, B. (Eds.) A poetics of unnatural narrative. (pp. 185-198). Ohio State University Press

Bell, A. (2011). . In Page, R., & Thomas, B. (Eds.) New narratives : stories and storytelling in the digital age. (pp. 63-82). University of Nebraska Press

Bell, A. (2011). Ontological boundaries and methodological leaps: The importance of possible worlds theory for hypertext fiction (and beyond). In New Narratives Stories and Storytelling in the Digital Age. (pp. 63-82).

Bell, A. (2007). . In Stockwell, P., & Lambrou, M. (Eds.) Contemporary stylistics. (pp. 43-55). Continuum:

Books

Bell, A., & Ensslin, A. (2024). . Routledge.

Alber, J., & Bell, A. (Eds.). (2021). Fact and Fiction in Contemporary Narratives. Routledge.

Ensslin, A., & Bell, A. (2021). Digital Fiction and the Unnatural: Transmedial Narrative Theory, Method, and Analysis. Ohio State University Press.

Bell, A., Browse, S., Gibbons, A., & Peplow, D. (Eds.). (2021). Style and Reader Response: Minds, Media, Methods. John Benjamins.

Bell, A., & Ryan, M.-.L. (Eds.). (2019). . Lincoln: University of Nebraska.

Bell, A., Ensslin, A., & Rustad, H.K. (Eds.). (2014). . New York: Routledge.

Bell, A. (2010). . Palgrave Macmillan.

Theses / Dissertations

Ivansson, E.A.C. (2023). . (Doctoral thesis). Supervised by Gibbons, A., Bell, A., & Peplow, D.

Ondrak, J. (2022). . (Doctoral thesis). Supervised by Bell, A.

Other activities

I am a member of the AHRC Peer Review College.

Postgraduate supervision

I welcome applications from research students interested in studying in the fields of cognitive poetics and stylistics, narratology/narrative theory, digital fiction (including videogames), contemporary fiction, experimental writing, reader response research, and empirical methods.

I have supervised the following postgraduate research projects:

  • Alternate Realities: Possible Worlds Theory and Counterfactual Historical Fiction;
  • Drawing out Language: The Destabilisation of Information Overload through Conceptual Writing;
  • A Study into How Contemporary Print Fiction Remediates Digital Writing;
  • ‘Digesting Creepypasta’: A Genre Analysis of Social Media Horror Fiction;
  • The Archival Turn in Multimodal Literature;
  • Nothing As We Need It: For Chimeric Writing;
  • Anacoluthic Syntax: Feminist Phrasings in Writing and Reading

Media

Alice is interested in how digital technology can enhance and evolve literature. She studies literature written specifically for digital media, which often combine text with images, film, and sound. As a literary-linguist, Alice is interested in how language works in digital fiction. She is also interested in how readers process these texts cognitively.

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