academy for irish cultural heritages - Research - University of Ulster

Qualifications
BA Hons (cum laude) in Foreign Languages and Literatures at the Facoltà di Lingue e Letterature Straniere,
Università di Sassari (Italy).
MA in Irish Literature in English at the University of Ulster, Northern Ireland.
PhD at the University of Ulster, Northern Ireland. She wrote her doctoral thesis on the use of Greek tragedy in
contemporary Irish drama from the late 1970s to date.
Research Fields
Dr Salis is currently doing research on the representation of the ‘Other’ in contemporary Irish literature. While at
the Academy she will develop the theme of contemporary migration from a literary perspective, which is a vastly
under-represented research area and ties in with a number of other researchers in AICH who are working in the
area of migration. In addition, she is expanding her doctoral research in view of a publication on the use of Greek
Tragedy in contemporary Irish drama in the Italian language
Dr Karyn Stapleton
Dr. Karyn Stapleton is a Lecturer in the School of Communication. Her core research involves the application of
Discourse Analysis to issues of politics, culture and identity. Her recent research has focused on Northern Ireland,
and she has a particular interest in Northern Irish unionism and Protestantism. Between 2001-2004, she was
employed in the Institute of Ulster Scots Studies (UU), with which she retains strong research links. She has also
been employed on two externally funded research projects.
Karyn is a member of the International Communication Association (ICA); the British Psychological Society (BPS);
the International Pragmatics Association (IPrA); and the European Parliamentary Network. She has recently coedited,
with J. Wilson, a research volume entitled Devolution and Identity (Ashgate, 2006).
Qualifications
BSc (Hons) (First class) Communication Studies
D.Phil in Communication
Research Fields
Discourse and Identity
Political Discourse
Cultural and National Identities
Northern Irish Politics and Identity
Unionism/Protestantism
Ulster Scots
Qualitative Methodologies
Narrative Analysis
Language and Gender
Communities of Practice
Gender Identity
Prof Robert Welch
Robert Welch is a literary historian, poet, and novelist. He is Professor of English and was previously Head of the
School of English, Media and Theatre Studies. He lectured at Leeds University, University College, Cork, and at
Ile-Ife University, Nigeria. He was a Visiting Fellow at St John’s College, Oxford; the Jefferson-Smurfitt Fellow at
the University of Missouri, St Louis; and the Dal Grauer Lecturer at the University of British Columbia.. He is a
Fellow of the English Association and is on the editorial board of the Canadian Journal for Irish Studies. He is a past
President of the International Association for the Study of Irish Literatures.
Qualifications
Honours degree in English and Irish; first class honours for an MA (by research) at UCC; and a PhD from the
University of Leeds, supervised by A N Jeffares.
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