Thesis Outline

Luke's thesis Hybrid Futures explored how speculative fiction engages with ecocritism, specificially considering how, by drawing upon modes and tropes from various speculative genre traditions - such as Fantasy, Horror and Science Fiction - Spec Fic can inform our understanding of the Anthropocene and bridge a conceptual gap between the Athropocenic and Cthulucenic values.

Research Overview

Luke's research focuses on Speculative Fiction, an umbrella term which encompasses genre fiction such as Fantasy, Horror, Science Fiction, and the Gothic with my more specific interests being Fantasy and the Gothic. He engages with this interest through readings of various media including film, television, novels, and videogames.

Career Details

Previous Teaching

From October 2021 to May 2024, he has also taught in the English and Creative Writing Department on various modules: as a seminar tutor on ENGL100 British Literature module (2021-23) as well as worked as a group mentor on the ENGL301 Dissertation (2023-24) and ENGL419 Research Methodology and Reflective Practice in English Literature (2021-23) modules.

Luke has previously taught in the Department of Sociology on the first year SWK116 Contemporary Social Problems module from October 2019 to May 2022.

Editorial and Organisational Experience

Executive Editor for LUX: Undergraduate Jounral of Literature and Culture. (January 2019 to July 2020).

Co-Organised the Gothflix conference. Taking place at Lancaster University on the 1st and 2nd February 2020, this conference explored examples of Horror and the Gothic on the Netflix streaming platform.

Co-Organised the Next-Gen 2019 conference. Taking place at Lancaster University in June 2019, this conference was a study day for PhD students and early research students to present papers relating to videogame studies.

Conference Papers

‘Who Doesn’t Love a Good Scare?’: Liberal Horror in Netflix’s Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018). International Gothic Association 2019: Gothic Terror, Gothic Horror. Lewis University, USA. 30^th July – 2^nd Aug 2019. (1^st Aug).

‘Unholy Relicts’: Monsters in the Polluted World of The Witcher III: Wild Hunt (2015). Next-Gen 2019. Lancaster University. 20^th June 2019.

‘Who Doesn’t Love a Good Scare?’: Liberal Horror in Netflix’s Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018). Gothic Spectacle. Lancaster University. 1^st June 2019.

‘This is Hell, of course there’s a gift shop’: Gothic Afterlives in The Good Place (2016). Reimagining the Gothic V: Returns, Revenge, Reckonings. University of Sheffield. 10^th-12^th May 2019 (11^th May).

‘On this island I find degeneracy’: Reading island narratives through a Gothic lens. Reimagining the Gothic IV: Aesthetics and Archetypes. University of Sheffield. 26^th-28^th Oct 2018 (27^th Oct).

‘A Survivor is Born’: Considering the Castaway in the Contemporary ‘Island Gothic’. Anomalies: A Conference. Lancaster University. 20^th June 2018.