Dr Nia Davies

As a poet and researcher, I am interested in experimental creative practice and research that crosses disciplinary boundaries. My research emerges from a background in creative writing, poetry, performance, intercultural collaboration and literary curation. Most recently, my projects stem from my doctoral research into poetry, ritual and performance, such as my forthcoming poetry collection, Votive Mess (2024, Bloodaxe). I am also developing poetics inspired by explorations of performance, embodiment, ecology and my process of learning Cymraeg.

As a Research Assistant in FHSS I support research collaboration across disciplines and I’m interested in how inter-, multi- and transdisciplinary humanities-led research which can approach and tackle complex challenges such as the climate and ecological crisis, AI and digital and societal change.

Currently, and into the future, my research and creative practice is focused on the following interconnecting themes:

• how creative and embodied practice can contribute to understanding ecological crises and creating new forms of more equitable and biophilic living;
• the role of creative practice and subcultures in sustaining minoritised language cultures such as Cymraeg;
• psychoanalysis and the relationship of language, expression and sexuality to psychological wellbeing and relationships.

I am particularly interested in addressing these concerns in the context of linguistically experimental embodied practices such as poetry, poetics, performance, intermedia art practice and writing.

The videopoem Oceanik, made with Lucia Sellars, was winner of Outstanding Poem and Poetry Impact award from the Film and Video Poetry Society USA (2018).

All fours (Bloodaxe Books, 2017) was shortlisted for the Roland Matthias Prize for Poetry (2018) and longlisted for the Michael Murphy Memorial Prize for First collection (2019).

I am active on the curatorial committee of Nawr, a series of concerts and experimental arts events in South Wales: NAWR Music | (rwan.cymru). And I also support Pamenar press, an independent publisher producing books of poetry, hybrid and critical writing forms which are cross-cultural and multilingual: https://www.pamenarpress.com/

Following my previous roles as editor of Poetry Wales, co-curator of Poetry Emergency festivals and work at Literature Across Frontiers at the Mercator Institute, I also collaborate frequently with poetry, translation, performance and cultural communities in Wales and around the world.