Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research & Innovation)
Ruth Livesey was appointed as Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research and Innovation) at Royal Holloway, University of London in February 2025 having served as Associate Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research and Innovation) from August 2023. Prior to that she held a number of leadership roles at Royal Holloway including serving as Head of the Department of English and leading University-wide work on doctoral training, research excellence, and equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI).
As a member of the Senior Leadership Team and Executive Board, Ruth has strategic responsibility for all aspects of research, innovation and knowledge exchange across the University. In addition to leading the Research and Innovation action plan for University strategy, RH2030s, she is responsible for University preparation for and returns to the Research Excellence Framework, Knowledge Exchange Framework and partnership development with external research and innovation organisations. Ruth works in partnership with the Associate Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Postgraduate Research), Associate Deans for Research and Innovation, and the Research and Innovation Directorate led by Professional Services colleagues to support the continued success of Royal Holloway as a research-intensive University.
Ruth is a Professor of Nineteenth-Century Literature and Thought and her books and articles explore the literature and culture of the Victorian era with an emphasis on gender, place, and nineteenth-century infrastructures. Since 2018 her research has focused on one of the University’s most famous alumni, the writer George Eliot, who attended lectures at Bedford College in the 1850s.
Ruth is a member of UKRI’s Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Advisory Board, and a longstanding strategic peer reviewer for the AHRC and the Future Leaders Fellowship (FLF) scheme, which extends across UKRI funding councils. From 2020-2025 she chaired the Advisory Board of the UKRI FLF Development Network: a national training programme for UKRI-funded research leaders.
Ruth has been Professor of Nineteenth-Century Literature and Thought at Royal Holloway since 2017.
Please see details of Ruth’s research and impact here.
