Staging Liberation will provide the first comprehensive overview of the activities of 'fringe' feminist theatre companies from the beginning of the Women's Liberation Movement in 1968, until the last issue of Spare Rib, an influential second-wave magazine, in 1993.1 Due to the cyclical nature of prominent feminist debates, it has never been more important to look back and examine women's theatre history. One cannot help but see that when contemporary feminist theatre is placed within the context of third-wave feminism, especially the 'Reclaim the Night' protests, the resemblance to the various activities during the Women's Liberation Movement is clear and remarkable.2 To date, the following monographs have explored the wider histories of British 'fringe' theatre: Michelene Wandor, Carry on Understudies (1986), Lizbeth Goodman, Contemporary Feminist Theatres: To Each Her Own (1993) and Graham Saunders, British Theatre Companies 1980-1994 (2015). As yet, there are no extensive overviews of feminist 'fringe' theatre that explores the different companies and performances as part of wider activism, and discusses the blurring of boundaries between street and stage. Michelene Wandor's approach in Carry on Understudies is solely textual: this thesis seeks to extend this approach by thinking beyond the playtext. A website which categorises these feminist theatre companies is Unfinished Histories. Whilst this source provides an excellent starting point, as it contributes overviews of theatre groups and recommends resources for researchers, more extensive analysis is needed. By drawing on a range of archival resources, many of which are untouched, this thesis argues that in terms of feminist theatre, the boundaries of the space of performance and the space of protest merge into 'artistic activism.'3 This detailed history has not been written and these performances have not been recorded. Ultimately, this research aims to recover and analyse this rich and vibrant theatrical culture, which would otherwise be lost.

A fundamental paradigm in microbiology was created by Christian Gram's pioneering 1884 staining technique that characterised the vast majority of the bacterial world as either 'Gram-positive' or 'Gram-negative'. Subsequently, it was recognised that the hallmark of typical Gram-positive bacteria is a single cell membrane (monoderm), whereas Gram-negative bacteria possess a second, outer membrane (OM, diderm). Examination of the distribution of these cell envelope archetypes at higher taxonomic levels has led to the significant insights that [1] the majority of the bacterial world is diderm, [2] most bacteria belong to two large groups ('superphyla'), the Gracilicutes (diderm) and Terrabacteria (diderm or monoderm) and [3] that the likely root of the bacterial evolutionary tree between these superphyla suggests that the 'last bacterial common ancestor' was diderm. However, the earlier 'last universal common ancestor' (primordial protocell) was most likely monoderm. This makes the question 'how did bacterial OM evolve?' central to understanding bacterial evolution. Notably, no well accepted hypothesis for the mechanism of OM evolution has yet been proposed. Slightly counterintuitively, it appears that the defining features of an OM are not characteristic lipids but certain proteins present. Prominent among the definitive OM proteins are bacterial lipoproteins which are modified with a lipid anchor unique to bacteria. OM lipoproteins play crucial roles in OM assembly and stabilisation, particularly those anchored at the inner face of the OM (a 'protein head down, lipid tail up' orientation). In most Gracilicutes, lipoproteins are delivered from the cell membrane to the OM by the Lol ABC exporter system, which has been extensively characterised in the model diderm Escherichia coli. The central role of lipoproteins in OM biology suggests a novel hypothesis for OM evolution. It has been long established that monoderm bacteria can release lipoproteins to their extracellular environment ('shedding'). Thus, we hypothesise that released lipoprotein(s) may have reassociated with the cell wall peptidoglycan and/or surface proteins of monoderm bacteria. Such interactions would position the lipoprotein lipid group towards the bacterial surface i.e., matching the 'protein head down, lipid tail up' orientation of OM lipoproteins. Over evolutionary timescales, such interactions may have become robust enough to form a rudimentary lipid barrier (proto-OM), which was then strengthened by intercalation with released membrane lipids. We propose to test this hypothesis by engineering a lipoprotein hyper-secretion phenotype in a monoderm host, Geobacillus stearothermophilus. To achieve this, we will exploit the E. coli Lol system for OM lipoprotein localisation, inserting the lolCDE lipoprotein exporter genes into the chromosome of the monoderm Geobacillus host. We predict that this system will extract lipoproteins from the Geobacillus cell membrane and, in the absence of an OM, thus create a hyper-secretion phenotype.

Urban expansion is a key threat to global biodiversity, with 70% of the global human population predicted to be living in urban areas by 2050. Urban grasslands comprise significant areas of cities, with the majority in public and private greenspaces typically managed by regular mowing to create 'neat' lawns. There is growing interest in improving urban grassland management to benefit biodiversity, with reduced mowing (e.g., the 'No Mow May' campaign) and addition of flowering 'meadows' or turf increasingly popular methods for mitigating insect pollinator decline in cities by increasing floral resource availability. Whilst previous studies have explored the impacts of grassland management on pollinator communities or on soil quality and carbon sequestration, a key knowledge gap exists on how below-ground processes (soil function and ecology) interact with above-ground (floral resources, plant-pollinator interactions) communities in urban grasslands. Can pollinator-friendly urban grassland management provide lasting benefits to soil ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling and managing greenhouse gas emissions? Do soil properties affect nectar and pollen availability and quality and how does this affect pollinator communities? This project will examine the relationship between above-ground and below-ground ecological processes and assess whether different management approaches influence this relationship and thus the quality of floral resources available for pollinators in urban grasslands. Fieldwork will take place in public parks, road verges and residential gardens across Tyneside, examining existing management approaches and incorporating field-based experiments. This will be complemented by laboratory analyses of soil properties. Public perception of different management approaches and ecosystem service provision in urban grasslands will be explored using social science methods. Research will be designed in partnership with Urban Green Newcastle and utilise baseline data collected from urban parks in Newcastle upon Tyne. Findings will be incorporated into urban grassland management guidance via links with key policy and practice stakeholders. The project will address the following research gaps and questions: 1) What are the impacts of different urban grassland management approaches on floral and pollinator communities? 2) What are the potential benefits and disservices of managing urban grasslands for pollinators on soil quality? 3) Do soil quality and properties interact with floral reward availability under different urban grassland management approaches? 4) How do people respond to urban grassland management approaches and value the ecosystem services they provide?

This PhD seeks to re-establish the voices of a middling class of woman in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, using Newcastle Cathedral's ledger stones as a starting point into a deeper investigation of their lives. Many of the ledger stones at the Cathedral have very little information on the women compared to their male counterparts, where they are often referred to simply as "his wife", sometimes without even a date of death. This thesis would investigate the women named in the ledger stones to show the lives they lived were vibrant and unique, and that they were key figures in Newcastle life.

Anchored in the theories of Foucaldian Discourse Analysis and Narrative Paradigm Theory, this project shall look into the depiction of Muslims in Indian graphic narratives and argue how it acts as a praxis for dismantling their distorted image portrayed in popular news and films. Two editions each of Longform and First Hand Graphic Narratives shall be analysed and material from popular news and films, such as media platforms like Zee News, Republic TV etc, and films like Veer Zaara, and Bajrangi Bhaijaan among others, shall be reviewed to form a backdrop against which the graphic narratives can be read.