Her comparative literature research covered well known publications, such as
Cold Comfort Farm, and
Anne of Green Gables, the 1934 film version of the latter she said glossed over the character's "loss, rejection, cruel authority figures, and loneliness", and that the character of
Anne Shirley had "overshadowed that of her creator." Hammill has also written about the "Great American Novel" contender,
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. One of her areas of interest in 2002, whilst at Cardiff, was also Canadian literary reviews considering the idea of nature and the "
Gothic". In 2007, when Hammill was at Strathclyde, she wrote about her research examining literary women and writing between the wars, and the notion of
celebrity. She began the
AHRC Middlebrow Network in 2008, which has grown to 400 members. and a book titled
Magazines, Travel and Middlebrow Culture published with Michelle Smith, in 2015. Her work studying middlebrow culture looked further at the impact of publications like
Vanity Fair (1914–36);
American Mercury (1924–81);
New Yorker (1925– );
Esquire (1933– ) in a chapter written with Karen Leick in Oxford University Press publication
Modernism and the Quality Magazines. The Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, in 2015, funded a "Modern Magazines project" with Hammill,
Hannah McGregor, and Paul Hjartarson, publishing their key findings in the Canadian academic journal
English Studies in Canada and in the
Journal of Modern Periodical Studies. The previous year she had given a keynote lecture for ACCUTE at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences (
Brock University, Canada). In 2018, she gave a keynote lecture at the "Big Magazines" conference (
Aix-Marseille Université, France)
Ocean liners and literature Hammill's most recent focus has been on the role of ocean liners in modern literature. She has been asked to speak at conferences and events across the country, and internationally. For example, in 2018 at the
V&A Museum Ocean Liners Conference; at
Nottingham Trent University Periodicals and Print Culture Research Group (2020); at a
King's College London 2020 event titled
The Frantic Atlantic: Ocean Liners in the Interwar Literary Imagination; invited as keynote speaker on ''"A business man's dream": Promoting/Narrating the RMS Queen Mary at the International Postgraduate Port and Maritime Studies Network Belfast conference
(2020); and in considering Transatlantic Style: The Ocean Liner and the "International Set"'' in the second USA Transatlantic Literary Women's series (online 2020). Hammill has also contributed to telephones in literature (online exhibition) and an
English PEN International Women's Day event
The Right to Roam: Women and Free Expression. Other selected publications •
Literary Culture and Female Authorship in Canada 1760-2000 (2003), - see Awards • co-editor: ''Encyclopedia of British Women's Writing, 1900-1950'' (2006) •
Sophistication: A Literary and Cultural History (2010) described as 'smart and capacious' - see Awards • ''Modernism's Print Cultures'' (2016) - with Mark Hussey • co-editor of the
Palgrave series:
Material Modernisms • Introduction, new edition
Margaret Kennedy's 1941
Where Stands a Wingèd Sentry (2021) • editor, new edition
Martha Ostenso's 1928
The Young May Moon (2022, Borealis Press)
Carnegie Trust Research Incentive Grant
Current research publications These are published by the University of Glasgow. == Awards ==