Laurence Wright is an Extraordinary Professor in the Languages and Literature Research Entity at North-West University. He was formerly H.A. Molteno Professor of English and Director of the Institute for the Study of English in Africa (ISEA) at Rhodes University. He was awarded the Vice-Chancellor's Distinguished Senior Research Medal in 2009. A member of the South African Academy of Science, a Rhodes Scholar and a Commonwealth Scholar, he is also a Gold Medallist and Fellow of the English Academy of Southern Africa, and Honorary Life President of the Shakespeare Society of Southern Africa.

He has published widely on writers such as Sol Plaatje, VS Naipaul, Edgar Allan Poe, RL Peteni, Joseph Conrad, Guy Butler, Shakespeare, JM Coetzee, Tom Sharpe and Somerset Maugham. His output includes work on the future of the humanities, on the economics of South African language policy, and on the education crisis in the Eastern Cape.

Under his leadership, ISEA developed groundbreaking research and implementation work in Adult Literacy, Industrial Education, in-service education for rural English teachers, textbook design and academic publishing.The story of the Institute is recounted in ISEA 1964-2014: A South African Research Institute Serving People, edited by Monica Hendricks (Grahamstown: NISC, 2016).