This is the second lecture in our second-year theory core module, and it introduces students to theories on the relationships between authors, readers, texts, and their meaning. Below you can find the the handout for this lecture. Prezi to follow!
This lecture examines theories on the relationship between history and literature, and is intended as an introduction to New Historicism in particular.
This is an introductory lecture to feminist theory, featuring a detailed lecture handout and Prezi.
This is an introductory lecture to postmodernist theory, which forms the last critical lens we examine in this second-year course on literary and culture theory. This post contains both the Prezi and the lecture handout I’ve designed for this session.
This is an introductory lecture to posthumanism, and the post contains the Prezi I designed as part of my second-year Literary & Cultural Theory module.
This is an introductory lecture to structuralism, poststructuralism, and deconstruction. This post contains a detailed lecture handout as well as the Prezi for the lecture.
This lecture introduces students to gender and queer theories and some of their key concepts, including also their relationship to feminist theory and transgender issues.
This is a lecture that recaps some of last semester’s theories and consider both how scholars have theorised the role of popular culture in today’s society and how we might analyse different popular culture texts – such as music videos, TV shows, and adverts – through the theories we have studied on this module.
This lecture prepares students for the first essay on Literary & Cultural Theory. Next to recapping some basic guidelines (with the help of pet videos), it also tries to explain some of the new challenges students might face when writing an essay which incorporates theory.
Women and Belief is a six-volume collection of primary materials covering a wide range of opinions about women, their self-identity, and the combination of their spiritual and political beliefs.
This AHRC-funded Contemporary Women’s Writing Skills Development Programme (CWWSkills) was a series of six workshops held between August 2013 and July 2014. The programme is designed to enable UK-based postgraduate research students and early-career researchers who work in the field of contemporary women’s writing to develop an entrepreneurial approach to their research.
24-26 July 2013, Liverpool John Moores University
Workshop, 18/06/2013 “Transforming Postgraduate Research”, C21 Scholar, University of Oxford
Keynote, 10/05/2013 “Roles Conference”, PG Gender and Sexuality Research Network, Uni of Birmingham
Roundtable, 10/05/2013 “Roles Conference”, PG Gender and Sexuality Research Network, Uni of Birmingham
Over recent years, research into religious belief during the Victorian period and the early twentieth century has grown in diversity and importance. The centrality of faith-based discourses to women of the period has long been recognized by scholars in the field. But until now relatively little significance has been attached to the fundamental relationship between women’s faith and women’s rights. This new title in the History of Feminism series remedies that omission. Women and Belief, 1852–1928 is a six-volume collection of primary materials covering a wide range of opinions about women, their self-identity, and the combination of their spiritual and political beliefs.
This book chapter discusses the relationship between pornography and feminist politics in two neb-victorian novels: Sarah Waters’s *Fingersmith* (2002) and Belinda Starling’s *The Journal of Dora Damage* (2006).
10/02/2017 “Social Media for PhD Researchers” (University of Greenwich)
I’m thrilled to to be giving a two-hour workshop on social media to doctoral researchers at the University of Greenwich on 10 February 2017. If you’re interested in having me facilitate a...
19/10/2016 Social Media for Arts & Humanities Researchers (University of Manchester)
I’m thrilled to have been asked to facilitate this social media workshop for the conference of the AHRC North West Doctoral Training Centre in Manchester this Autumn. Please check back here...
21/06/2016 “Knowledge Is Power: Changing Academia One PhD at a Time” (University of Sheffield)
You can now listen back to this keynote! Simply click on this link, and scroll to 29min 25sec, or listen from the beginning of the event. I’m thrilled to have been...
Be Patient. Persevere. Value Slowness.
Tight turnaround times for staggering towers of essays. Fixed minimum numbers of publications per REF cycle. And while you’re at it, make sure your work has measurable impact on non-academic audiences and...
The Good Stuff: So Far, So Good?
Today is the fourteenth day of “The Good Stuff”, a project in which I challenge myself to write down and publish one positive thought every day until the end of this...
Everyone will tell you that they have times of extreme worry, sadness, anger, or frustration. Sometimes, when you try to explain your anxiety or depression to people, they will tell you...
I have struggled with mental health most of my adult life. There, I said it. I am a human being, one who has worked all of my life, gained two...
Surviving in Silence: Child Sexual Abuse Survivors in Academia
I remember being a young teenager and hesitatingly explaining from my school desk why – uncharacteristically – I hadn’t produced any homework. It was my favourite lesson on a subject...
The Cost of Mental Illness: Stigma & Bullying in Academia
An anonymous blogger shares their experiences of being discriminated against and bullied due to their mental health issues. Is mental illness nothing more than an inconvenient expense for university departments?
An anonymous contributors reflects on their experiences of schizophrenia during their PhD and their nevertheless successful journey to a permanent academic job.
An anonymous PhD student discusses how Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and the pressures of academia have led them to become addicted to painkillers. Are academics prone to socially acceptable addictions?
This post is a brief reflection on how to deal with the fact that you might not be the only one working on “your” topic.
Some of the most common questions with which PhD researchers are concerned focus on how they should set their priorities during their doctoral studies. What else, and how much of...
We Regret to Inform You: On Interview Feedback
Interview feedback is difficult to approach, both giving and receiving. As someone who has more often been on the receiving end, I’ve found directly helpful feedback to be the exception...
The Twilight Zone: After the PhD, Before the Academic Job
You’re close to submitting your PhD, to passing your viva voce examination with flying colours, and to be awarded your doctorate. At various stages in these final months of your...
Academic job interviews can take a variety of forms, and I’ve experienced a few different kinds of job interview – both from the perspective of a candidate, as well as...
I Went On Woman’s Hour, But Where Did My She-Hulk Go?!
On 11 November 2016, Mary Moreland and I launched the Heritage Lottery Funded project War Widows’ Stories live on Woman’s Hour. We were given eight star-struck minutes with BBC Radio...
[Commentary] Thoughts, Fears, & Brexit
I was invited to write this piece for the Times Higher Education blog, where it was originally published on 26 June 2016 under the title “‘I’m scared’: German academic in the...
How Do I Look? When Fear Interferes
This week I got to be in my first ever film: a four-minute epic about Victorian widows, made for BBC Arts as part of the AHRC/ BBC Radio 3 New Generation Thinkers scheme …
AHRC/ BBC Radio 3 New Generation Thinkers
I had been meaning to apply for the AHRC/ BBC Radio 3 New Generation Thinkers initiative for a couple of years now, and last December I finally decided to take...
Keep Calm & Take Time Off: Being Ill at Work
When you’re ill, do you keep calm and carry on, or do you keep calm and take time off? I’ve just come to the end of two weeks sick leave....
