Anglo-Saxon literary patronage: origins and development. Literature in English began more than a thousand years ago with the Anglo-Saxons, whose greatest work, the epic poem 'Beowulf', marked the transition from an oral poetic tradition to written literature. This project is the first to examine the relationship between patrons and writers in the creation of the earliest English literature and its books.
Eliza Haywood and Daniel Defoe: gender, genre and nation in the Eighteenth-Century novel. This is the first study of the significant, but unaccounted for, parallels between Defoe and Haywood's careers. This research provides a new perspective on the origins of the eighteenth-century novel by challenging the binary of realism and romance that organises its critical history and interrogating the relation between novel and nation.
Complexions of Empire: racial ideology, West Indian slavery and British romanticism. The aim is to undertake a major interdisciplinary study of British culture and colonialism in the 18th century, with a particular focus on identity formation, the development of racial ideology, and the rhetoric of abolitionism. By focussing on the representation of the West Indies and West Indian social identity and customs, in the context of social conditions in England, the project will advance our current un ....Complexions of Empire: racial ideology, West Indian slavery and British romanticism. The aim is to undertake a major interdisciplinary study of British culture and colonialism in the 18th century, with a particular focus on identity formation, the development of racial ideology, and the rhetoric of abolitionism. By focussing on the representation of the West Indies and West Indian social identity and customs, in the context of social conditions in England, the project will advance our current understanding of the dynamic of metropolitan/colonial relations.Read moreRead less
War, Literary Culture and Masculinity in Romantic Period Britain, 1750-1850. The Romantic period represents a formative moment in the history of Australia and my reconsideration of Romantic culture and war has relevance for understanding this history. Australia's own experience of war first originated with the frontier wars of 1788-1838. My research into British Romantic military and naval war writing will provide key insights into the military culture that dominated this formative moment of Aus ....War, Literary Culture and Masculinity in Romantic Period Britain, 1750-1850. The Romantic period represents a formative moment in the history of Australia and my reconsideration of Romantic culture and war has relevance for understanding this history. Australia's own experience of war first originated with the frontier wars of 1788-1838. My research into British Romantic military and naval war writing will provide key insights into the military culture that dominated this formative moment of Australian military history. War has, more broadly, been pivotal in the formation of Australian nationhood and identity. My project will contribute to our understanding of the role of war in Australian culture by providing fresh insight into the historical role of war writing in constructing modern forms of identity.Read moreRead less
An Open University: Public lecturing in the Romantic period. This project aims to investigate and account for an under-researched and radically underestimated aspect of our intellectual and literary culture, the public lecture, focusing specifically on public lecturing in the Romantic period and on the lecture institutions that sprang up in the early nineteenth century. It will examine, amongst other things, the role public lectures played in the (self-) education of women and the development o ....An Open University: Public lecturing in the Romantic period. This project aims to investigate and account for an under-researched and radically underestimated aspect of our intellectual and literary culture, the public lecture, focusing specifically on public lecturing in the Romantic period and on the lecture institutions that sprang up in the early nineteenth century. It will examine, amongst other things, the role public lectures played in the (self-) education of women and the development of 'English' as a discipline. The first ever comprehensive study of an extensive pedagogical practice that was also a popular diversion. This project will position public lecturing in the history of education and the knowledge economy of the early nineteenth century.Read moreRead less
Reading Children in Early Modern Culture. This project will offer new understandings of childhood as a historically- and culturally-contingent construct that will impact on perceptions of childhood in twenty-first-century Australia. It will use local and international archives to uncover a variety of early modern texts that were produced for children but have not yet been considered in terms of child readership. It is important to explore the significant historical links between children and lit ....Reading Children in Early Modern Culture. This project will offer new understandings of childhood as a historically- and culturally-contingent construct that will impact on perceptions of childhood in twenty-first-century Australia. It will use local and international archives to uncover a variety of early modern texts that were produced for children but have not yet been considered in terms of child readership. It is important to explore the significant historical links between children and literature as it will enable us to access the history of this marginalized group and will result in a more nuanced understanding of the cultural processes of educating children and the important role of literature in defining childhood identities, issues that continue to be relevant today.Read moreRead less
Women's Poetry and Classicism in Early Modern England, 1500-1700. The primary national/community benefit of the project is the charting of how women pursued sophisticated education and imaginative literary expression despite the gender-biased structures of exclusion prevalent in early modern England. The period from Isabella Whitney's first published book (1567) to Margaret Cavendish's (1653) sees nothing less than the first emergence of Englishwomen as publishing authors. It is of great importa ....Women's Poetry and Classicism in Early Modern England, 1500-1700. The primary national/community benefit of the project is the charting of how women pursued sophisticated education and imaginative literary expression despite the gender-biased structures of exclusion prevalent in early modern England. The period from Isabella Whitney's first published book (1567) to Margaret Cavendish's (1653) sees nothing less than the first emergence of Englishwomen as publishing authors. It is of great importance that this historical emergence be interrogated because it will help us understand how women rose from domestic silence to public voice, how they turned masculine classical resources to 'feminist' ends, and how the idea of the woman writer developed in England in the age of print. Read moreRead less
Literature and Science in the Early Middle Ages. This project aims to investigate the interplay between early medieval science and the literary imagination. The project focuses on Anglo-Saxon England, which provides a fully developed and well-preserved vernacular literary record, beside a learned Latin literary culture. It aims to investigate an important reciprocal relationship at a transitional moment in Western culture: the ways scientific learning influenced the early medieval literary imagi ....Literature and Science in the Early Middle Ages. This project aims to investigate the interplay between early medieval science and the literary imagination. The project focuses on Anglo-Saxon England, which provides a fully developed and well-preserved vernacular literary record, beside a learned Latin literary culture. It aims to investigate an important reciprocal relationship at a transitional moment in Western culture: the ways scientific learning influenced the early medieval literary imagination, and how the literary imagination influenced early medieval science. Study of the relationship between science and literature provides an insight into how people have understood the world around them and their relationship with it, interpreted in the light of inherited knowledge and the imagination.Read moreRead less
A Critical Investigation into the Life and Writings of Francis Jeffrey (1773-1850). Insofar as our culture was and to a large extent remains a development of the culture of Britain during the Romantic period, and of its often conflicting ideas of nature and subjectivity, individualism and nationalism, my research into Jeffrey's career and writings will bring benefit to Australia by making conceptual advances in key areas of our cultural and political history. The only places where Francis Jeffre ....A Critical Investigation into the Life and Writings of Francis Jeffrey (1773-1850). Insofar as our culture was and to a large extent remains a development of the culture of Britain during the Romantic period, and of its often conflicting ideas of nature and subjectivity, individualism and nationalism, my research into Jeffrey's career and writings will bring benefit to Australia by making conceptual advances in key areas of our cultural and political history. The only places where Francis Jeffrey's enormously influential 'Edinburgh Review' was read more avidly than in Britain in the early decades of the nineteenth century were in the ex-colony of America and in British colonies like Australia. Read moreRead less
The medieval town imagined: representations of urban culture in medieval literature. As the size and number of towns in north-west Europe expanded from the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, the cultural response to economic and social changes produced by urbanisation was articulated in literary texts. The project aims to examine ways in which towns and urban culture are represented in medieval English, Welsh and French literature, foregrounding the attitudes constructed by the texts towards town ....The medieval town imagined: representations of urban culture in medieval literature. As the size and number of towns in north-west Europe expanded from the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, the cultural response to economic and social changes produced by urbanisation was articulated in literary texts. The project aims to examine ways in which towns and urban culture are represented in medieval English, Welsh and French literature, foregrounding the attitudes constructed by the texts towards towns, townspeople and the impact of the urban economy. The resulting monograph and database of references will provide new evidence for the competitive relationships between feudal nobilities and emerging urban elites.Read moreRead less