The material cultures of early modern women's writing: editing, reception and mediation. This project provides the first comprehensive account of how early modern women's writing was produced and circulated from its original appearance to the present day. Changing the ways in which we read and value women's writing, it will produce new knowledge about early modern texts and their afterlives.
Literature and politics in the 1620s. The methodology used in this project will illuminate other areas of literature, including our own, because literary history remains in need of sophisticated ways to understand how culture, politics, and society intersect.The 1620s did not cordon writing and performance off from matters of state, but rather saw them as being intertwined.
Transformative Utopianism: Contemporary Children's Literature Responding to Changing World Orders from Glasnost to 11 September, 2001. Political and cultural instabilities and conflicts from 1990 to the present have profoundly affected children's literature. Works of fiction in particular have deployed utopian and dystopian tropes to project possible futures to their implied readers. The project uses the concept of 'transformative utopianism' to suggest that these tropes do important social, cul ....Transformative Utopianism: Contemporary Children's Literature Responding to Changing World Orders from Glasnost to 11 September, 2001. Political and cultural instabilities and conflicts from 1990 to the present have profoundly affected children's literature. Works of fiction in particular have deployed utopian and dystopian tropes to project possible futures to their implied readers. The project uses the concept of 'transformative utopianism' to suggest that these tropes do important social, cultural and political work by challenging and reformulating ideas about power and identity, community, the body, spatio-temporal change, and ecology. In this way the project draws together multiple theoretical interpretations of texts to demonstrate the responsiveness of children's literature to broader ideological, social, theoretical and pedagogical contexts.Read moreRead less
English: the History of a Discipline 1920-70. This project aims fundamentally to change and enrich our understanding of a dynamic intellectual movement—academic literary criticism between 1920 and 1970. During this period, English (as it was often called) shaped the humanities at both the secondary and tertiary level. It also changed how and why we read literature. This project will produce what the scholarship still lacks: a detailed, analytic account of the history of English in the period, i ....English: the History of a Discipline 1920-70. This project aims fundamentally to change and enrich our understanding of a dynamic intellectual movement—academic literary criticism between 1920 and 1970. During this period, English (as it was often called) shaped the humanities at both the secondary and tertiary level. It also changed how and why we read literature. This project will produce what the scholarship still lacks: a detailed, analytic account of the history of English in the period, including in Australia, sensitive to the discipline’s impact and to the forces which caused it to take new paths in the 1970s. Benefits include expanding academic and public awareness of this rich disciplinary history and informing strategic directions for English in Australia and abroad.Read moreRead less
Literature and the Face: A Critical History. The project aims to chart and analyse the representation of the human face in literary texts from the medieval to the contemporary era. It expects to generate comprehensive new knowledge about changing literary and textual discourses about the face by combining rhetorical analysis, the insights of cognitive literary theory, and digital methodologies. Significant outcomes include a deeper understanding of the cultural history of facial expression, iden ....Literature and the Face: A Critical History. The project aims to chart and analyse the representation of the human face in literary texts from the medieval to the contemporary era. It expects to generate comprehensive new knowledge about changing literary and textual discourses about the face by combining rhetorical analysis, the insights of cognitive literary theory, and digital methodologies. Significant outcomes include a deeper understanding of the cultural history of facial expression, identity and emotion, with particular attention to gender and ethnicity. The project’s engagement activities will illuminate the relationship between literary history and contemporary social understandings of the face and allow us to better understand current transformations in facial recognition.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE200101675
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$419,950.00
Summary
War-Widow, Mother, Slave, Refugee: Andromache in Romantic Europe. This project aims to uncover how Andromache, a prominent classical figure in the Trojan wars, was represented and deployed to shape the literature, politics and culture of Romantic-era Europe. Its expected outcome is a significant reassessment of an understudied figure, focusing on her portrayals as a grieving widow, slave and refugee in times of national crisis and change, especially the Napoleonic wars. Its innovative method com ....War-Widow, Mother, Slave, Refugee: Andromache in Romantic Europe. This project aims to uncover how Andromache, a prominent classical figure in the Trojan wars, was represented and deployed to shape the literature, politics and culture of Romantic-era Europe. Its expected outcome is a significant reassessment of an understudied figure, focusing on her portrayals as a grieving widow, slave and refugee in times of national crisis and change, especially the Napoleonic wars. Its innovative method combines literary studies, musicology, cultural and material history, and emotions history. The project intends to strengthen Australia’s leading role in Romantic studies, enrich cultural life, and foster community reflection on the significant challenges of migration, refugees, gender and violence, war and emotions.Read moreRead less
Rethinking the Victim: Gendered Violence in Australian Women's Writing. This project, the first to examine gendered violence in Australian literature, argues that literary texts by Australian women writers offer unique ways of understanding the social problem of gendered violence, bringing this often private and suppressed issue into the public sphere. It draws on the international field of violence studies to investigate how these writers challenge the victim paradigm and figure women's agencie ....Rethinking the Victim: Gendered Violence in Australian Women's Writing. This project, the first to examine gendered violence in Australian literature, argues that literary texts by Australian women writers offer unique ways of understanding the social problem of gendered violence, bringing this often private and suppressed issue into the public sphere. It draws on the international field of violence studies to investigate how these writers challenge the victim paradigm and figure women's agencies. By including white, Indigenous and minority women writers in its case studies, and by interviewing selected writers, it will shed new light on the role of gendered violence in the diverse and interconnected cultural histories of the nation, and will significantly extend the parameters of the Australian literary canon.Read moreRead less
Journals in Theory: Practices of Academic Judgment. This project aims to examine the way key journals transformed the discipline of literary studies from 1946 to now. It expects to generate new knowledge of how editorial practices of academic judgement institutionalised and legitimated new modes of reading, thinking and writing. Based on archival research on journals including Critical Inquiry, Tel Quel and The Australian Journal of Cultural Studies, the project's outcomes will show how, in brin ....Journals in Theory: Practices of Academic Judgment. This project aims to examine the way key journals transformed the discipline of literary studies from 1946 to now. It expects to generate new knowledge of how editorial practices of academic judgement institutionalised and legitimated new modes of reading, thinking and writing. Based on archival research on journals including Critical Inquiry, Tel Quel and The Australian Journal of Cultural Studies, the project's outcomes will show how, in bringing together new intellectual passions, governance structures and imagined readerships, journals bestowed on criticism its current working definition. Expected benefits include a better account of the relationship between conceptual innovation and institutional mechanisms for research integrity.Read moreRead less
Eco-colonial Australian literature and the shaping of Australia’s environmental consciousness. This project aims to consider how colonial Australian literary writing shaped Australia's environmental consciousness. It will explore how colonial Australian literature expressed ecological issues: questions of land clearance, species classification, habitat, extinction, climate change and the effect of environmental disasters. By examining colonial Australian literary writing, natural historians’ wor ....Eco-colonial Australian literature and the shaping of Australia’s environmental consciousness. This project aims to consider how colonial Australian literary writing shaped Australia's environmental consciousness. It will explore how colonial Australian literature expressed ecological issues: questions of land clearance, species classification, habitat, extinction, climate change and the effect of environmental disasters. By examining colonial Australian literary writing, natural historians’ works and debates about the management of resources, this project expects to reveal our literary past and add historical depth to current environmental concerns in Australia.Read moreRead less
Mary Wroth: A Contextual Biography and Electronic Edition. This project will result in the biography of a remarkable early modern woman: Lady Mary Wroth. Wroth was an extremely talented writer who produced a huge prose romance, poetry and a pastoral play, and the project will also involve the production of an electronic edition of her writing. No biography of Wroth exists, and the contextual biography which I will write will offer many insights into early Jacobean society and culture. As a whole ....Mary Wroth: A Contextual Biography and Electronic Edition. This project will result in the biography of a remarkable early modern woman: Lady Mary Wroth. Wroth was an extremely talented writer who produced a huge prose romance, poetry and a pastoral play, and the project will also involve the production of an electronic edition of her writing. No biography of Wroth exists, and the contextual biography which I will write will offer many insights into early Jacobean society and culture. As a whole, the project will enhance Australia's strong research contribution to the key area of early modern studies.Read moreRead less