School of Social, Historical and Literary Studies

Profile

My research interests fall under the umbrella heading of ‘the fantastical imagination’: magical beliefs and practices, witchcraft, the supernatural, superstition, prophecy, millenarianism, legends, myths, urban folklore and (proto-)science-fiction tropes in the modern period (anything post-1700). I am particularly interested in the way these ideas and mentalities were used to navigate the experience of modernisation, especially as a means of resistance and adaptation. At the same time I use these rather offbeat areas of historical research to explore the nature of different types of nineteenth-century cultures and the concept of modernity.  I am happy to supervise PhDs on any of these weird and wonderful topics.  

I teach across the undergraduate programme, including core units such as Empires and Identities 1750-1914, The Masses and Modernity 1750-1914,options such as In Darkest England: Culture, Conflict and the City, and my Special Subject, Magic and Modernity 1800-1920. Additionally, I supervise third-year dissertations in the social and cultural history of the nineteenth century, and teach on the MA History of War, Culture and Society (which I also coordinate).  

Qualifications

• FHEA (Fellow of the Higher Education Academy)
• PhD in History – University of East Anglia (2007)
• MA in Modern History – Birkbeck College, University of London (2001)

Research Clusters

• Social, Historical and Cultural Change in Europe

Discipline Areas

• History

Research CV

Current Research Projects

• I am currently developing a research project which will explore proto-science fiction ideas in eighteenth and nineteenth-century British culture. Taking a historicist approach to this popular literary genre this project seeks to examine the ways the future was imagined in the collective imagination and how this period’s emerging sci-fi tropes expressed the aspirations and anxieties of early modernisation. Linked to this is a developing interest in neo-Victorian cultures and their engagement with the past. I am currently writing an article on the relationship between historiography and the steampunk subgenre.
• I am a core member of the Port Town, Urban Cultures research group, a collaborative project run by historians at the University of Portsmouth and the National Museum of the Royal Navy. My particular research interests include the interface between urban and maritime folklore and the transmission of supernatural beliefs overseas. Linked to this is an evolving collaborative project with colleagues at other UK and European universities, our aim being to shape fresh approaches to the social and cultural history of port towns around the world.
• I have been approached by a publisher to edit a book on war and culture in the twentieth century. This new project is still in the early stages of development.

Publications

Books

• 2012 The Legend of Spring-heeled Jack: Victorian Urban Folklore and Popular Cultures, Boydell and Brewer, ISBN:1843837870
• 2012 The Magical Imagination: Magic and Modernity in Urban England, 1780-1914, Cambridge University Press, 308pp, ISBN:1107002001 

Journal Articles

• ‘The Legend of Spring-heeled Jack: Urban Folklore in Victorian Popular Culture’, Gramarye, vol.1, no 1 (2012), pp.41-56.  
• ‘Remaking Magic: The “Wizard of the North” and Contested Magical Mentalities in the Mid-Nineteenth Century Magic Show’, Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft, vol.4, no.1 (2009), pp.26-51.
• ‘Breaking Modernity’s Spell - Magic and Modern History’, Cultural and Social History, vol.4, no.1 (2007), pp.115-122.
• ‘The Humbugg of the World at an End: the apocalyptic imagination and the uses of collective fantasy in Norfolk in 1844’, Social History, vol.31, no.4 (2006), pp.455-468. 

Book Chapters

• ‘Supernatural Folklore and the Popular Imagination: Re-reading Object and Locality in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Norfolk', in T.A. Heslop, Elizabeth Mellings and Margit Thofner (eds), Art, Faith and Place in East Anglia (Woodbridge, Boydell and Brewer, 2012), pp.240-252 ISBN 9781843837442.
• ‘Illuminated by Darkness: Superstition, the Supernatural, and the Challenges of Modernity c.1800 – 1870’ in Rosalind Crone, David Gange and Katy Jones (eds), New Perspectives in British Cultural History (Cambridge Scholars Press, Cambridge, 2007)

Consultancy

• Acted as a researcher and advisor for an independent documentary filmmaker.
• Advisor for Cambridge University Library’s digitalisation project.
• External moderator for Access to Higher Education Diploma courses in southern England, 2008-12 (Saava and then Ascentis)
• Referee for peer-reviewed journals such as Cultural and Social History and Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft. I have also been a reader for developing publications by Palgrave Macmillan.
• Regularly contribute book reviews to academic journals and online sites including the Journal of British Studies, Reviews in History, Annual Bulletin of Historical Literature,and European History Quarterly.