University of Hertfordshire

Faculty Member, English Literature

Senior Lecturer in English Literature

About

I am Senior Lecturer in Literature and MA Programme Tutor in Humanities at the University of Hertfordshire. I completed my PhD at the Centre for Eighteenth-Century Studies, University of York, in 2004. I taught in the Department of English Literature at the University of Sheffield before taking up my post at Hertfordshire in 2007. My research interests include eighteenth-century literature, literature and science, writing for children and young adults, vampire literature and culture. I am a reviewer of manuscripts for Routledge, Broadview Press and MUP together with a number of journals including the ‘Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies’.

I investigate the relationship between scientific debates, juvenile literature, sexuality and culture, in eighteenth and early nineteenth-century educational writing and books for young adults more broadly. I am the convener of the 'Open Graves, Open Minds: Vampires and the Undead in Modern Culture' research project at the University of Hertfordshire. OGOM relates the undead in literature, art and other media to questions concerning gender, technology, consumption and social change. http://www.opengravesopenminds.com/index.html
The first stage of this saw the OGOM conference at the University of Hertfordshire in April 2010. Media interest in the conference has been unprecedented. See the websites attached to this page for coverage, or view the video from the Wall Street Journal:  http://online.wsj.com/video/vampires-make-it-into-academia/6637172C-B540-492D-A169-BD546CD238F1.html and read my interview in The Guardian: 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/apr/06/vampire-conference-literature-hertfordshire?INTCMP=SRCH

You can view the full conference programme here: http://herts.academia.edu/SamGeorge/Books/165832/Open-Graves--Open-Minds--Vampires-and-the-Undead-in-Modern-Culture--&nbsp.&nbsp.
Research from the OGOM book that developed out the first conference was showcased at the Bram Stoker Centenary Symposium at Keats House in Hampstead in April 2012. You can view the programme of talks for this special event here: http://herts.academia.edu/SamGeorge/Talks/51769/Open_Graves_Open_Minds_Bram_Stoker_Centenary_Symposium_April_20th-21st_2012
The chapter headings and contributors to the OGOM collection are listed under ‘books’. I am continuing to lead the OGOM project and I am currently investigating the trope of non reflection and its relationship to undead aesthetics and vampire portraiture in a number of early narratives.

Further papers from the 2010 conference will appear in a special edition of ‘Gothic Studies’ whilst the 'Open Graves, Open Minds' book will be adopted as a reader for the new MA module ‘Reading the Vampire: Science, Sexuality and Alterity in Modern Culture’.  The vampire MA will run for the first time in 2010/11 and has already caused quite a stir. I was interviewed by Simon Midgley in ‘The Times’ about inviting vampires into the curriculum and giving them an academic platform in an article entitled ‘Counting on Dracula’ (March 16th 2011). For further discussions see ‘Coffin Boffin Syllabus’: http://entertainment.stv.tv/showbiz/168301-robert-pattinson-kristen-stewart-on-coffin-boffin-syllabus/ and 'Get your Master's Degree in Vampire Literature' : http://www.manolith.com/2010/04/09/get-your-masters-degree-in-vampire-literature. You can view the course schedule for the introductory module under ‘Teaching Documents’ on the left. To enquire about applying to this MA Programme please contact me directly on s.george@herts.ac.uk. 

An interrogation into sexuality and culture is central to my research elsewhere and I explore this through my work on women writers and the sexual system of botany in my  book: 'Botany, Sexuality and Women's Writing 1760-1820: From Modest Shoot to Forward Plant' (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2007). I continue to investigate themes around the cross fertilisation of literature and science in my current research which focuses on the relationship between natural science, sexuality and culture in juvenile literature for girls. I probe into genre's relationship to gender and uncover the uses of natural history in conduct literature and in sex education for girls. A book developing out of this project ('Girlhood’s Tender Shoots: Education, Natural Science and Female Sexuality 1760-1840’) is planned for publication in 2013.

My forthcoming research builds on this interdisciplinary approach whilst also seeking to widen the project by introducing an international element. I am collaborating with scholars in Sweden and Germany on a project entitled: ‘Botanising Women: Transmission, Translation and European Exchange’.  A special edition of the Journal for Literature and Science on women and botany is an early offshoot of this project; I am guest editing this for publication in 2011. My paper ‘Animated Beings: Enlightenment Entomology for Girls’ has been chosen by Wiley to represent 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day in an online edition http://dmmsclick.wileyeurope.com/view.asp?m=c094493r2s7d1bfigbdd&u=16438204&f=h

I teach Enlightenment, Eighteenth-Century and Romantic period literature together with the MA module I have developed on 'Reading the Vampire'. Much of my teaching focuses on the literary representation of the child and early children’s literature ('The Romantic Child' (level 3) and 'The Making of the Modern Child' (MA)). I would welcome proposals from PhD students who wish to work on any aspect of science and literature, eighteenth-century studies, literature for children, vampire literature and/or teen fiction and projects relating to literature, sexuality and culture more broadly. 

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