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PhD Supervision

Monorail

I welcome PhD applications on the following topics: 21st-century literature, utopian and dystopian narratives, science fiction, literary and critical theory, Western Marxism and the philosophy of the Frankfurt School.

[N.B. If you are interested in undertaking a PhD on contemporary literature, please ensure that you have thought about the gender balance of your case studies before making an application – proposals should make every reasonable effort to include women authors and thinkers.]

If you are considering applying for MPhil/PhD research in any of these areas, please get in touch with the Admissions Tutor about your research plan before making an application.

For more information about applying for a PhD in English & Humanities at Birkbeck, see here: http://www.bbk.ac.uk/study/2015/phd/programmes/RMPENGHU/

My current PhD students include:

  • Laura Kaye, “Women and Animals in Literature of the Anthropocene,” Creative Writing PhD, Co-Supervisor with Toby Litt (started 2019)
  • Eleonora Rossi, “Womanhood, Reproduction, and Spatial Confinement in Contemporary Anglo-American Feminist Dystopias,” English PhD, 1st Supervisor (started 2019)
  • Carly Robinson, “Becoming-woman and Progressive Feminist Narrative Form in Contemporary Fiction,” English PhD, Co-Supervisor (started 2016) [see Carly’s research profile here]

Recently graduated students include:

  • Sasha Myerson, “The Neon Ferris Wheel: Collective Subjects and Communities in Second Wave Feminist Cyberpunk,” English PhD, 1st Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2022) [see Sasha’s research profile here]
  • Katie Stone, “Utopia and the Child in Science Fiction and Its Criticism,” English PhD, 1st Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2021) [see Katie’s research profile here]
  • Elizabeth Jones, “Spectacular Alienation and the Novel,” English PhD, 2nd Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2022)
  • Rhodri Davies, “Post- and Transhuman Spiritualities and the Singularity,” English PhD, 2nd supervisor (started 2013)
  • Tom Dillon, “ ‘What is the Exact Nature of the Catastrophe?’ New Worlds Magazine and the 1960s Counter-Culture in the UK,” English PhD, 2nd Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2021) [see Tom’s research profile here]
  • Raphael Kabo, “Imagining the End of Capitalism: Utopia and the Commons in Contemporary Literature,” English PhD, 1st Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2020) [see Raphael’s research profile here]
  • Daniel Barrow, “Scars of the Visible: the Politics of the Image in Contemporary Experimental Fiction,” English PhD, 1st Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2019) [see Dan’s research profile here]
  • Stuart Lawson, “The Politics of Open Access,” Digital Humanities PhD, Co-supervisor (PhD awarded in 2019) [see Stuart’s research profile here]
  • Claudia Firth, “Three Moments of Crisis and The Aesthetics of Resistance,” Critical Theory PhD, 2nd Supervisor [see Claudia’s research profile here]
  • Sara Pahor, “Conflicting Urban Futures in Contemporary British London Novels,” Visiting PhD Student from the University of Padova (September 2014 – March 2015)
  • Jacqueline Kyte, “Literary Representations of Safety in British Fiction of the Long Decade, 1939-1950 and the Implications for Readers,” English PhD, 2nd Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2016)
  • Christos Callow, “Etherotopia: Utopian Philosophy as Literature and Practice,” Creative Writing PhD, 1st Supervisor (PhD awarded in 2014)

Featured image by Joe Penniston under a CC BY-NC-ND license.