Steph Alder
College: College of Humanities
Discipline: English
Department: Humanities
Research Centre/Unit: Victorian Studies
After working as a secondary school English teacher since 1997, I embarked on a Masters Degree with the Open University in 2013 for which I gained a Distinction. The experience re-ignited a passion for research and I am now studying for a PhD at the universities of Exeter and Reading, funded by the South, West and Wales Doctoral Training Partnership.
My essay 'The Silent Indiscretion: Re-thinking Censorship in Thomas Hardy's "An Indiscretion in the life of an Heiress"' is published in the winter 2017 issue of the Thomas Hardy Journal.
As winner of the Thomas Hardy Society 2017 student essay competition, my essay 'Demolishing the Doll of English Fiction: Hardy and the Medium of Censorship' is published in the spring 2018 issue of the Thomas Hardy Society Journal. My article on Hardy's legacy in the secondary school curriculum, is published in the autumn 2019 issue of The Thomas Hardy Journal.
I have also published on Hardy in the Conversation (December 2018) and on Hardy, Eliot and Censorship in the Conversation (July 2020) and the British Association for Victorian Studies Newsletter (July 2019). My article on Geraldine Jewsbury and censorship is forthcoming with Victorian Periodicals Review. I am the editor of the Thomas Hardy Society journals.
On a recent AHRC funded research trip to the United States, I found two previously unknown letters from Florence Nightingale to Charles Edward Mudie. You can read my blog piece about my discoveries here: blogs.nottingham.ac.uk/florencenightingale/2019/10/01/finding-florence-nightingale-across-the-atlantic-by-steph-meek/
I am an Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.
