Dr Jordan Kistler

Lecturer

English

Contact

Personal statement

I joined Strathclyde as a lecturer in English in 2019. My research interests are in  19thcentury literature, with specific interests in Victorian poetry, literature and science, museum studies, and Gothic fiction. 

I gained my BA from New York University (USA), my MA from York University (CA), and my PhD from King's College, University of London.

I am happy to supervise students on any topics related to Victorian literature or the Gothic, including within literature and science, museum studies, decadence and aestheticism, women's health in nineteenth-century literature, the senses in literature, travel and empire writing, and monstrosity. 

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Teaching

My teaching spans the nineteenth century, and focuses on poetry, gender, and the Victorian Gothic. 

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Research Interests

I have recently published on the intersections between museums and literature in the nineteenth century and nineteenth-century understandings of non-Darwinian evolutionary theory.

the intersections between Victorian science and fin de siècle decadent literature, the representations of women in late-Victorian Gothic fiction, and the depiction of blindness in nineteenth-century poetry. 

My first monograph, Arthur O’Shaughnessy: A Pre-Raphaelite Poet in the British Museum (Routledge, 2016), explored O’Shaughnessy’s contributions to the Victorian medieval revival, Pre-Raphaelitism, decadence, and aestheticism. O’Shaughnessy’s work as a taxonomist in the British Museum is foregrounded in this study to suggest new ways of thinking about the relationship between science and literature during this period, through the lens of a technician rather than a theoretician.

My current project is a wide-ranging cultural history of the 19th-century British Museum. As an interdisciplinary, public, and national museum, the British Museum offers a unique lens through which to consider key questions of 19th-century epistemology: How can one ‘know’ from what one sees? How is knowledge organized? Who has access to it? How does this shape public perceptions of class, gender, and nationality? The project explores major changes in the popular conception of history, education, and knowledge itself, across disciplinary boundaries.

I have also published on the intersections between Victorian science and fin de siècle decadent literature, the representations of women in late-Victorian Gothic fiction, and the depiction of blindness in nineteenth-century poetry. 

Professional Activities

European Society for the Study of English (ESSE)
Participant
26/8/2024
‘Museum Cryptids: hoaxes, jokes, and marketing ploys’
Speaker
22/5/2024
International Conference of Three Societies on Literature and Science
Speaker
10/4/2024
Curious Creatures Creative Writing Workshop
Host
5/4/2024
Cusp: Late 19th-/Early 20th-Century Cultures (Journal)
Peer reviewer
26/3/2024
BBC Radio 4 Feedback
Contributor
15/3/2024

More professional activities

Projects

The People’s Friend? Recovering Scottish Popular Magazine Culture (CDP)(Charlotte Lauder)
Kistler, Jordan (Principal Investigator) Blair, Kirstie (Co-investigator) Goldie, David (Co-investigator)
01-Oct-2018 - 31-Mar-2023

More projects

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Contact

Dr Jordan Kistler
Lecturer
English

Email: jordan.kistler@strath.ac.uk
Tel: 444 8365