Notes on Contributors
AARON BETTANY is a postgraduate student currently in the latter stages of the LLM International law with human rights course at Keele University. Aaron has recently finished his Masters’ dissertation where he investigated the human rights abuses on the offshore processing plant of Nauru by private corporations, focussing on difficulties with holding such legal personalities to account at international level as well as examining their actions through a biopolitical framework, namely Giorgio Agamben’ s‘ State of Exception’ and‘ Bare life’. Continuing from his dissertation Aaron is currently writing a PhD proposal to investigate the externalisation of border security and its continued privatisation, with roles and human rights responsibilities of states being‘ outsourced’ to large corporations. The theoretical framework will remain biopolitics, which will aid analysis of the securitization of immigration control.
NATALIE WEBSTER has recently finished her undergraduate degree in English Literature at University of Chester. She is starting the Contemporary Literature and Film MA course at Keele University from September 2017. She will be pursuing research on postmodern narratives; in particular lies, hallucinations and imagination within texts and the friction between reality and fiction. She will focus on theories such as phenomenology and thing theory to determine how much the‘ real’ world, or‘ cultural symptoms’( Belsey, 2005) influence the reader’ s perception of fiction. Natalie then hopes to pursue a PhD with an eye to a career in research and lecturing.
LAUREN DALE is currently studying an MRes at Keele University in History. She completed her undergraduate degree in History at Keele University and has recently been awarded a fully funded PhD at the University of York from the White Rose College of Arts and Humanities under the supervision of Dr Jeremy Goldberg. Throughout her academic training, she has focused predominately on medieval social history, delving into ' untold ' histories. Lauren’ s undergraduate dissertation analysed childbirth as a medieval social convention. Lauren’ s masters thesis examines the ecclesiastical and secular perceptions of abortion and infanticide through the middle ages. For her doctoral thesis, Lauren looks to examine the significance of virginity during transition from adolescence to adulthood in later medieval England. She will focus on ecclesiastical and lay experiences of virginity and disparities among men and women.
KELLY HOUSBY completed her undergraduate degree as a mature student with the Open University. She is studying for an MA in English Literatures at Keele University whilst working part-time as a student support worker at Staffordshire University. She hopes to study for a PhD at Keele in future. This article is an abridged from a section of her master’ s research.
DANIEL SKENTELBERY is just beginning an MRes in Film Studies, researching representations of failure in CBBC sitcoms. He has previously written on cosplay at undergraduate level for the dissertation,‘ Cosplay: Harley Quinn and the Subversion of Gender Norms’, which went to receive the MCC‘ Laura Mulvey Prize’.
AIMEE MERRYDEW will be starting her PhD in English Literature this September, following her Bachelors and Masters degrees( all at Keele University). Her research focuses on gender expression in contemporary American culture and poetry, with particular interest in representations of the body in Ely Shipley’ s Boy with Flowers.
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