Professor Jane Hodson
School of English
Head of the School of English
+44 114 222 8471
Full contact details
School of English
Jessop West
1 Upper Hanover Street
Sheffield
S3 7RA
- Profile
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My research interests lie at the interface of language and literature, and I am interested in the way in which style is contested at an ideological level. As a linguist I am particularly concerned with the Later Modern English and Historical Sociolinguistics. As a literary scholar my specialism lies in prose of the Romantic period.
My first degree was in English at Leeds University, where I predominantly studied literature, but also took several courses in English Language. Having unexpectedly developed a taste for grammar, I then went to Cambridge University where I did an MPhil in Linguistics before joining the School of English to study for a PhD. This was completed in 2000 and is entitled The Politics of Style: Burke, Wollstonecraft, Paine and Godwin. In it I explore theories of language and practices of language in the French Revolution Debate in England in the 1790s. I published a monograph based upon this work in 2007.
More recently, I have been working on the ways in which dialects and other nonstandard varieties of English are represented in literature, and I have published Dialect in Literature and Film (2014) and the edited volume Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (2017). I am currently working on new monograph which will deal with the representation of nonstandard language in novels published in the early nineteenth century.
I have a strong interest in communicating academic research to external audiences, and I have worked with Chatsworth, Grimm & Co and the Poetry Business among other organisations. In 2017-18 I was Academic in Residence at Chatsworth.
- Research interests
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My current area of interest is in the way in which dialects of English are represented in literature. In 2011 I was awarded a grant by the AHRC to undertake a two-year project on `Dialect in British Fiction 1800-1836'. Since then I have published widely on the subject of dialect representation, including Dialect in Literature and Film (2014) and the edited volume Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (2017).
I have an ongoing interest in the way in which Yorkshire English has been represented in film and literature over the past 200 years. In 2013 the University held an exhibition on 'Yorkshire Voices', displaying some of the archival material related to this topic in the University Library.
- Publications
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Books
- Dialect in Film and Literature. Palgrave Macmillan.
- Language and revolution in Burke, Wollstonecraft, Paine, and Godwin. Ashgate Publishing Limited.
Edited books
- Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century. Abingdon: Routledge.
- Linguistics and Literary History: In honour of Sylvia Adamson. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Journal articles
- Talking to peasants: language, place and class in British fiction 1800–1836. English Language and Linguistics, 27(3), 543-560.
- Staging language : place and identity in the enactment, performance and representation of regional dialects. Folia Linguistica, 55(1), 285-288. View this article in WRRO
- Everybody Knows: Engaged Research and the Changing Role of the Academic. Participations: journal of audience and reception studies, 14(1), 329-350. View this article in WRRO
- Talking like a servant: What nineteenth century novels can tell us about the social history of the language. Journal of Historical Sociolinguistics, 0(0). View this article in WRRO
- In Search of Jane Austen: The Language of the Letters. Women's Writing, 23(2), 267-271.
- Introduction. Linguistic Approaches to Literature, 25, 1-11.
- Developments in literary dialect representation in British fiction 1800–1836. Language and Literature, 22(4), 315-332.
- Special issue: selected papers from the fourth International Conference on Late Modern English. English Language and Linguistics, 16(2), 201-207.
- Women write the rights of woman: the sexual politics of the personal pronoun in the 1790s. Language and Literature, 16(3), 281-304. View this article in WRRO
- The Problem of Joseph Priestley’s (1733–1804) Descriptivism. Historiographia Linguistica, 33(1-2), 57-84. View this article in WRRO
- New approaches to the study of later modern english introduction. Historiographia Linguistica, 33(1-2), 1-9.
- Introduction. Historiographia Linguistica, 33(1-2), 1-9.
- Reviews. Journal of English Linguistics, 32(1), 55-58.
- "The strongest by most undecorated language”: Robinson’s rhetorical strategy in Letter to the Women of England. Women's Writing, 9(1), 87-105.
- Language as it is in Caleb Williams. La Questione Romantica, 105-117.
- Can a statue breathe? The Linguistic (un)coupling of Godwin and Wollstonecraft. Romanticism on the Net(18), 0.
Chapters
- The Significance of Stance in Fictional Representations of Non-Standard Language and Prescriptivism In Yáñez‐Bouza N, Rodríguez‐Gil ME & Pérez‐Guerra J (Ed.), The Significance of Stance in Fictional Representations of Non-Standard Language and Prescriptivism Multilingual Matters Limited
- ‘Did She Say Dinner, Betsey, at This Taam o’Day?’: Representing Yorkshire Voices and Characters in Novels 1800–1836 In Honeybone P & Maguire W (Ed.), Dialect Writing and the North of England (pp. 188-210). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
- The Problem With Dialect Poetry In Hélie C, Brault-Dreux E & Loriaux E (Ed.), No Dialect Please, You're a Poet: English Dialect in Poetry in the 20th and 21st Centuries New York: Routledge. View this article in WRRO
- Literary Uses of Dialect In Duff D (Ed.), The Oxford Handbook of British Romanticism (pp. 513-528). Oxford: Oxford University Press. View this article in WRRO
- Introduction In Hodson JL (Ed.), Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (pp. 33-50). Abingdon: Routledge.
- ‘I expect that I prefer them horses considerable beyond the oxen’: American English in British fiction 1800-1836 In Hodson JL (Ed.), Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (pp. 33-50). Abingdon: Routledge.
- Introduction, Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (pp. 1-13). Routledge
- Jane Austen and the Prescriptivists In Auer A, Gonzalez-Dias V, Hodson JL & Sotirova V (Ed.), Linguistics and Literary History (pp. 151-170). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
- Introduction In Auer A, Gonzalez-Diaz V, Hodson JL & Sotirova V (Ed.), Linguistics and Literary History (pp. 1-12). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
- Gothic and the Language of Terror In Wright A & Townshend D (Ed.), Romantic Gothic An Edinburgh Companion (pp. 289-305). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
- Dialect in Literature In Sotirova V (Ed.), The Bloomsbury Companion to Stylistics (pp. 416-429). London: Bloomsbury Publishing.
- Joseph Priestley’s two Rudiments of English Grammar: 1761 and 1768 In Tieken-Boon van Ostade I (Ed.), Grammars, Grammarians and Grammar-Writing in Eighteenth-Century England (pp. 177-190). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
- When the students become the teachers: practical pedagogical stylistics with third year undergraduates In Zyngier S & Watson G (Ed.), Literature and Stylistics for Language Learners: Theory and Practice (pp. 27-36). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
- Dialect in Film and Literature. Palgrave Macmillan.
- Research group
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I welcome PhD applicants who wish to undertake interdisciplinary work in language and literature, particularly with reference to dialect representation, historical stylistics, and issues of power, politics and gender.
Recent graduates include:
- Suzanne Pickles. 2019. Post-Authenticity: Literary Dialect and Realism in Victorian and Neo-Victorian Social Novels.
- Eleanor Bird. 2018. Narratives and depictions of slaves and former slaves in Canada: 1800-1900.
- Yasir Al Jumaili. 2018. The Representation of Negative Mental States in the Poetry of John Keats: A Cognitive Approach to His Metaphors of Depression.
- Ayumi Nonomiya. 2016. Second Person Pronouns in Eighteenth Century Dramas.
- Hugh Escott. 2014. 'Speikin' Proper': Investigating Representations of Vernacular Speech in the Writing of Three Authors from South-Yorkshire Coal-Mining Backgrounds.
- Teaching activities
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I enjoy teaching on both the BA in English Language and Literature and the MA in English Language and Linguistics. My level three module ‘Dialect in Film and Literature’ builds on my research interests, and students on that module have worked with me to research topics such as representations of Yorkshire English and dialect in Children's Literature, and to communicate their findings to general audiences.
At graduate level, I contribute to several team-taught modules and co-teach 'Literary Language: History and Culture' with Dr Richard Steadman-Jones. This year in 'Literary Language' we will be exploring Language and Literature in the City.