Background

Background

I work in the field of modern and contemporary literature, with particular interests in medical humanities, trauma and memory studies, and feminist theory. I am currently writing my next book, Relating Suicide, which is under contract with Bloomsbury Academic Press. I am also developing a collaborative, interdisciplinary project on reproductive loss.

I have been Senior Lecturer at Newcastle University since 2006. I was appointed as Lecturer in 1999. 

Roles and Responsibilities

In 2019-20, I am Deputy Head for the School of English. I am also Director of Impact.  

I am a co-organiser of the Medical Humanities Network at Newcastle University. 

Research

Research Interests

My research focuses on modern and contemporary literature, and I have particular expertise in medical humanities, trauma and memory studies, and feminism and affect. I am currently working on a contracted book: Relating Suicide (Bloomsbury Academic Press). I am also developing a collaborative, interdisciplinary project on reproductive loss, working with colleagues in the medical sciences and with the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle. 

Recent publications include Medicine and Empathy in Contemporary British Fiction (Edinburgh University Press, 2017) and the co-edited Edinburgh Companion to the Critical Medical Humanities (Edinburgh University Press, 2016). Other books include Memory: New Critical Idiom (Routledge, 2008), Theories of Memory: A Reader (Edinburgh University Press, 2007), W. G. Sebald: A Critical Companion (Edinburgh University Press, 2004), and Trauma Fiction (Edinburgh University Press, 2004). I have also co-edited a special issue of Feminist Theory on feminism and affect (2012).  

Doctoral Supervision

I am an experienced supervisor of doctoral projects and welcome applications in any area of my expertise.

External Activities 

I am a regular national and international examiner and reviewer. I am a member of the AHRC Peer Review College (2017-2020). I am a founding member of the Northern Network for Medical Humanities Research and I sit on the steering committee. I was the project lead on a Knowledge Transfer Partnership with Seven Stories: The National Centre for the Children's Book, which was the recipient of the Times Higher Education Learning and Management Award for Knowledge Exchange Project of the Year, 2017.    

Teaching

Undergraduate Teaching

SEL3362, English Literature Dissertation (module leader and supervisor)

SEL3364/5, Extended Essay I and II (module leader, supervisor and lecturer)

SEL2206, Contemporary Cultures (lecturer and seminar leader)

SEL1023, Transformations (module leader and lecturer)

Postgraduate Teaching

MA Research Matters: 'Affect Theory' (MA in English Literature)

Thinking Theories and Methods: 'Medical Humanities' (Doctoral Training Programme, Faculty of Arts and Humanities)

External Examining

Cardiff University (2011-2014), Bristol University (2016-20).

Publications

• Whitehead A. Medicine and Empathy in Contemporary British Fiction: An Intervention in Medical Humanities. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2017.
• Whitehead A, Woods A, Atkinson S, Macnaughton J, Richards J, ed. Edinburgh Companion to the Critical Medical Humanities. Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh University Press, 2016.
• Whitehead A, Woods A. Introduction. In: Anne Whitehead, Angela Woods, Sarah Atkinson, Jane Macnaughton and Jennifer Richards, ed. The Edinburgh Companion to the Critical Medical Humanities. Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh University Press, 2016, pp.1-31.
• Whitehead A. War and Beauty: The Act of Unmasking in Pat Barker's Toby's Room and Louisa Young's My Dear, I Wanted to Tell You. In: Saunders C; Macnaughton J; Fuller D, ed. The Recovery of Beauty: Arts, Culture, Medicine. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, pp.217-234.
• Whitehead A. The Medical Humanities: A Literary Perspective. In: Victoria Bates, Alan Bleakley, and Samuel Goodman, ed. Medicine, Health and the Arts: Approaches to the Medical Humanities. London and New York: Routledge, 2014, pp.107-127.
• Whitehead A. Reading with empathy: Sindiwe Magona's Mother to Mother. Feminist Theory 2012, 13(2), 181-195.
• Pedwell C, Whitehead A, ed. Affecting Feminism: Questions of Feeling in Feminist Theory (Special issue of Feminist Theory). London: Sage, 2012.
• Pedwell C, Whitehead A. Introduction: Affecting feminism: Questions of feeling in feminist theory. Feminist Theory 2012, 13(2), 115-129.
• Whitehead A. Writing with care: Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go. Contemporary Literature 2011, 52(1), 54-83.
• Whitehead A. Representing the Child Soldier: Trauma, Postcolonialism and Ethics in Delia Jarrett-Macauley's Moses, Citizen and Me. In: Ganteau, JM; Onega, S, ed. Ethics and Trauma in Contemporary British Fiction. Amsterdam: Rodopi BV, 2011, pp.205-234.
• Whitehead A. Trauma and Resistance in Art Spiegelman's In the Shadow of No Towers. In: Crownshaw, R; Kilby, J; Rowland, A, ed. The Future of Memory. Oxford: Berghahn, 2010, pp.241-251.
• Whitehead A. Journeying through hell: Wole Soyinka, trauma, and postcolonial Nigeria. Studies in the Novel 2008, 40(1-2), 13-30.
• Whitehead A. Memory. London and New York: Routledge, 2008.
• Whitehead A. The Role of Theories of Memory in Teaching the Holocaust. In: Eaglestone R; Langford B, ed. Teaching Holocaust Literature and Film. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008, pp.37-47.
• Rossington M, Whitehead A, Contributing eds.: Anderson L, Chedgzoy K, Mukherjee P, Richards J, ed. Theories of Memory: A Reader. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007.
• Whitehead A. Tony Harrison, the Gulf War and the poetry of protest. Textual Practice 2005, 19(2), 349-+.
• Whitehead A. Pat Barker's Regeneration Trilogy. In: Shaffer, B.W, ed. A Companion to the British and Irish Novel 1945-2000. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005, pp.550-561.
• Whitehead A. Trauma fiction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2004.
• Long JJ, Whitehead A. W. G. Sebald - A Critical Companion. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2004.
• Whitehead A. The past as revenant: Trauma and haunting in Pat Barker's Another World. Critique - Studies in Contemporary Fiction 2004, 45(2), 129-146.
• Whitehead A. 'Telling Tales: Trauma and Testimony in Binjamin Wilkomirski's Fragments'. Discourse 2003, 25(1 & 2), 119-137.
• Whitehead A. Geoffrey Hartman and the Ethics of Place: Landscape, Memory, Trauma. European Journal of English Studies 2003, 7(3), 275-292.
• Whitehead A. A Still, Small Voice: Letter-writing, Testimony and the Project of Address in Etty Hillesum's Letters from Westerbork. Cultural Values 2001, 5(1), 79-96.
• Rossington M, Whitehead A, ed. Between the Psyche and the Polis: Refiguring History in Literature and Theory. Aldershot and Burlington, Vt: Ashgate, 2000.
• Whitehead Anne. Refiguring Orpheus: the possession of the past in Ted Hughes' Birthday Letters. Textual Practice, 13 227-241 1999.
• Anne Whitehead. Open to Suggestion: Hypnosis and History in Pat Barker's Regeneration. Modern Fiction Studies, 44 674-694 1998.