Title: Education and Victorian Sensation Fiction
Editors: Andrew Green & Jessica Cox (Brunel University)
Publisher: Routledge
Series Aims:
The aim of the Routledge Literature & Education series is to address the multiple ways in which education and literature interact. This includes:
- notions of how literary texts function educatively or what happens to them once they are brought into educational spaces and used for educational purposes
- the ways in which literary texts deal with the philosophical idea of literature as a function of education (i.e. literature and the literary as natural products of education)
- education as a function of literature (i.e. literary texts as in themselves an educative medium with explicit–or less explicit–educational intentions).
The intention of this series is, therefore, to consider in a generous sense the different ways in which literature and education interact. We are proposing an edited volume considering a range of ways in which Victorian sensation fiction relates to these ideas.
With this in mind, we are interested in generating proposal ideas from authors for inclusion in such a volume. We are looking for proposed chapters falling in two main sections:
Section 1: Education and Learning in Sensation Fiction
Chapters in this section might deal with issues such as – but not limited to:
- the sensation novel and Victorian educational debates/legislation
- representations of educational environments (e.g. schoolrooms, schools, lecture halls, etc.)
- representations of educators (e.g. governesses, tutors, teachers, tutors, scholars, etc.)
- representations of learners
- the idea of the detective figure as both learner and educator
- the role of textual materials in the texts that 'educate'
- ways in which the texts themselves educate their readers (e.g. on points of law)
- ways in which characters seek deliberately to mis-educate or are mis-educated
- framing of the genre’s educative capacity in relation to contemporary social developments (e.g. changing views on womanhood, the rise of the detective police force, urban expansion, etc.)
- the potentially dangerous nature of the genre (e.g. ethical issues, the framing of society and societal views)
- ways in which the texts present new views of issues and thus make them subjects for educational and learned debate (e.g. developing views of womanhood)
- publication practices (e.g. the role of Victorian journals and their broader educational and social functions)
- books, literacy, and illiteracy
- women and education
- ideas of ‘dangerous’ knowledge
- gendered education
- scientific knowledge
Section 2 - Sensation Fiction in Education
Chapters in the section might deal with issues such as – but not limited to:
- sensation fiction and the school curriculum (primary, GCSE, A level)
- adapting sensation fiction for younger readers (e.g. abridged, dramatized or screen versions)
- consideration of contemporary reworkings of sensation fiction for young adult readership, such as Philip Pullman's Sally Lockhart trilogy of novels
- adaptations of sensation fiction for the screen and other media
- sensation fiction and the HE curriculum
- sensation fiction and canonical literature
- sensation fiction and literary theory
- teaching sensation fiction in HE.
We ask that interested authors submit a 300-word abstract of their proposed chapter along with a short Author Biography (50-100 words). This should be sent to Andrew Green (Andrew.green@brunel.ac.uk) and Jessica Cox (jessica.cox@brunel.ac.uk) by Wednesday, July 31, 2024.