Michelle Beth Chong

Thesis Title: Realism, Freedom, Reform: Modes of Bodily Movement in Nineteenth-Century Literature

Supervisor: Professor Helen Small

Research Interests: Victorian Literature, Embodiment, Phenomenology, Gesture Theory, Spatial Theory, Material Culture

Doctoral Research: My research brings together archival material and literary works to examine the ways in which Victorian print culture challenged conventional public opinion on bodies in motion and thus helped change the cultural norms and expectations of late Victorian society. I aim to call attention to perceived changes in physical self-expression arising from machinery and labour, modes of transportation and mobility, dress and freedom of movement, and the effects of an ever-widening worldview on representations of regional 'corporeal styles'. Amidst these developments, writers such as Elizabeth Gaskell, Thomas Hardy, and New Women writers Sarah Grand and Ménie Dowie captured the complexities of the day while pushing for reform on labour laws, women’s rights, and ideas on freedom, propriety, and social mobility. Ultimately, my research contributes to an ongoing interest in diversifying the sensory frameworks used when trying to comprehend the lived experiences of a society. By proposing a framework to examine the portrayal of bodily movement, I hope to encourage closer examinations of the kinaesthetic and proprioceptive senses in literature.