Dr Angelica Michelis
Senior Lecturer
My profile
Biography
My teaching areas range from Gender Studies to Gothic Fiction. I like working across genres, centuries and themes and in an interdisciplinary manner. My interests cover literary and filmic works and include early modern poetry, nineteenth century novels, psychoanalytic theory as well as contemporary crime fiction and fictional and theoretical works on food and eating.
In my teaching, I try to infect students with my own curiosity and passion for the subject and the texts we read. Even if I have been teaching a specific novel, poem, play for years, every time I open it up again, I will find something new and surprising. I love it when students discover new ways of reading and when they teach me new ways of reading and understanding texts.
Words of wisdom
Don’t listen to people who tell you that studying literature will not help you to get a ‘proper job.’
Academic and professional qualifications
MA and PhD in English and American Literature, History of Art and Modern History.
Languages
Bilingual in German and English
Expert reviewer for external funding bodies
I have reviewed books and articles and acted as peer reviewer for a range of academic journals.
Teaching
Why do I teach?
I have always had a passion for teaching and the idea of lifelong learning. My time at university, studying, working with other students and being involved in various projects was life changing for me and informed my decision to stay in Higher Education as a tutor and researcher. Books, stories, narratives etc fascinate me and I love exploring them from a critical point of view. At a time when everything is viewed in a utilitarian sense and in relation to input/output it is of great importance that we show that there are alternative ways of experiencing and looking at life.
Postgraduate teaching
Gender Studies; Nineteenth century literature, late nineteenth century British literature, in particular sensation and gothic fiction; contemporary poetry, in particular British and Irish women’s poetry; Contemporary Critical Theory, food in literature and culture.
Subject areas
English Literature in particular 19th century, contemporaray poetry; culture of food
Supervision
I am currently supervising PhD projects in poetry and creative writing and on the femme fatale in Victorian literature
Research outputs
Nineteenth century literature and culture; the Gothic; contemporary poetry; psychoanalytic criticism; Critical Theory, food/eating in relation to culture and literature; gender and women studies.
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Books (authored/edited/special issues)
Michelis, A., Rowland, A. (2003) The poetry of Carol Ann Duffy: choosing tough words.
Michelis, A. (1996) Frauen, Dichtung und andere Raetsel. Eine Untersuchung feministischer Aspekte in zeitgenoesischer Lyrik englischsprachiger Dicherinnen. Saarbruecken: Roehrig.
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Chapters in books
Michelis, A. (2022) 'Visual and Literary Representations.' A Cultural History of Shopping in the Modern Age. Bloomsbury, pp. 129-152.
Michelis, A. (2018) 'The Chef, in the Kitchen, with the Knife: Anthony Bourdain's Culinary Crime Fiction.' Blood on the Table Essays on Food in International Crime Fiction. McFarland,
Michelis, A. (2018) 'Man-Eaters: Confessional Food Writing as Narratives of Masculinity.' The Routledge Companion to Literature and Food. Routledge,
Michelis, A. (2017) 'Feeding the Vampire: the ravenous hunger of the fin de siècle.' In Addyman, M., Wood, L., Yiannitsaros, C. (ed.) Food, drink and the written word in Britain, 1820-1954. Routledge, pp. 84-103.
Michelis, A. (2005) 'Eat my words: poetry as transgression.'
Michelis, A. (2003) ''Me not know what these people mean': gender and national identity in Carol Ann Duffy's poetry.' The Poetry of Carol Ann Duffy: 'Choosing Tough Words'. Manchester: Manchester University Press, pp. 77-99.
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Journal articles
Michelis, A. (2021) ''Running seemed like a good option': gender, genre and the reluctant detective in Kate Atkinson's crime fiction.' Fictions: Studi sulla narratività, XX
Michelis, A. (2016) 'Hungry Eyes: reflections on hosting and decoration.' Feast: Setting the Table, (2)
Michelis, A. (2015) ''Am I a Vampire then, who Must have a Spike Driven into my Heart?' Monstrosity and the Gothic in Illness Narratives and Medical Advice Literature on Eating Disorders.' GOTHIC STUDIES, 17(1)
Michelis, A. (2014) 'Foreign Recipes: Mothers, Daughters and Food in Like Water for Chocolate, The Joy Luck Club and A Chorus of Mushrooms.' Crossroads: A Journal of English Studies, 1/2014
Michelis, A. (2014) '“To Learn to Live without Alternatives”: forgetting as remembering in Christa Wolf’s The City of Angels; or, The Overcoat of Dr. Freud.' Journal of Literature and Trauma Studies, 3(1) pp. 63-80.
Michelis, A. (2013) '"Where Bees Pray on Their Knees": Spiritual and Religious Symbolism in Carol Ann Duffy's The Bees.' Symbolism An International Annual of Critical Aesthetics, 12/13pp. 336-352.
Michelis, A. (2010) 'Food and crime: Whats eating the crime novel?.' European Journal of English Studies, 14(2) pp. 143-157.
Michelis, A. (2010) 'Rhyming hunger: poetry, love and cannibalism.' Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses, 60pp. 61-78.
Michelis, A. (2003) 'The woman in the red dress: Gender, space, and reading.' MODERNISM-MODERNITY, 10(1) pp. 210-212.
Michelis, A. (2003) ''Dirty Mamma': horror, vampires, and the maternal in late nineteenth-century gothic fiction.' Critical Survey, 15(3) pp. 5-22.
Michelis, A. (2002) 'A Country of One's Own? Gender and National Identity in Contemporaray Women's Poetry.' European Journal of English Studies, 6(1) pp. 61-71.
Michelis, A. (1997) 'Stop making sense: Heiner muller germ any and intellectuals.' Angelaki - Journal of the Theoretical Humanities, 2(3) pp. 77-87.
Michelis, A. (1996) 'Art histories and visual cultural studies.' Year's Work in Critical and Cultural Theory, 6(1) pp. 175-189.
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Conference papers
Michelis, A. (1998) 'The pleasure of saying it: Images of sexuality and desire in contemporary women's poetry.' In Conference on Seeing and Saying. SAARBRUCKEN, GERMANY, 12/1995 - Gohrbandt, D., vonLutz, B. (ed.) PETER LANG PUBLISHING INC, pp. 59-72.