Dr. Bridget C Donnelly
Assistant Professor
Departments / Programs
Degree Information
- PHD, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2020)
- BA, Lawrence University (2012)
Areas of Expertise
British literature of the long eighteenth century, Restoration to Romanticism (1660-1830); theory and history of the novel; Gothic and horror literature; narratology and narrative theory; women writers; gender and sexuality studies; critical theory and cultural studies; history of transportation; law and literature; philosophy and literature
Biography
Dr. Bridget Donnelly joined the English department at MTSU in 2020. Her primary research and teaching focus is British literature of the "long" eighteenth century (roughly 1660-1830). She has published work on Daniel Defoe and Jane Austen in journals including Philosophy and Literature and Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture. Her current book project focuses on representations of carriage accidents in eighteenth-century fiction. She also enjoys teaching and researching Gothic and horror literature from the 18th century through the present.
Publications
“Accidents, Risk Management, and Driving Culture, 1780-1830.” Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture. Vol. 49 (September 2020): 173-195.
“‘Chequer-Works of Providence’: Skeptical Providentialism in Daniel Defoe’s Fiction.” Philosophy and Literature. Vol. 43, No. 1 (April 2019): 107-120.
Review of Equestrian Cultures: Horses, Human Society, and the Discourse of Modernity. ...
Read More »“Accidents, Risk Management, and Driving Culture, 1780-1830.” Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture. Vol. 49 (September 2020): 173-195.
“‘Chequer-Works of Providence’: Skeptical Providentialism in Daniel Defoe’s Fiction.” Philosophy and Literature. Vol. 43, No. 1 (April 2019): 107-120.
Review of Equestrian Cultures: Horses, Human Society, and the Discourse of Modernity. Ed. Kristen Guest and Monica Mattfield, University of Chicago Press, 2019. Eighteenth-Century Fiction. Vol. 34 (Fall 2022): 613-615.
Forthcoming Publications:
“‘Big Reputation’: Reading Taylor Swift and/with Eighteenth-Century Women Writers." In edited collection Taylor Swift and/as Literature. Ed. Anastasia Klimchynskaya and Betsy Winakur Tontiplaphol, Bloomsbury Publishing, forthcoming.
Invited Contribution to “Thirty Years, Thirty Ideas” series, Women Writers Project (digital publication) on Women’s Materiality, Display, and Fashionable Carriage, with Katharine Landers, forthcoming.
Five entries in The Cambridge Guide to the Eighteenth-Century Novel, 1660-1820. Ed. April London, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.
Presentations
“Accidents and Pseudo-Abductions: The Carriage as Space of Seduction in Eighteenth-Century Fiction,” American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2023
Workshop Leader, with Katharine Landers (Utica University), “Fashionable Carriage: Women, Materiality, and Display in the 17th and 18th Centuries,” Attending to Women, 1100-1800, Newberry Library, 2022
“Interrupt...
Read More »“Accidents and Pseudo-Abductions: The Carriage as Space of Seduction in Eighteenth-Century Fiction,” American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2023
Workshop Leader, with Katharine Landers (Utica University), “Fashionable Carriage: Women, Materiality, and Display in the 17th and 18th Centuries,” Attending to Women, 1100-1800, Newberry Library, 2022
“Interrupted Voyages: Carriage Accidents in Eighteenth-Century Gothic Fiction,” International Gothic Association Conference, 2022
Seminar Workshop Participant: Women and the Law, American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2022
“Jane Barker’s ‘Hardcore’ Patchwork Aesthetic in the Galesia Trilogy,” American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2022
“Spectral Traffic: Ghost-Driven Coach Accidents in the Eighteenth-Century Gothic,” Northeast American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2021
“Lady Driver, Coming Through! Gender and Driving Culture in the Long Eighteenth Century,” American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2021
“All the World’s a Stage-Coach: Staging the Coaching Accident in the Eighteenth-Century Novel,” American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2019
Roundtable Participant, “Ladies’ Men” (Paper Title: “The Mail-Coach and the Male-Coach”), American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2019
“Accidental Events and the Problem of Contingency in 18th-Century Novelistic Narrative,” International Conference on Narrative, 2018
“Never Upset in a Gig: Accidents and Driving Culture in the Golden Age of Coaching,” American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Conference, 2018
“Cruel Intentions: The Accidental Rhetoric of Violence in 18th-Century Fiction,” British Women Writers Conference, 2017
Awards
Fred and Joan Thomson Award for Outstanding Work on a Dissertation in 18th- or 19th-Century British Literature, Department of English and Comparative Literature, UNC-Chapel Hill, 2020
Huntington Library, W.M. Keck Foundation Fellowship for short-term research (one month in residence), 2019
Aubrey Williams Research Travel Grant, American Society for 18th-Century Studies, 2018
Jerry Leath Mills/Studies in Philology Travel Award for archival research in England, ...
Read More »Fred and Joan Thomson Award for Outstanding Work on a Dissertation in 18th- or 19th-Century British Literature, Department of English and Comparative Literature, UNC-Chapel Hill, 2020
Huntington Library, W.M. Keck Foundation Fellowship for short-term research (one month in residence), 2019
Aubrey Williams Research Travel Grant, American Society for 18th-Century Studies, 2018
Jerry Leath Mills/Studies in Philology Travel Award for archival research in England, 2018
Best Graduate Student Paper Award, International Society for the Study of Narrative, awarded at annual conference in Amsterdam, 2016
Courses
ENGL 1010: Expository Writing (have taught Honors and MT Engage sections)
ENGL 2020: Themes in Literature and Culture: Gothic and Horror
ENGL 3000: Introduction to Literary Studies
ENGL 3020: British Literature: 1700-1918
ENGL 4230: Selected British Writers (one section on Eliza Haywood, Samuel Richardson, and Jane Austen; another on Gothic and Horror Writers)
English 6001/7001: Introduction to Graduate Studies: Bibliography and Research
ENGL 61...
Read More »ENGL 1010: Expository Writing (have taught Honors and MT Engage sections)
ENGL 2020: Themes in Literature and Culture: Gothic and Horror
ENGL 3000: Introduction to Literary Studies
ENGL 3020: British Literature: 1700-1918
ENGL 4230: Selected British Writers (one section on Eliza Haywood, Samuel Richardson, and Jane Austen; another on Gothic and Horror Writers)
English 6001/7001: Introduction to Graduate Studies: Bibliography and Research
ENGL 6131/7131: Studies in Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Literature: Women Writers and the Rise of the Novel