Centre for Eighteenth Century Studies
MA Student... Rachel Feldberg
"Coming back to University as a mature student to study for an MA after years out of academia was a real adventure but the CECS staff were very supportive. In fact from my first informal interview in a room tucked away up a winding staircase at Kings Manor in the building where Anne Lister went to school, I knew CECS was the right place for me. It’s a small department so the regular weekly seminars, some organised by the department and others by the Postgraduate Forum, meant I was able to get to know my fellow MAs and the PhD students, who were always willing to offer advice and reassurance. But because CECS comes under the English Department I also had access to all the essay writing and thesis development tools they offer.
I chose CECS because of its interdisciplinarity and the involvement of staff from such a wide variety of departments- and over the year I made use of them all. Popping up in office hours to ask art historians about portraiture and musicologists about how to look at an eighteenth century score. The module choices were varied and stimulating and I loved the discipline hopping possibilities. I deliberately picked courses from English, History and History of Art, studying Gothic Novels, Visual Culture and British Imperialism in India and Representations of Women and I wrote about the things I found particularly interesting: women’s letters petitioning the Bank of England from Newgate prison, the press in eighteenth century Jamaica and the role of an original score in an eighteenth century gothic production. Faced with this smorgasbord of interests the staff were always encouraging. Alongside all of that I audited a fascinating course in Historical Archaeology which covered approaches to studying hidden voices in key areas like colonialism and enclosure and filled in so many gaps.
There’s no doubt that taking on a full time MA was demanding: lots of interesting reading to do, work in small groups to get stuck into, seminar presentations to prepare and essays to write, but it was a brilliant year. Strict personal timetabling really helped (definitely no wondering ‘what shall I do this morning!’) and there was always someone to turn to for advice. Everything I learnt on my MA laid the foundations for my PhD but for lots of other people it led to an equally interesting job in heritage, law, publishing, working for a local authority, event management and even setting up an eighteenth century costume business."