Emily Alder
Emily Alder

Dr Emily Alder FHEA

Lecturer

Biography

Dr Emily Alder researches literature and science, environmental humanities, Gothic, and Weird fiction, particularly in the literature and culture of the long nineteenth century, and is noted for her contributions to the field of Nautical Gothic through publications such as ‘Through Oceans Darkly: Sea Literature and the Nautical Gothic’ (2017). She is the author of Weird Fiction and Science at the Fin de Siècle, a monograph published in 2020 with Palgrave Macmillan, and numerous articles and chapters about animals, the sea, and environmentalism in Weird, Gothic, and science fiction.

Emily is co-convenor of the Haunted Shores Research Network and project leader for Scottish Shores: Gothic Coastal Environments. She is Membership Secretary of the British Society for Literature & Science, and General Editor of Gothic Studies, the journal of the International Gothic Association.

At Edinburgh Napier University, Emily is a member of the Centre for Arts, Media, & Culture and the Centre for Conservation & Restoration Science.

With an undergraduate degree in English Literature from Newcastle University and a PhD from Edinburgh Napier, Emily is Lecturer in English Literature and Programme Leader for BA (Hons) English in the School of Arts & Creative Industries. Emily teaches undergraduate modules on nineteenth-century literature, environmental literature and film, and the Gothic.

Events

Esteem

Conference Organising Activity

  • Haunted Shores Symposium organisation
  • Nature and the Long Nineteenth Century postgraduate conference organisation
  • Cities and Crime in the Long Nineteenth Century
  • Robert Louis Stevenson in the 21st century

 

Editorial Activity

  • Editor in chief, Gothic Studies, the journal of the International Gothic Association
  • Assistant Editor for Gothic Studies, the journal of the International Gothic Association

 

Invited Speaker

  • Frankenstein’s daughters: girl scientists in children’s literature

 

Media Activity

  • Interview for BBC Natural Histories

 

Public/Community Engagement

  • Panel member on Let’s Talk Frankly, Edinburgh International Science Festival. Summerhall, Edinburgh, 9 April 2018.
  • Article for The Conversation

 

Research Degree External Examining

  • External Examiner, PhD, University of Lancaster

 

Reviewing

  • Peer reviewing for Broadview Press, Liverpool University Press, and Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction.

 

Date


38 results

Jurassic Plants: The Botanical Worlds of Spielberg’s Jurassic Park (1993)

Journal Article
Alder, E. (in press)
Jurassic Plants: The Botanical Worlds of Spielberg’s Jurassic Park (1993). Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, https://doi.org/10.1093/isle/isad075

“Waked, and unquiet”: William Hope Hodgson’s The Night Land

Book Chapter
Alder, E. (in press)
“Waked, and unquiet”: William Hope Hodgson’s The Night Land. In C. Sederholm, & K. Woofter (Eds.), The Weird: A Companion. Oxford: Peter Lang
William Hope Hodgson (1877-1917) is a central but sometimes overlooked figure in the development of weird fiction in the early twentieth century. Hodgson’s work flourished at ...

Arctic Ghosts: Whale Hunting and Haunting in Arthur Conan Doyle’s 'The Captain of the Pole-Star'

Journal Article
Alder, E. (in press)
Arctic Ghosts: Whale Hunting and Haunting in Arthur Conan Doyle’s 'The Captain of the Pole-Star'. Victorian Studies,

“A Thing Of Dreams And Desires, A Siren, A Whisper, And A Seduction”: Mermaids and the seashore in H. G. Wells’s The Sea Lady: A Tissue of Moonshine

Journal Article
Alder, E. (2021)
“A Thing Of Dreams And Desires, A Siren, A Whisper, And A Seduction”: Mermaids and the seashore in H. G. Wells’s The Sea Lady: A Tissue of Moonshine. Shima, 15(2), 85-100. https://doi.org/10.21463/shima.142
The Sea Lady (1901) is one of the more neglected early novels of H. G. Wells, particularly compared to his more famous scientific romances. Both a social satire and a mediatio...

The Entangled Terrestrials: Mapping E.T.’s Ecological Web

Presentation / Conference
Alder, E. (2021, April)
The Entangled Terrestrials: Mapping E.T.’s Ecological Web. Paper presented at British Society for Literature and Science Annual Conference, Online
Steven Spielberg’s E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982) has accrued an eclectic but small body of scholarly criticism. With this paper I contribute an ecocritical analysis of the...

Shades of Sail: Edwardian Nautical Hauntings

Book Chapter
Alder, E. (2021)
Shades of Sail: Edwardian Nautical Hauntings. In C. Bloom (Ed.), The Palgrave Handbook of Steam Age Gothic (839-856). Cham: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-40866-4_45
Ghost ships are an enduring trope in history, literature, and folklore of the sea, and continually change in meaning according to their cultural contexts. The early twentieth ...

‘The thought of it haunts you all your life’: Arthur Conan Doyle’s Arctic Ghosts

Presentation / Conference
Alder, E. (2020, October)
‘The thought of it haunts you all your life’: Arthur Conan Doyle’s Arctic Ghosts. Paper presented at Gothic Nature III, Online

Ecocriticism and the Genre

Book Chapter
Alder, E., & Bavidge, J. (2020)
Ecocriticism and the Genre. In C. Bloom (Ed.), The Palgrave Handbook of Contemporary Gothic (225-242). Cham: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33136-8_14
‘Ecocriticism and the Genre’ explores a recent and topical development in Gothic scholarship, the ecogothic. Gothic literature often exhibits a fascination with sublime, terri...

Weird Fiction and Science at the Fin de Siecle

Book
Alder, E. (2020)
Weird Fiction and Science at the Fin de Siecle. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32652-4
This book explores how nineteenth-century science stimulated the emergence of weird tales at the fin de siècle, and examines weird fiction by British writers who preceded and ...

Our Progeny’s Monsters: Frankenstein Retold for Children in Picturebooks and Graphic Novels

Book Chapter
Alder, E. (2018)
Our Progeny’s Monsters: Frankenstein Retold for Children in Picturebooks and Graphic Novels. In Global Frankenstein, 209-225. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-78142-6
Frankenstein is surprisingly well-suited to stories aimed at children and is often adapted for young readerships. This essay explores why, through a focus on graphic narrative...

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