Hodson, Jane, Professor

Professor Jane Hodson

School of English

Head of the School of English

j.hodson@sheffield.ac.uk
+44 114 222 8471

Jessop West

Full contact details

Professor Jane Hodson
School of English
Jessop West
1 Upper Hanover Street
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S3 7RA

Profile

My research interests lie at the interface of language and literature, and I am interested in the way in which style is contested at an ideological level. As a linguist I am particularly concerned with the Later Modern English and Historical Sociolinguistics. As a literary scholar my specialism lies in prose of the Romantic period.

My first degree was in English at Leeds University, where I predominantly studied literature, but also took several courses in English Language. Having unexpectedly developed a taste for grammar, I then went to Cambridge University where I did an MPhil in Linguistics before joining the School of English to study for a PhD. This was completed in 2000 and is entitled The Politics of Style: Burke, Wollstonecraft, Paine and Godwin. In it I explore theories of language and practices of language in the French Revolution Debate in England in the 1790s. I published a monograph based upon this work in 2007.

More recently, I have been working on the ways in which dialects and other nonstandard varieties of English are represented in literature, and I have published Dialect in Literature and Film (2014) and the edited volume Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (2017). I am currently working on new monograph which will deal with the representation of nonstandard language in novels published in the early nineteenth century.

I have a strong interest in communicating academic research to external audiences, and I have worked with Chatsworth, Grimm & Co and the Poetry Business among other organisations. In 2017-18 I was Academic in Residence at Chatsworth.

Research interests

My current area of interest is in the way in which dialects of English are represented in literature. In 2011 I was awarded a grant by the AHRC to undertake a two-year project on `'. Since then I have published widely on the subject of dialect representation, including Dialect in Literature and Film (2014) and the edited volume Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (2017).

I have an ongoing interest in the way in which Yorkshire English has been represented in film and literature over the past 200 years. In 2013 the University held an exhibition on 'Yorkshire Voices', displaying some of the archival material related to this topic in the University Library.

Publications

Books

Hodson J (2014) Dialect in Film and Literature. Palgrave Macmillan.
Hodson J (2007) Language and revolution in Burke, Wollstonecraft, Paine, and Godwin. Ashgate Publishing Limited.

Edited books

Hodson JL (Ed.) (2017) Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century. Abingdon: Routledge.
Auer A, Gonzalez-Diaz V, Hodson JL & Sotirova V (Eds.) (2016) Linguistics and Literary History: In honour of Sylvia Adamson. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Journal articles

HODSON J (2023) . English Language and Linguistics, 27(3), 543-560.
Hodson J (2021) . Folia Linguistica, 55(1), 285-288.
Ryall A, Hodson J & Strine C (2017) Everybody Knows: Engaged Research and the Changing Role of the Academic. Participations: journal of audience and reception studies, 14(1), 329-350.
Hodson J (2016) . Journal of Historical Sociolinguistics, 0(0).
Hodson J (2016) . Women's Writing, 23(2), 267-271.
Auer A, González-Díaz V, Hodson J & Sotirova V (2016) . Linguistic Approaches to Literature, 25, 1-11.
Hodson J & Broadhead A (2013) . Language and Literature, 22(4), 315-332.
BEAL JC, FITZMAURICE S & HODSON J (2012) . English Language and Linguistics, 16(2), 201-207.
Hodson J (2007) . Language and Literature, 16(3), 281-304.
Hodson J (2006) . Historiographia Linguistica, 33(1-2), 57-84.
Beal JC, Hodson J, Steadman-Jones R & Percy C (2006) . Historiographia Linguistica, 33(1-2), 1-9.
Beal JC, Hodson J, Steadman-Jones R & Percy C (2006) . Historiographia Linguistica, 33(1-2), 1-9.
Hodson J (2004) . Journal of English Linguistics, 32(1), 55-58.
Hodson JL (2002) "The strongest by most undecorated language”: Robinson’s rhetorical strategy in Letter to the Women of England. Women's Writing, 9(1), 87-105.
Hodson JL (2001) Language as it is in Caleb Williams. La Questione Romantica, 105-117.
Hodson J (2000) . Romanticism on the Net(18), 0.

Chapters

Hodson J (2024) The Significance of Stance in Fictional Representations of Non-Standard Language and Prescriptivism In Yáñez‐Bouza N, Rodríguez‐Gil ME & Pérez‐Guerra J (Ed.), The Significance of Stance in Fictional Representations of Non-Standard Language and Prescriptivism Multilingual Matters Limited
Hodson J (2020) ‘Did She Say Dinner, Betsey, at This Taam o’Day?’: Representing Yorkshire Voices and Characters in Novels 1800–1836 In Honeybone P & Maguire W (Ed.), Dialect Writing and the North of England (pp. 188-210). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Hodson J (2019) The Problem With Dialect Poetry In Hélie C, Brault-Dreux E & Loriaux E (Ed.), No Dialect Please, You're a Poet: English Dialect in Poetry in the 20th and 21st Centuries New York: Routledge.
Hodson JL (2018) Literary Uses of Dialect In Duff D (Ed.), The Oxford Handbook of British Romanticism (pp. 513-528). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hodson JL (2017) Introduction In Hodson JL (Ed.), Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (pp. 33-50). Abingdon: Routledge.
Hodson JL (2017) ‘I expect that I prefer them horses considerable beyond the oxen’: American English in British fiction 1800-1836 In Hodson JL (Ed.), Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (pp. 33-50). Abingdon: Routledge.
Hodson J (2017) , Dialect and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century (pp. 1-13). Routledge
Hodson JL (2016) Jane Austen and the Prescriptivists In Auer A, Gonzalez-Dias V, Hodson JL & Sotirova V (Ed.), Linguistics and Literary History (pp. 151-170). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Hodson JL, Auer A, Sotirova V & Gonzalez-Diaz V (2016) Introduction In Auer A, Gonzalez-Diaz V, Hodson JL & Sotirova V (Ed.), Linguistics and Literary History (pp. 1-12). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Hodson JL (2016) Gothic and the Language of Terror In Wright A & Townshend D (Ed.), Romantic Gothic An Edinburgh Companion (pp. 289-305). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Hodson JL (2015) Dialect in Literature In Sotirova V (Ed.), The Bloomsbury Companion to Stylistics (pp. 416-429). London: Bloomsbury Publishing.
Hodson JL (2008) Joseph Priestley’s two Rudiments of English Grammar: 1761 and 1768 In Tieken-Boon van Ostade I (Ed.), Grammars, Grammarians and Grammar-Writing in Eighteenth-Century England (pp. 177-190). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
Gavins J & Hodson J (2006) When the students become the teachers: practical pedagogical stylistics with third year undergraduates In Zyngier S & Watson G (Ed.), Literature and Stylistics for Language Learners: Theory and Practice (pp. 27-36). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Research group

I welcome PhD applicants who wish to undertake interdisciplinary work in language and literature, particularly with reference to dialect representation, historical stylistics, and issues of power, politics and gender.

Recent graduates include:

Suzanne Pickles. 2019. .
Eleanor Bird. 2018. .
Yasir Al Jumaili. 2018. .
Ayumi Nonomiya. 2016. .
Hugh Escott. 2014. .

Teaching activities

I enjoy teaching on both the BA in English Language and Literature and the MA in English Language and Linguistics. My level three module ‘Dialect in Film and Literature’ builds on my research interests, and students on that module have worked with me to research topics such as representations of Yorkshire English and dialect in Children's Literature, and to communicate their findings to general audiences.

At graduate level, I contribute to several team-taught modules and co-teach 'Literary Language: History and Culture' with Dr Richard Steadman-Jones. This year in 'Literary Language' we will be exploring Language and Literature in the City.