British Association for Romantic Studies

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The British Association for Romantic Studies supports the study of #c18th and #c19th literature and culture. https://www.bars.ac.uk/main/

Image Credit: H. E. Pountney, Tudor Gateway to Aston Hall (1895), Birmingham Museum With overlaid at the top of the page the University of Birmingham and BARS logos, then 'Romantic Retrospection' and the dates '29-31 July 2026'.
Video of Chloe, wearing a green top and shorts, sitting in a front of bookshelves and talking. A dog is sharing the chair.
Poster on a pastel rainbow gradient background, which reads: Call for Contributors: QUEER ROMANTICISM TIKTOK SERIES It's Pride Month, and we're making a series on the Tik Tok about queer Romanticism! And you can help! We'd love to post short videos about: - Modern queer books, films, etc that use Romanticism in interesting ways - Queer readings of Romantic texts - Whatever else 'queer Romanticism' means to you! We can edit videos for you, so no experience is needed! Email britishassociationromantic@gmail.com with any ideas and/or questions.
Poster for 'BARS Digital: TikTok, Short-form Content Creation, and Romantic Research', which reads: 'BARS’s TikTok account provides a platform for sharing tidbits of Romanticism with a wider audience. All of our members are welcome to contribute to the TikTok page to share their expertise, but we understand that short-form video is a confusing format for many people to work in. In this lunchtime workshop run by the BARS communications team (Amy Wilcockson and Chloe Wilcox), we will provide practical information of how to make TikToks for us, showing you: - How TikTok works; - How to choose a topic to speak about and tailor it to the time limit; - How to film and edit videos. The workshop will include a breakout session in which you’ll have the opportunity to draft a script for your own video. We hope that attending will make the prospect of making a TikTok for us less intimidating, and allow us to feature a wider range of expertise on our account (from people like you!). It’ll also help you with other academic and Romantic social media work by getting you familiar with the mysterious but ever-growing world of short-form vertical video.'
A screenshot of two Youtube thumbnails. The first video is titled, 'Romantic Drama, Contemporary Performance: A Roundtable Discussion' and the second, 'Sarah Burdett’s ‘Drama Queens of the Georgian Period: A Tragic-Comic Entertainment’.
A green poster which reads: MAY 2026 BLOG POST PROMPTS Want to write for the BARS Blog? Here are some ideas for May! • The Comms Fellow is now deep in finals season and her first exam is on medieval literature: write about Romantic Medievalisms • Write about Romanticism and university. (The Romantics at uni, teaching/being taught Romanticism at uni, etc). • Hopefully the Comms Fellow will not fail any exams, but just in case: write about Romanticism and failure! (Failed/unfinished works, failures in the literary marketplace, representations of failure,
Poster for BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR ROMANTIC STUDIES DIGITAL EVENTS SERIES FOR SPRING 2026. SCIENCE AND MEDICINE IN WOMEN'S WRITING DURING THE ROMANTIC PERIOD ROUNDTABLE. MONDAY MAY 18 @ 5PM (UK TIME) / 9 AM (PACIFIC TIME)/ 11 AM (CENTRAL TIME) / 12 PM (EASTERN TIME) This roundtable brings a variety of topics in science and medicine together and seeks to offer a more comprehensive understanding of the intersection of literature, science, and medicine during the Romantic period. How, the presenters in this roundtable ask, did female Romantic writers incorporate scientific/medical knowledge into their works despite being barred from actively participating in scientific/medical discussions? The four speakers will present on topics such as environmental humanities and Ann Radcliffe's travel writing, botany and Sydney Owenson's The Wild Irish Girl (1800) as a Bildungsroman, sleep studies and Mary Wollstonecraft's and Mary Shelley's notions of dreaming, and Wollstonecraft's Letters Written during a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark (1796) as feminist disability life writing. Presenters: • Emily Barber, PhD Student in English Literature, University of Notre Dame • Katherine Gaffney, Lecturer, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign • Liz Wan, DPhil Student in English Literature, University of Oxford • Risako Nomura, MA Student in English Literature, Oregon State University Moderator: Risako Nomura
Poster for Placing the Nineteenth Century, An EHU19 PGR & ECR Conference. Theme: The North (West). Keynote Speaker: Dr Claire O'Callaghan (Loughborough University). Date: Friday 26th June 2026. CfP deadline: Friday 1st May 2026. Email ehuplace@outlook.com for abstracts and queries. Next to the text, the poster shows several images of the northwest throughout history.
Poster for "'Ann Radcliffe, Then and Now' presents Women in White and the New Gothic Cinema. A free lecture by Professor Catherine Spooner + a screening of Guillermo Del Toro's Crimson Peak. The Showroom Cinema, 18th June, 6pm." Next to the text, the poster features a photo of a blonde woman in a white linen dress, holding a butterfly and candlesticks.
Join us for this Research and Innovation event designed to support colleagues who intend to apply for grants, including EU funding, and those who are keen to develop research collaborations. The event will link the expertise of academic colleagues with suitable funding opportunities and will support the development of meaningful partnerships to generate research income and collaborations. We welcome all members of our diverse research community at all career stages to attend.  The event will include presentations from a range of successful grant winners (from the BARS Exec and further afield) with time for Q&A Speakers: Carmen Casaliggi, Andrew McInnes, Matthew Sangster, Gerry McKeever, Sophie Coulombeau, Rhona Brown
Screenshot of the BARS Digital Events Youtube channel. The most recent 2 videos are titled Walking Forward with Annette von Droste Hülshoff and Dorothy Wordsworth and Romantic Creativity Roundtable.
Poster for BARS blog ideas. You can write about: Wuthering Heights and Romanticism; Why are there so many Austen adaptations this year; 200 years of Blake's Job; 5 world book day ideas.
Poster for the 'Reviving the Liberal' digital event explaining that speakers Serena Baiesi, Will Bowers, Greg Kucich, Diego Saglia, Maria Schoina, and Alessia Testori will discuss their research on and editing of the Romantic-era periodical The Liberal.
Screenshot of a website. The text reads: Routledge - Taylor & Francis Group Submit a Manuscript to the Journal Brontë Studies For a Special Issue on To Be Forever Known: The Brontës and Poetry Abstract deadline 01 April 2026 Manuscript deadline 15 December 2026
Call for Papers The Annual John Keats Conference June 2026 The Keats Circle Keats House, Hampstead, London Friday 5 June - Sunday 7 June 2026 The Keats Foundation is delighted to announce that the annual John Keats Conference will run from Friday 5 June to Sunday 7 June 2026 at Keats House in Hampstead, London. Our conference theme will be ‘The Keats Circle’. Our keynote lectures will be delivered by: Sarah Wootton (Durham University) Lauren Cooper (Syracuse University) Kate Singer (Mount Holyoke College) Proposals for 20-minute papers for presentation at the 2026 John Keats Conference are now invited. Our conference theme, The Keats Circle, has been broadly conceived to ensure that papers reflecting the full range of current Keats studies can be accommodated. Please email a paper proposal of 200-250 words, with a title and outline of your proposed presentation, to keatsconfsecretary@gmail.com to arrive by Saturday 21 February 12 noon UK time. For obvious reasons, all papers should have a significant Keats dimension. Registration will open on Monday 2 March.
Poster for the ECEN Inaugural Seminar: Dr. Jeremy Davies (Leeds), 'Continuity and Change in Eighteenth-Century Environmental Culture' Thursday 26" February, 2026 Heslington Hall, University of York (H/G21) and Online 17:00-19:00 GMT Please jown us for the inaugural seminar of the ECEN, in which Dr. Jeremy Davies of the University of leeds will address us on 'Continuity and Change in Eighteenth-Century Environmental Culture? From 17:00 to 19:00 GMT, both here at Heslington Hall and over a Zoom link which will be provided nearer the time, Dr. Dayies will speak on the Georgic mode, the rise of the machine, and Romantic green onsciousness. We are incredibly excited to welcome a scholar as important to the field, and to our own work, as Dr. Davies, and hope that as many of you as possible will be able to jormus, and enjoy what promises to be a brilliant paper and a lively discussion! Visit us at: https://hzj520.wixsite.com/eighteenth-century-e
Call for submissions poster. In The History of Sexuality (1976), Foucault outlines the ‘discursive explosion’ that occurred around sex during the long nineteenth century. Sexuality, as we define it today, became attached to personal identity for the first time. In literature, art, and politics, sex often reflected the period’s social anxieties and around gender and power, yet also newfound uses of erotic aesthetics. Modern queer theorists first situated their work within nineteenth- century studies (Eve Kofosky Sedgewick, Between Men, 1985), and recent work in the field historicises marginalised groups (Jen Manion, Female Husbands: A Trans History, 2020). Sex encourages us to consider the broader cultural and societal dynamics of the long nineteenth century, and the lasting influence of these structures today . This issue of Romance, Revolution and Reform is looking for papers of 5,000-8,000 words on ‘Sex in the Long Nineteenth Century’ (1789-1914) in all its forms and in a global context. We encourage broad interpretations of sex and invite submissions that explore its fluid and multifaceted nature. The journal encourages multi- and interdisciplinary papers from across the Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities and invites contributions from those at any career stage, including PGRs and ECRs. Possible topics may include, but are not limited to: • Sexuality and queer studies • Gender, feminism, and masculinities • Trans studies • Pregnancy, childbirth, and childcare • Sex scandals in court and politics • Gothic literature • Decadence; hedonism • Sexual health, contraception, and the medical humanities • Sex work • Print culture; pornography and Victorian erotica • Postcolonial and ecocritical perspectives on gender and sex The closing date for submissions is midnight on Friday 16th April. Papers should be submitted to rrr@soton.ac.uk. Early expressions of interest are welcomed. Submission guidelines can be found here: https://www.rrrjournal.com/policies
David stands in front of some bookshelves holding a copy of The Last Man.
Poster for a PGR/ECR networking event. 30 January 2026, 12pm-2pm (CET), 11am-1pm (UK). This event affords the opportunity for ECRs and PGRs working on research projects relating to literary studies in any language to build their research community. The event will include two short academic talks, opportunities to network, good conversation, and signposting to exciting opportunities in the future! Schedule: 5 Minutes Opening Remarks 20 Minutes: Presentation from James Dowthwaite 25 Minutes: Zoom room meet and greets in breakaway groups (with a primary text to inspire discussion and break the ice) 20 Minutes: Second Presentation TBC 10 Minutes: Contact exchange, open room for discussion, plus the circulation of a list of opportunities in the future that might be open to PhDs and MA graduates 5 Minutes: Closing remarks, and information on a follow up meeting If you would like to join the event, please email Roslyn Irving at rirving@uni-mainz.de
Poster for the Eighteenth Century Ecologies Network Seminar Series 2026, Heslington Hall, University of York, and Online: "Based at the University of York's Centre for Eighteenth Century Studies, the Eighteenth-Century Ecologies Network is a hub for researchers interested in the many diverse ecologies of the long eighteenth-century and Romantic periods. Through a regular seminar series beginning in early 2026, we aim to present the latest research in our field, allowing scholars from across the eighteenth-century humanities to engage with diverse and cutting-edge research from established and emergent scholars in the field. We thus hope to produce a network of mutually informed and engaged scholarship, with an eye always to the climate crisis. Visit us at: https://hzjs20.wixsite.com/eighteenth-century-e"
Screenshot of the BARS Digital Events Youtube channel. The most recent two videos are 'Shelley’s Anni Mirabiles: The Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley' and 'Volcanic Romanticism'.
CfP poster: "The antiquarian networks of the eighteenth century and Romantic era contributed to a fascinating constellation of multicultural, multilingual, exchange across the globe. The study of antiquarianism was a vastly popular pastime and scholarly pursuit in Europe, especially as a way of mapping ancient world cultures, religions, and politics onto contemporary society. The circulation of knowledge within local, national, and global networks paradoxically consolidated independent national exceptionalisms, as well as contributing to a budding multicultural globalism. Texts such as James Macpherson’s “Fragments of Ancient Poetry” (1763) prompted a revival of vernacular traditions across the British Isles like ballad imitations and Norse translations, while the establishment of the Society of Antiquaries in Britain encouraged the circulation and study of material culture. With the various inventive reimaginations of world mythologies, and as an oppressive vehicle for European imperial agendas, the study of vernacular antiquities during the long eighteenth century formed the critical foundations of contemporary worldviews via the lens of the past. Pre-dating Herder’s thesis about “Volksgeist, ” these antiquarian practices already constituted a rewriting of histories, memories, and cultures, and brought to the fore questions of heritage, identity, empire, trade, as well as the value ascribed to language. Through this global trade of antiquity in all its forms—material, textual, visual—both national and local European perspectives were brought into dialogue with alternate histories and the legacy of bygone eras. Networks of Antiquity is a two-day interdisciplinary conference held in person and in English at the University of Copenhagen. It aims to bring together scholars of Eighteenth Century Studies, Romanticism, and Reception Studies to examine how antiquarian networks across Europe and beyond created porous cultural borders during the long eighteenth century."
Drawing of an archive box against an orange background, with the text "BARS Stephen Copley Research Awards Deadline November 15".