Writer – Researcher – Lecturer
Currently: Lecturer in English (1830-present), Mansfield College, University of Oxford.
My research and teaching interests are in queer and trans studies, gender and sexuality, modern and contemporary literature and postcolonial studies.
I am working on a book for Edinburgh University Press about queerness, gender, space and time in twentieth-century Ireland, focusing on the fiction of Elizabeth Bowen, Kate O’Brien, Molly Keane and Dorothy Macardle.
I have a particular interest in queer and radical histories, as well as oral history and site-specific methodologies. I have worked on collaborative and community research projects investigating queer history and colonial legacies in Cambridge, gendered experiences in higher education and radical history in London.
I received my PhD in Multi-disciplinary Gender Studies from the University of Cambridge Centre for Gender Studies in 2023 and I have taught English at the University of Cambridge and Maynooth University.
I am always interested in hearing about potential collaborations and I welcome invitations to speak, write, chair or facilitate workshops. Feel free to get in touch at naoise.murphy@mansfield.ox.ac.uk or find me online @naoisemurphy.
Writing
‘Listening to Queer Ghosts.’ In Jeremy Chow and Declan Kavanagh (eds.), The Edinburgh Companion to Queer Reading, Edinburgh University Press, 2024.
‘Book review: Modernism in Irish Women’s Contemporary Writing: The Stubborn Mode.’ Irish University Review 54(2), 2024, 399-402.
‘Book review: Misfit Modernism.’ The Modernist Review 52, 10 June 2024.
‘Camp Comedy and “Submerged Trouble”: Molly Keane’s Queer Collaborations.’ English Studies 104(6), 2023, 1097-1117.
‘The Queer Transnational in Kate O’Brien and Elizabeth Bowen.’ Review of Irish Studies in Europe (RISE) 5(1), Special Issue: Irish Sexual Liberation and its Literature - Part 1. ‘Speaking out/ when it’s dangerous’, 2022, 8-27.
‘Kate O’Brien: Queer Hauntings in the Feminist Archive.’ Journal of Feminist Scholarship 19 (Fall), 2021, 80-91.
‘Queering history with Sarah Waters: Tipping the Velvet, lesbian erotic reading and the queer historical novel.’ Journal of International Women’s Studies 22(2), 2021, 7-18.
‘The Right to Dream: Gender, Modernity, and the Problem of Class in Kate O’Brien’s Bourgeois Bildungsromane.’ Irish University Review 49(2), 2019, 276–289.
Workshops
‘Haunted Houses’, developed for Maynooth English in the Community at Maynooth Community Library.
Stories of haunted houses are stories about power. Ghosts challenge how we think about property and land ownership; they won’t move out, even when new human residents move in. Their claims on space don’t operate according to human laws and regulations, but prioritise other forms of attachment and belonging. The current crisis in housing is defined by inequalities in power. Can haunted houses help us to think about this crisis in new ways?
In this workshop, we consider different ways of thinking about haunting, and try our hand at writing some new ghost stories responding to this moment of crisis.
‘Trans Lit 1312: Exploring Contemporary Trans Fiction’, developed with Julian Bernard and the Small Trans Library Dublin.
A workshop mapping the landscape of contemporary trans fiction in English. We consider genre, style and the demands of the publishing industry, exploring how these factors are shaping the emergence of a distinctive trans literary canon.
‘Lesbian/Dyke Solidarity in Action’, developed with Aine Bennett, Catherine Kelly and Saskia Papadakis for Lesbian Lives 2024.
From New York to Nicaragua, from #Repealthe8th to #EndSARS, lesbians and dykes have long been at the forefront of global political struggle, organising on our own behalf and in solidarity with other movements. This workshop creates space for reflection on the past, present and future of lesbian/dyke solidarity organising.
Some of the questions it poses include:
Why have lesbians/dykes been central to global liberation movements? What tactics and priorities can we learn from the history of lesbian/dyke activism? What work do lesbians/dykes/queer women/nonbinary people do in organising? How do we build solidarity across difference within dyke/lesbian spaces stratified by race/class/ability/gender identity etc? What is the future of lesbian/dyke solidarity organising?
Projects
I have experience in public history, queer history, oral history and creative and site-specific methodologies. Here are some of the projects I’ve been involved in:
2022-2023: Research and Development Associate, Uncomfortable Cambridge.
Researched and designed discussion-led walking tours, exploring colonial legacies, queer history, and the politics of space and memory in the city.
2023: Research assistant, Spurling Report on Women in Higher Education - 30 Years On.
Created an oral history archive for a research project on gendered experiences in higher education, based at King’s College Cambridge.
2020-2023: Co-convenor, CamQueerHistory.
Organised public events about queer and LGBTQ+ histories.
2021-2022: Researcher, Newnham Queer Archive.
Collaborated with a team to found the Archive and conducted oral history interviews with LGBTQ+ members of Newnham College.
2020-2021: Volunteer researcher and oral historian, ‘5 Cally Road: 60 years of books and activism’, with On The Record.
Conducted interviews and research into the history of LGBTQ+ activism at Peace House, 5 Caledonian Road, London. Developed an audio composition, ‘Shelter’, for a sound installation at Housmans Bookshop.