Kirstie Blair

Kirstie Blair, FRSE is Dean of Arts and Humanities at Stirling University and became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 2021. She specialises in Victorian literature and the working class writing, poetry and literature, and working with museums and industrial heritage sites to engage the community around them.[1] Her book Working Verse in Victorian Scotland: Poetry, Press, Community' won the Saltire Society Book of the Year and Research Book of the Year awards in 2019.[2]

Kirstie Blair

FRSE
EmployerUniversity of Stirling
Known forresearch into Victorian literature and the working class writing, poetry and literature, and industrial heritage
Notable workWorking Verse in Victorian Scotland: Poetry, Press, Community (2019) winner of two Saltire Society Literary Awards
AwardsFellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 2021

Education and career

Blair graduated M.A. from the University of Cambridge in 1997, won a two-year Kennedy Fellowship to Harvard University the following year, completed her M.Phil at St Anne's College Oxford in 2000. She completed her doctorate (D.Phil) there two years later and in 2004, a Diploma in teaching and learning in Higher Education.[3] She tutored at St. Peter's College, Oxford,[4] then her academic career moved to the University of Glasgow (2006–13 )as a lecturer, then senior lecturer. In 2013 she became Chair at the University of Stirling. In 2016 she joined the University of Strathclyde as chair in English, and from 2017-2020 served as the Head of the School of Humanities.[3]

As well as researching Victorian literature, especially working class writing and poetry, Blair has also studied links between literature and religion and literature and medicine. Her work is extending into children's literature of the period and current day popular material, known as fanfiction.[3]

Recent research

Blair wrote in 2006 on Victorian Poetry and the Culture of the Heart [5] looking at medical as well as symbolic use of the heart, a review has indicated that this 'element of Victorian poetry has been neglected; this book begins to redress this disregard in a fresh and exciting way, suggesting that there is more to the heart than just its beat.'[6] And later writing about Form and Faith in Victorian Poetry and Religion in 2012,[7] she was described as challenging the consensus of academia, and said to be 'close to the bone' in claiming that some texts have been 'shortchanged by a bias in post-deconstructive scholarship'.[8]

She was the recipient of grants from the Leverhulme Trust and Carnegie Trust, and in 2016 created an anthology of newspaper verse from Scotland The Poets of the People's Journal: Newspaper Poetry in Victorian Scotland '.[9][3] Her work has included a two year Carnegie funded collaboration with colleagues at Glasgow University producing in 2018 'The People's Voice: Political Poetry, Song and the Franchise, 1832-1918'.[3] In sharing her findings, Blair commented 'it is important to remember that the very existence of a ‘Poet’s Corner’ and the critical forum of the ‘Notices to Correspondents’, in almost every local paper across Scotland, in itself had a significant relationship to the franchise debate.'[10] And she worked with Dr. Lauren Weiss, on 'Literary Bonds' funded by the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals, which explored Victorian mutual improvement societies' publications,[3] and they jointly presented their findings at an Oxford seminar on Science, Medicine and Culture in the Nineteenth Century'.[11]

In 2019, her Working Verse in Victorian Scotland: Poetry, Press, Community[12] was described as a 'paradigm-shift' and changing attitudes to working class literature.[13] The Saltire Award jury named it the Scottish Book of the Year 2019,[2] and also awarded it the Research Book of the Year with the judges stating that 'the fact that it is an important, significant piece of research did not discolour its enjoyability, with laugh out loud moments and fascinating facts.'[2] Her engagement with local communities such as in Hamilton where she critiqued the nineteenth century local press's attitude to working class writing, and debated if this formed part of the universal suffrage reformers' arguments (in showing that workers had suitable intellectual capacity).[14]

Blair's research includes writers of what is widely considered 'bad poetry',[15] such as Dundee's McGonagall.[16] In 2019, Blair co-convened the British Association for Victorian Studies conference in the city, which brought 272 delegates from 14 countries, and claimed an inward investment of over £330,000. The location was chosen, she said, because of the 'combination of new and exciting developments such as the V&A, and Dundee's important Victorian heritage, like the Verdant Works and McManus building.' The event was given positive feedback from early career researchers and raised interest in Blair's research on working class poetry.[17] Earlier (2017) Blair had joined the steering committee of the Scottish Centre for Victorian and Neo-Victorian Studies (SCVS)[18] and in 2018, she presented the keynote speech at the founding of the Scottish Network for Nineteenth-Century European Cultures (SNNEC) titled: ‘Whose Cry is Liberty and Fatherland? Scottish Poets and European Nationalism’.[19]

She is now working with Dr. Mike Sanders and Dr. Oliver Bett[20] on an AHRC industrial heritage and literature project, called Piston, Pen & Press.[21] Her major funded projects, including this (funded to almost £660,000) are listed by the UK research council.[22] Working class writers, including factory women, and relations to the radical press are often illustrated by concrete examples.[23]

Blair's contribution to understanding the genre and her insight and analysis is in various references in The Cambridge Companion to Victorian Women's Poetry[24] and also in The Oxford Handbook of the Oxford Movement.[25]

Hre research is also referred to in a 2020 interdisciplinary study of the 'Fin-de-Siecle Scottish Revival.'[26]

As a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (2021), Blair is presenting with others on the 'new and engaging ways to encounter our past' in the RSE's Curious 2021 series of public outreach events, with a session entitled 'Nostalgia and applied games'.[27]

Blair's current and past research publications are listed on ORCID [28] and researchgate[29]

See also

Blair's research is cited on

References
  1. "Professor Kirstie Blair FRSE". The Royal Society of Edinburgh. 4 May 2021. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  2. "The Saltire Society announces winners of 2019 Literary Awards". www.creativescotland.com. 2 December 2019. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  3. "Kirstie Blair". University of Strathclyde. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  4. Unmapped countries : biological visions in nineteenth century literature and culture. Anne-Julia Zwierlein, Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg. Centre for British Studies. London: Anthem Press. 2005. pp. xi - About the Authors. ISBN 1-84331-159-3. OCLC 60885196.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  5. Blair, Kirstie (2006). Victorian poetry and the culture of the heart. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 978-0-19-153438-6. OCLC 646790766.
  6. Caleb, Amanda Mordavsky (2006). "The British Society for Literature and Science · Kirstie Blair, Victorian Poetry and the Culture of the Heart". www.bsls.ac.uk. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  7. Blair, Kirstie (2012). Form and faith in Victorian poetry and religion (1st ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-964450-6. OCLC 769989330.
  8. Lecourt, Sebastian (2013). "Review of Form and Faith in Victorian Poetry and Religion". The Wordsworth Circle. 44 (4): 236–238. doi:10.1086/TWC24044475. ISSN 0043-8006. JSTOR 24044475.
  9. The poets of the People's Journal : newspaper poetry in Victorian Scotland. Kirstie Blair. Glasgow. 2016. ISBN 978-1-906841-28-7. OCLC 959034084.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)
  10. Blair, Kirstie (11 May 2016). "Poetry, Education and the Franchise in the Local Press – Prof Kirstie Blair". The People's Voice. Retrieved 30 August 2021.
  11. "Science, Medicine and Culture in the Nineteenth Century Seminars in Michaelmas Term 2018". diseasesofmodernlife.web.ox.ac.uk. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  12. Blair, Kirstie (2019). Working verse in Victorian Scotland : poetry, press, community (1st ed.). Oxford. ISBN 978-0-19-187949-4. OCLC 1089960853.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  13. Keegan, Bridget (1 September 2020). "Working Verse in Victorian Scotland: Poetry, Press, Community by Kirstie Blair". The Wordsworth Circle. 51 (4): 439–447. doi:10.1086/711029. ISSN 0043-8006. S2CID 229532174.
  14. Shaw, Michael (11 May 2016). "Poetry, Education and the Franchise in the Local Press – Prof Kirstie Blair". The People's Voice. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  15. Blair, Kirstie (1 November 2013). "McGonagall, 'Poute', and the Bad Poets of Victorian Dundee". The Bottle Imp. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  16. Sneddan, Ciaran (4 February 2017). "Tay bard William McGonagall 'deliberately wrote bad poems to earn more money', professor claims". The Courier. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  17. "BAVS2019 – The British Association for Victorian Studies 2019 Conference | Dundee & Angus Convention Bureau". www.conventiondundeeandangus.co.uk. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  18. "Steering Committee |". Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  19. "Workshop 1 – Report". Establishing SNNEC*. 27 April 2018. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  20. "People – Piston, Pen & Press". Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  21. "Piston, Pen & Press – Literary Cultures in the Industrial Workplace, 1840-1918". Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  22. "UK Research and Innovation - Kirstie Blair". UKRI. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  23. "Kirstie Blair". History Workshop. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  24. The Cambridge companion to Victorian women's poetry. Linda K. Hughes. Cambridge, United Kingdom. 2019. pp. 5, 6, 86, 92, 128–138, 140–144, 167, 175–6, 279, 283, viii, x. ISBN 978-1-107-18247-9. OCLC 1052874868.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)
  25. The Oxford handbook of the Oxford Movement. Stewart J. Brown, Peter Benedict Nockles, James Pereiro (1st ed.). Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press. 2017. pp. 108, 110, 283, 410–422, ix, xv. ISBN 978-0-19-958018-7. OCLC 962330916.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  26. Shaw, Michael (2020). The fin-de-siecle Scottish revival : romance, decadence and Celtic identity. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. pp. 8–9, 30, 267, xi. ISBN 978-1-4744-3398-3. OCLC 1130249268.
  27. "Curious | Nostalgia and applied games". Curious. 12 July 2021. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  28. "ORCID". orcid.org. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  29. "Kirstie Blair's research works | University of Glasgow, Glasgow (UofG) and other places". ResearchGate. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
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