This is a preliminary announcement about the upcoming conference, ‘Science, Gender and Sociability in a Northern City c. 1775-1820’ which will run from 8-10 June 2023 at the Centre for Eighteenth Century Studies, University of York.  This is an in-person event which will also be live streamed.

Please note: Full registration details will be circulated in mid-January 2023.

This interdisciplinary, three-day event will bring together scholars in the fields of women’s history, the history of science, literature and theatrical performance, history of music and historical archaeology from across the UK and the USA, to contextualise and analyse the diary of Jane Ewbank (1778‒1824).

Ewbank, the twenty-five year old daughter of a York druggist kept a 34,000-word diary during 1803-1805, which details a conscious and informed project of self-education via reading, sociability and her involvement in the intellectual and social landscape of a northern English city, including the theatre, concerts, science lectures, the natural world and its materiality.

Speakers include:
Michael Brown (University of Lancaster); John Christie (University of Oxford);
Rachel Cowgill (CECS University of York); Matthew Eddy (University of Durham);
Mary Fairclough (CECS University of York); Rachel Feldberg (CECS University of York); Joanna de Groot  (CECS University of York); Matthew Jenkins (CECS University of York); Corinne Fowler (University of Leicester); Jon Klancher (University of Pittsburgh); Karen Lipsedge (University of Kingston); Jon Mee (CECS University of York); Amy Prendergast  (Queen’s University Belfast); Jane Rendall (CECS University of York); Anne-Marie Roos (University of Lincoln); Gillian Russell (CECS University of York); Joanna Wharton (Birkbeck, University of London).

Location
The conference will take place at the University of York’s historic Kings Manor campus in the centre of the city, two minutes from York Minster.  We look forward to seeing you there!