Biography
Laura Rotunno received her MA and Ph.D. in English from the University of Missouri at Columbia. Her research and teaching interests include nineteenth-century British literature, the novel, narrative theory, cultural studies, and genre and gender studies. "The Long History of 'In Short': Mr. Micawber, Letter-Writers, and Literary Men," an article that foregrounds her interest in nineteenth-century correspondence customs, appears in Victorian Literature and Culture. Her book Postal Plots in British Fiction 1840-1898: Readdressing Correspondence in Victorian Culture was published by Palgrave in 2013. Her current project investigates late-nineteenth-century novels that explore female athletes and academics; her two most recent articles concerning this topic can be found in Victorian Review and Nineteenth-Century Gender Studies.
Research Interests
- British Literature and Culture
- 19th British Cultural History
- The Novel
- Genre and Narratology
- New Woman Fiction
- 19th British Education and Athleticism
Publications
“University Education.” The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Victorian Women’s Writing, edited by Lesa Scholl. 3 May 2020, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02721-6_290-1.
“Trial and Success: A Non-DH Savvy Professor Adopts COVE.” COVE: Central Online Victorian Educator, Teaching Section. 9 Aug. 2019, https://editions.covecollective.org/teaching/trial-and-success-non-dh-savvy-professor-adopts-cove.
“What Being a Professional Bodybuilder Taught Me about Gaining Tenure.” Times Higher Education, 2 June 2018, https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/what-being-professional-bodybuilder-taught-me-about-gaining-tenure.
“What If the New Woman Is a Scholar-Athlete Too?” Nineteenth-Century Gender Studies, vol. 13, no. 1, Spring 2017.
“Trained Bodies.” Victorian Review, vol. 42, no.1, Spring 2016. pp. 37-43.
“Writing on the Frontlines of Public Memory: English and History Undergraduates Contributing to the Flight 93 Oral History Project.” Co-written with Douglas Page. Pedagogies of Public Memory: Teaching Writing and Rhetoric at Museums, Archives, and Memorials, edited by Jane Greer and Laurie Grobman, Routledge, 2015. pp. 135-46. Studies in Rhetoric and Communication Ser.
Postal Plots in British Fiction, 1840-1898: Readdressing Correspondence in Victorian Culture, Palgrave, 2013, 224 pps. Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture.
"Blackfriars: The Post Office Magazine, A Nineteenth-Century Network of 'The Happy Ignorant.'" Victorian Periodicals Review, vol. 44, no. 2, Summer 2011, pp. 141-64.
"Writers of Reform and Reforming Writers in Aurora Leigh and A Writer of Books." Gender and Victorian Reform, edited by Anita Rose, Cambridge Scholars Press, 2008, pp. 58-72.
"E-Writing: Expository Writing Exploring the Electronic." From Hip Hop to Hyperlinks: Teaching about Culture in the Composition Classroom, edited by Joanna N. Paull, Cambridge Scholars Press, 2008, pp. 252-73.
"User Ids: Email Novels and the Search for Identity." a/b: Auto/Biography Studies, vol. 21, no. 2, Summer 2006, pp. 70-82.
"'This alone would drive me to despair': The Position of Anselm in Robert Browning's 'The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St. Praxed's Church.'" Browning Society Notes, vol. 31, March 2006, pp. 22-34.
"The Long History of 'In Short': Mr. Micawber, Letter-Writers, and Literary Men." Victorian Literature and Culture, vol. 33, no. 2, 2005, pp. 415-33.
"Novel Expectations to Novel Evaluations." Academic Exchange Quarterly vol. 9, no. 1, Spring 2005, pp. 89-92.
Education
Ph.D. in English: August 2003
The University of Missouri at Columbia
Dissertation: "Readdressed: Correspondence Culture and Nineteenth-Century British Fiction"
MA in English: December 1998
The University of Missouri at Columbia
Thesis: "Horror-Struck, Silence-Stricken: The Gothic and Epistolary within Frankenstein, Melmoth the Wanderer, and Dracula"
B.A. Summa cum laude in English and German, and Concentration in Philosophy: May 1994
The University of Nebraska at Kearney