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Barbara Taylor (historian)

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Barbara Taylor
Born
Barbara Gold Taylor[1]

(1950-04-11) 11 April 1950 (age 74)
Canada
Other namesBarbara G. Taylor
Academic background
Alma mater
ThesisThe Feminist Theory and Practice of the Owenite Socialist Movement in Britain, 1820–45 (1980)
Academic work
DisciplineHistory
Institutions

Barbara Gold Taylor FRHistS (born 11 April 1950) is a Canadian-born historian based in the United Kingdom, specialising in the Enlightenment, gender studies and the history of subjectivity. She is Professor of Humanities at Queen Mary, University of London.[2]

She was born and raised in Western Canada. In 1971, she was awarded her first degree in political thought from the University of Saskatchewan. She then moved to London, where she gained an MSc in the same subject at the London School of Economics, followed by a PhD in history at the University of Sussex. She taught history at the University of East London from 1993 until 2012 and then moved to Queen Mary, University of London, as joint professor of the schools of English & Drama, and History.[3]

She has received research grants and fellowships from the Leverhulme Trust, the Nuffield Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation (1996), the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, and the Wellcome Trust.[3]

Taylor has written a biography of Mary Wollstonecraft, the early English feminist and republican,[4][5] and continues to speak on her life. She spoke about her in 2009 at Newington Green Unitarian Church as part of the 250th anniversary of Wollstonecraft's birth.[6][7]

With the psychologist Adam Phillips, Taylor is the co-author of On Kindness (2009).[8][9][10] Taylor's memoir The Last Asylum: A Memoir of Madness in Our Times, describing her years at Friern Hospital, was published in 2014.[11][12][13][14] It was a finalist for the 2015 RBC Taylor Prize.[15]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Taylor, Barbara (2015). The Last Asylum: A Memoir of Madness in Our Times. University of Chicago Press. p. 27. ISBN 978-0-226-27392-1. I am Barbara Gold Taylor (after my mother's maiden name, Goldenberg).
  2. ^ "Professor Barbara Taylor". The School of History, Queen Mary, University of London. Retrieved 17 July 2016.
  3. ^ a b "Professor Barbara Taylor, Hons BA (Saskatchewan), MSc (London School of Economics), D Phil (Sussex), Fellow Royal Historical Society". School of English and Drama | Queen Mary, University of London. Retrieved 5 January 2018.
  4. ^ Hawley, Judith (3 October 2003). "The stroppier the better: Judith Hawley finds Mary Wollstonecraft's reputation enhanced by her collected letters and Barbara Taylor's study, Mary Wollstonecraft and the Feminist Imagination". The Guardian.
  5. ^ Additional reviews of Mary Wollstonecraft and the Feminist Imagination:
  6. ^ gruner, Peter (17 April 2009). "Festival for 'first feminist'". Islington Tribune.
  7. ^ "Celebrating the 250th anniversary of the birth of Mary Wollstonecraft, 'The Mother of Feminism'!". womensgrid archive. 21 April 2009. Retrieved 9 October 2022.
  8. ^ Stevenson, Peter (29 July 2009). "Easy to Be Hard". The New York Times.
  9. ^ Warnock, Mary (10 January 2009). "Humanity's gift that keeps on giving: A history of kindness offers an absorbing overview of a defining attribute, finds Mary Warnock". The Guardian.
  10. ^ King, Ed (4 January 2009). "On Kindness by Adam Phillips and Barbara Taylor". The Sunday Times.
  11. ^ Armstrong, Laura (5 March 2015). "Barbara Taylor shares story of her 'madness' in memoir: Book, which was nominated for Charles Taylor Prize, also offers a scathing critique of the mental health system in the western world of today". Toronto Star.
  12. ^ Moreton, Cole (9 February 2014). "'I was a loony, a nutter. I was on the far side of the moon': Barbara Taylor's memoir of her time in Britain's last Victorian asylum argues that mental health patients deserve better care today". The Daily Telegraph.
  13. ^ Levingston, Suzanne Allard (28 April 2015). "Historian recollects the demons of her own past in The Last Asylum". The Washington Post.
  14. ^ Additional reviews of The Last Asylum:
  15. ^ "The winner of the 2015 RBC Taylor Prize". Charles Taylor Foundation. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
[edit]
  • Barbara Taylor profile at the Queen Mary college of the University of London
Awards
Preceded by Deutscher Memorial Prize
1983
Succeeded by