Expertise Summary

Patricia Plummer is Professor of English and Postcolonial Studies. Her publications, research and teaching focus on English literature and culture since the Long Eighteenth Century, Orientalism and travel writing, postcolonial literatures and gender studies as well as popular culture.

She studied English, Egyptology and Classical Archaeology at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, where she received her PhD degree (2000). She has been Assistant Professor and Senior Lecturer at Mainz University (2000-2010), Interim Professor at the University of Landau (2010), and Invited Visiting Professor of Interdisciplinary Gender Studies at the University of Koblenz (2005). More recently Patricia Plummer has been Visiting Professor at Macquarie University, Sydney (2019), and has held visiting research fellowships at The University of Sydney (Department of Studies in Religion  2015), Australian National University (Joint HRC and Gender Institute Research Fellowship 2016), and National University of Ireland, Galway (Moore Institute Visiting Research Fellowship 2019).

As one of the Pls in the DFG-funded interdisciplinary research group "Ambiguity and Difference: Historical and Cultural Dynamics", Patricia Plummer and her team investigated manifestations of (ethnic, gender-specific and/or religious) ambiguity in eighteenth-century British discourse on travel during the first founding period (2019-2022). Her current research project is about "Orientalism in Colonial Australia, 1770-1901: A Transimperial Perspective" (2022-2025; second funding period). 

Patricia Plummer is passionate about teaching. She was one of the collaborators in Professor Mick Short's international e-learning investigation 'Language & Style' (2004-05), and has since received numerous awards and grants for her own teaching projects, including the UDE 'Scholarship Lehre divers' (2017), which enabled her to develop a hands-on course on museums, diversity and repatriation, and in 2018 she created a blended-learning course 'Key Concepts in Postcolonial Studies'. More recently, the UDE-funded project 'DAS Lab' (2020-21) enabled her, together with assistants Evelyn Messel and Lena Busch, to develop and implement a number of web-based courses in Australian Studies, including the e-learning site 'Digital Australian Studies Lab.' Last but not least, Patricia Plummer has been one of the Pls in the joint e-learning project "Digitaler 1-Fach MA Australian Studies," together with colleagues at the universities of Aachen, Cologne, Düsseldorf and Münster (2022-24, funded by the NRW Ministry for Culture and Science). 

Patricia Plummer is the author of a monograph on style in Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist (2003) and has co-edited numerous volumes, including: Perspektiven der Frauenforschung (1998), Frauen auf der Spur (2001), Subversive Romantik (2004) and Ambiguität und Geschlecht in der Neuzeit: Interdisziplinäre Perspektiven (2024), co-edited with Frank Becker. 

• English literature from the 18^th to the 21^st century
• Travel writing since the Early Modern Age
• Australian literature 
• Women’s and Gender Studies
• Gender and Orientalism; Literature and Religion 
• Crime Fiction and Popular Culture

Since April 2011: Full Professor of English Literature and Postcolonial Studies, University of Duisburg-Essen 

2010-11: Interim Professor of English Literature and Postcolonial Studies, University of Duisburg-Essen 

​2010: Interim Professor of British Cultural Studies, Landau University

2006-11: Senior Lecturer, Department of English and Linguistics, Mainz University (leave of absence: 2010-11)

2000-06: Assistant Professor, Department of English and Linguistics, Mainz University

2000: Dr. phil., Mainz University, doctoral thesis on style in Charles Dickens’s Oliver Twist

1993-2000: Research assistant (wiss. Mitarbeiterin), Department of English, Mainz University

1981-88: Studied English Literature, Egyptology and Classical Archaelogy at Mainz University (M.A.)

2022-25: PI, DFG-Research Group "Ambiguity and Distinction"  Subproject "Orientalism in Colonial Australia, 1770-1901"

2024: Visiting Researcher, Macquarie University, Department of Media, Communications and Creative Arts

2019-22: PI, DFG-Research Group "Ambiguity and Distinction" Subproject "Unveiling Orientalism: Ambiguity in British Discourse on Travel of the long Eighteenth Century"

2019: Visiting Professor, Department of Modern History, Macquarie University, Sydney 

          Visiting Resarch Fellow, Moore Institute, NUI Galway

2016: Joint Visiting Research Fellow, Humanities Research Centre and Gender Institute, Australian National University 

2015: Visiting Research Fellow, Department of Studies in Religion, The University of Sydney

2007: Research Grant, Kalkhof-Rose-Stiftung (1.3.-31.7.2007)

2005: Invited Visiting Professor of International and Interdisciplinary Gender Studies, Koblenz University

2000: Dissertation Award of Humanities, Mainz University 

1993: Women's Studies Award (2nd prize), Federal State of Rhineland-Palatinate 

2022-24: PI, Joint Teaching Project "Australian Studies Online" 

2021-22: Digital Australian Studies Lab, Teaching Innovation Grant, Lehre digital, UDE

2018: Teaching Innovation Grant, UDE

Project: “Digital Postcolonial Studies“ 

2017: Scholarship Lehre divers, UDE

Project: “Museen als Lernorte von Diversität“ 

2004-06:  “Language & Style: A Web-Based Course“ (international investigation; principal investigator: 
Professor Mick Short, Lancaster University, UK)  (collaborator, with Beatrix Busse)

Essen Gender Research Institute  board member and spokesperson research cluster „Perception, Representation, Visibility“

Research Network of Women’s and Gender Studies in North Rhine Westphalia  advisory board (since 2014) 

Head of Department, Department of Anglophone Studies, UDE (since April 2020-22)

Faculty board, Faculty of Humanities, UDE (2016-22)

Gender Equality Commission, UDE (2016-18)

Diversity Management Commission, UDE (2012-16)

Zeitschrift für Australienstudien, co-editor (2022-24)

International Journal of Literary Linguistics , adivisory board (since 2012)

Feminist Europa: Review of Books , advisory board and founding member (1998-2002)

Orientalism in Colonial Australia, 1770-1901: A Transimperial Perspective (2022-2025)

Unveiling Orientalism: Ambiguity in British Discourse on Travel of the Long Eighteenth Century (2020-2023) 

Gender, Art and Theosophy: Louisa Le Freimann (1863-1956) 

Japan in the West 

2023: Australian Mobilities 

2013: Indigenous Australian Literature in Context, 1993-2013

2012: Erleuchtung Garantiert? Japan im Westen: Literatur – Kultur – Spiritualität 

Books

• Ambiguität und Geschlecht in der Neuzeit: Interdisziplinäre Perspektiven. Ed. Frank Becker and Patricia Plummer. Transcript: Bielefeld, 2024.  
• Subversive Romantik. [co-edited with Volker Kapp, Helmuth Kiesel and Klaus Lubbers]. Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 2004.
• Frauen auf der Spur: Kriminalautorinnen aus Deutschland, Großbritannien und den USA. [co-edited with Carmen Birkle and Sabina Matter-Seibel]. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2001. 
• Frauen in Kultur und Gesellschaft: Ausgewählte Beiträge der 2. Fachtagung Frauen-/ Gender-Forschung in Rheinland-Pfalz. Ed. Renate v. Bardeleben with the assistance of Sabina Matter-Seibel, Simone Nelles and Patricia Plummer. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2000. 
• Stil in Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist: Formen – Funktionen – Kontexte. [Style in Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist: Forms – Functions – Contexts]. Trier: WVT, 2003. [= Doctoral Dissertation Mainz 2000]​
• Perspektiven der Frauenforschung: Ausgewählte Beiträge der 1. Fachtagung Frauen-/ Gender-Forschung in Rheinland-Pfalz. [co-edited with Renate v. Bardeleben]. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 1998.    ​​

​
Journal Special Issues

• Pakistani Women's Narratives.  [forthcoming] 
• Stylistics und E-Learning. Sonderband von Language and Literature 15.3 (2006). Ed. Mick Short, Patricia Plummer and Beatrix Busse. 
• Engendering the Past in History and Archaeology. Special Issue of Feminist Europa 2/2002. [guest editor].

Book Chapters and Journal Articles (selection)

• "'A sleeping hermaphrodite with two stayrs': The Description of Strawberry Hill (1774, 1784) and Horace Walpole's Taste for Ambiguity." [with Syed Kazim Ali Kazmi]. UNIKATE: Berichte aus Forschung und Lehre 58 (2022): 18-30. Link
• "'Transgendered, castrated, or effminate'? Gender and Ambiguity in Cross-Cultural Perspective." Journal Netzwerk Frauen- und Geschlechterforschung in NRW 49 (2021): 74-80. [with Syed Kazim Ali Kazmi] (online )
• "Intellektuelle Frauen im Exil: Azar Nafisi, May Witwit, Ahdaf Soueif." IZGOnZeit 9 (2020), 21-35. Online: https://www.izgonzeit.de/index.php/izgonzeit. (online)
• "The Hidden History of an Australian Painter: Louisa Haynes Le Freimann (1863-1956)." Gender Forum, Issue 53 Special, Issue Gender Down Under, Ed. Victoria Herche (July 2015) 
• "From Paper Wars to Visual Paranoia: Contemporary British Negotiations of Muslim Fundamentalism." Narratives of Fundamentalism. Ed. Birgit Däwes. Literatur in Wissenschaft und Unterricht 2013: 45-57.
• "Güzel Sultanum: Gender und Macht im weiblichen Orientdiskurs: Die Orientreise Lady Mary Wortley Montagus (1716-18)." Geschlechterforschung: Blick hinter die Kulissen. UNIKATE: Berichte aus Forschung und Lehre Nr. 41 (2012). Ed. Essener Kolleg für Geschlechterforschung. 90-99. (online)
• "'The free treatment of topics usually taboo'd: Glimpses of the Harem in Eighteenth and Nineteenth-Century Orientalist Discourse." Word & Image in Colonial and Postcolonial Literatures and Cultures. Ed. Michael Meyer. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2009. 47-68.
• "The Return of the Gothic in Contemporary Anglophone Crime Fiction." “My Age is as a Lusty Winter”: Essays in Honour of Peter Erlebach and Thomas Michael Stein. Ed. Bernhard Reitz. Trier: WVT, 2009. 111-24.
• "Joan Riley." Twenty-First-Century Black British Writers. [Dictionary of Literary Biography vol. 347]. Ed. R. Victoria Arana. Detroit: Gale, 2009. 244-52.
• "Cruel Sultans, Fair Captives: The Influence of Richard Knolles's Generall Historie of the Turkes (1603) on Eighteenth-Century English Drama." Literature as History/History as Literature: Fact and Fiction in Medieval to Eighteenth-Century British Literature. Ed. Sonja Fielitz. Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang, 2007. 169-81.
• "Insatiable Desires: (Sub)Versions of Gender in William Beckford's Vathek and Frances Sheridan's The History of Nourjahad." Anglistentag 2006 Halle. Ed. Sabine Volk-Birke und Julia Lippert. Trier: WVT, 2007. 445-56.
• "Transcultural British Crime Fiction: Mike Phillips' Sam Dean Novels." Postcolonial Postmortems. Ed. Christine Matzke and Susanne Mühleisen. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2006. 255-70.
• "Investigating Student Reactions to a Web-Based Stylistics Course in Different National and Educational Settings." [with Mick Short and Beatrix Busse]. Literature and Stylistics for Language Learners: Theory and Practice. Ed. Greg Watson and Sonia Zyngier. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006. 106-25. (online)
• "'My Workshop of Filthy Creation': Subversive Intertextualität bei Mary Shelley." Subversive Romantik. Ed. Kapp, Kiesel, Lubbers and Plummer. Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 2004. 133-51.
• "Subversionen von Zeit und Raum in der amerikanischen Romantik." [with Klaus Lubbers]. Subversive Romantik. Ed. Kapp, Kiesel, Lubbers and Plummer. Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 2004. 23-52.
• "(V)Ermittlungen zwischen den Kulturen: Der zeitgenössische Kriminalroman als post-feministisches und post-ethnisches Projekt." Gender und Interkulturalität: Ausgewählte Beiträge der 3. Fachtagung Frauen-/Genderforschung in Rheinland-Pfalz. Ed. Liesel Hermes et al. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2003. 81-90.
• "Mattapoisett Revisited: The Postethnic Vision of Marge Piercy's Cosmopolitopia." [with Klaus Lubbers]. American Vistas and Beyond: A Festschrift for Roland Hagenbüchle. Ed. Marietta Messmer and Josef Raab. Trier: WVT, 2002. 267-84.
• "Re-writing the House of Fiction: Michèle Roberts' Daughters of the House." Engendering Realism and Postmodernism. Ed. Beate Neumeier. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2001. 63-85.
•  "'Grisly Jigsaws': Die Kriminalromane von Minette Walters." Frauen auf der Spur: Kriminalautorinnen aus Deutschland, Großbritannien und den USA. Ed. Carmen Birkle, Sabina Matter-Seibel and Patricia Plummer. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2001. 219-38.
• "Unter der Lupe: Neue Entwicklungen in der Krimilandschaft." [with Carmen Birkle and Sabina Matter-Seibel]. Frauen auf der Spur: Kriminalautorinnen aus Deutschland, Großbritannien und den USA. Ed. Carmen Birkle, Sabina Matter-Seibel and Patricia Plummer. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2001. 1-13.
•  "Ironie, Parodie, Zitat: Subversionen des Kriminalromans in Werken britischer Autorinnen." Frauen auf der Spur: Kriminalautorinnen aus Deutschland, Großbritannien und den USA. Ed. Carmen Birkle, Sabina Matter-Seibel and Patricia Plummer. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2001. 197-218.
• "Gender, Raum und Subversion im Kinderbuch: Frances Hodgson Burnetts The Secret Garden." Geschlechterräume: Konstruktionen von Gender und Raum. Ed. Margarete Hubrath. Köln: Böhlau, 2001. 117-32.
• "Der Tod der Märchenprinzessin: Die Mythenbildung um Diana Spencer, Princess of Wales (1961-1997)." Frauen in Kultur und Gesellschaft: Ausgewählte Beiträge der 2. Fachtagung Frauen-/Gender-Forschung in Rheinland-Pfalz. Ed. Renate v. Bardeleben. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2000. 319-33.

Encyclopedia Articles

Metzler Lexikon Literatur: Begriffe und Definitionen. 3^rd rev. ed,. Ed. Dieter Burdorf, Christoph Fasbender and Burkhard Moenninghoff. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2007:

• "Feministische Literaturwissenschaft"
• "Frauenliteratur"
• "Gothic novel"
• "Kriminalerzählung"
• "Kriminalliteratur"
• "Robinsonade"
• "Schauerroman"
• "Short Story"
• "Stil"
• "Stilisierung"
• "Stilistik"
• "Stilmittel"
• "Viktorianische Literatur"

Interviews

• "Mick Short (Lancaster University) in Conversation with Beatrix Busse and Patricia Plummer." Anglistik: Mitteilungen des Deutschen Anglistenverbandes 18.1 (2007): 135-51.
• "Creating Transcultural Crime Fiction: Interview with Mike Phillips." Postcolonial Postmortems. Ed. Christine Matzke and Susanne Mühleisen. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2006. 271-87.
• "'Die Blutspur fängt in frühester Jugend an': Interview mit Sabine Deitmer." Frauen auf der Spur: Kriminalautorinnen aus Deutschland, Großbritannien und den USA. Ed. Carmen Birkle, Sabina Matter-Seibel and Patricia Plummer. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2001. 87-99.
• "'Mir gefällt, dass Bella ein unabhängiges Leben führt': Interview mit Doris Gercke." Frauen auf der Spur: Kriminalautorinnen aus Deutschland, Großbritannien und den USA. Ed. Carmen Birkle, Sabina Matter-Seibel and Patricia Plummer. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2001. 77-85.

Reviews

• "Gendering Literary History: Review of Schabert, Ina, Englische Literatur aus der Sicht der Geschlechterforschung." Engendering the Past in History and Archaeology. Sonderheft von Feminist Europa 2 (2002): 21-22.
• Jana Gohrisch, (Un)Belonging? Geschlecht, Klasse, Rasse und Ethnizität im zeitgenössischen britischen Roman: Joan Rileys Romane (Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang, 1994)." Anglia 115.3 (1997): 429-33.

Science Communication

Articles

• "Unveiling Orientalism: Ambiguität im britischen Reisediskurs des langen 18. Jahrhunderts." Journal Netzwerk Frauen- und Geschlechterforschung in NRW 47 (2020): 74-80. (online)
• "Frauen- und Genderforschung in Rheinland-Pfalz: Projekte–Publikationen–Perspektiven." Themenheft "Frauen- und Geschlechterforschung an der Universität Trier" UniJournal 28 (2002): 9-11.
• "2. Fachtagung Frauen-/Gender-Forschung in Rheinland-Pfalz: Ausgewählte Beiträge werden dokumentiert." JOGU164 (Februar 1999): 38.
• "Jahresbibliographie Frauen- und Gender-Forschung in Rheinland-Pfalz 1996." Perspektiven der Frauenforschung: Ausgewählte Beiträge der 1. Fachtagung Frauen-/ Gender-Forschung in Rheinland-Pfalz. Ed. Renate v. Bardeleben and Patricia Plummer. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 1998. 271-76.
• "Fachtagung Rheinland-Pfalz: Perspektiven der Frauenforschung." JOGU 154 (Februar 1997): 26.

Interviews / Podcasts

• Lady Mary Wortley Montagu: Reisebriefe aus dem Orient. Radiowissen Bayern 2. Podcast. Erstausstrahlung: 15.3.2021. Autorin: Carola Zinner. Wiss. Beratung und Interviewpartnerin: Prof. Dr. Patricia Plummer (online)
• "Virginia Woolf (1882-1942)." Interviewer: Carolin Courts; on the occasion of the 125^th anniversary of Virginia Woolf’s birthday, WDR 5-Hörfunk (2007).
• "Frauenkrimis." Interviewer: Marie-Dominique Wetzel; feature on women crime writers, "Literatur im Land", SWR2-Hörfunk (2004).
• "Frauen auf der Spur." Interviewer: Sabine Mahr; Kultur im Land, SWR-Hörfunk (1999).