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Emily Roberts

Biography

Emily earned her M.A. in English from Appalachian State University (2012) and her B.S. in Secondary Education, English from Appalachian State University (2009). Here at UT, she is currently a GTA and is also working as a Writing Center Tutor in the designated ESL Writing Center. 

Emily has been very active in the academic community. Some of her publications include:

  • “Review of James M. Bromley and Will Stockton’s Sex before Sex: Figuring the Act in Early Modern England” in Comitatus 45, 2014
  • Working as a research assistant to Professor Hirschfeld as she edited the Oxford Handbook to Shakespearean Comedy for publication. 

While at UT, she has presented at several different institutions:

  • “Economy and ‘Honesty’ in Thomas Middleton’s A Chaste Maid in Cheapside.” Southeastern Renaissance Conference. University of South Carolina, Columbia. October 2017.

  • “‘Silent Submission’: The Effacement of Rape in Contemporary Fiction by Female Authors.” Global Issue Conference: International Women’s Rights. University of Tennessee, Knoxville. April 2015.   

  •  “Before I know myself seek not to know me’: Self and Carnal Knowledge in Shakespeare’s Venus and Adonis.” Southeastern Renaissance Conference. University of North Carolina, Greensboro. October 2014.
  • “‘Be bold, be bold. . . be not too bold’: Britomart, Beauty, and Chastity in Book III of Edmund Spenser’s Faerie Queene.” “Marginal Women in Medieval Literature” Panel, Southeastern Medieval Association Conference. Appalachian State University, Boone, NC. October 2013. 

Emily has also won several awards while studying at UT:

  • Joseph Trahern Dissertation Fellowship, University of Tennessee Department of English (2017-2018)
  • Keith P. Taylor Grant for Drama in Stratford, London, and Edinburgh program, University of Tennessee Department of English (2017)
  • Norman J. Sanders Dissertation Fellowship, University of Tennessee Department of English (2016-2017)
  • Newberry Renaissance Consortium Grant, Marco Institute and the Newberry Library (February 2015)
  • John C. Hodges Fellowship, University of Tennessee Department of English (2013-2014) 

Emily is currently working on her thesis, under the direction of Heather Hirschfeld. Her untitled dissertation examines allusions to Bathsheba, from the biblical narrative of David and Bathsheba, in English Renaissance literature. She is specifically interested in understanding what Bathsheba come to represent during the period and how her story connects with issues of consent and privacy.