Dr Manon Mathias

  • Reader (French)

Biography

I was born and raised in Cardiff where I attended a Welsh-medium comprehensive. I undertook my undergraduate degree in French and German at the University of Oxford (Trinity College) where I also completed my postgraduate degrees. After a Masters of Studies in European Literature, I was awarded a D.Phil in 2011 on the novelist George Sand. I worked as Rhys Fund Celtic Teaching Fellow, University of Oxford in 2007–2008 and then as Lecturer in French at Worcester College, University of Oxford from 2010 to 2011. I was Lecturer in French at Bangor University (2011–2012) and the University of Aberdeen (2013–2017), and was appointed as Lecturer in French at Glasgow in 2017. I was on maternity leave 2019-2020.

Research interests

Research interests

Medical humanities; cultural history; nineteenth-century novel; health humanities; history of science; history of medicine; dietetics; popular medicine; preventative medicine; hygiene

 I am Co-Director of the University of Glasgow Medical Humanities Research Centre and member of the SMLC Histories and Subjectivities research cluster

Preventative Medicine project

My current research examines the the popularisation of  preventative medicine in the nineteenth century and the notion of 'hygiene' in nineteenth-century France. I am looking at bestselling health manuals and the question of individual health and its articulation through language, especially in the novel. I secured the Society for French Studies Visiting International Fellowship (2023) to host Professor Alison Moore to co-author the first article on preventative medicine in French hygiene treatises. 

 

Gut Health project

I have completed the first study on the gut-mind connection in nineteenth-century French literature and medicine by looking at links between digestive health and the mind in novels, gastronomic writing and health manuals. Inspired by conversations with academics from a range of disciplines, I was PI on a Network Grant awarded by the RSE to fund the Scottish Gut Project. The project focused on the links between gut disorders and mental health amongst Scottish patients and investigated problems of communication and language in explaining digestive diseases and their impact on wellbeing. My second monograph, Gut, Brain, and Environment in Nineteenth-Century French Literature and Medicine was published by Routledge, April 2024. The Scottish Gut Project culminated with an international Symposium in April 2023 and led to a Special issue on Modernity and the Gut which aims to better theorise the gut and its relationship to modernity, with an emphasis on how modernity affects the gut and is affected by it.

The research was initially inspired by an international, cross-disciplinary workshop I organized in May 2017 on Gut Feeling to examine changing attitudes towards the digestive system in modern Western culture. The event was funded by a range of external sources including the British Academy and it provided the basis for a volume of essays, Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture (Palgrave: 2018) which I co-edited with Alison Moore (Western Sydney University). To foster further research on digestive health from a historical and cultural perspective, I organized a two-day workshop on 'The Gut-Brain Axis: Cultural and Historical Perspectives' in May 2018. This led to a specialist issue of of Microbial Ecology in Health & Disease on the 'The Gut-Brain Axis in History and Culture'. I also completed an article featured in History Today on the importance of health in the early development of gastronomy. 

 As Co-Director of the Scottish Food and Drink Histories artslab theme, I produced a video in June 2022 available here on my research and its connections with the theme's catalyst.

 

Background

My research broadly examines the literary, visual, medical and scientific culture of nineteenth-century France. My first monograph, Vision in the Novels of George Sand (OUP, 2016), considers the pull between the visual and the visionary in this period through an examination of Sand’s novels, in particular by exploring internal vision, the model of painting, and the scientific gaze. The book draws on my PhD thesis which was awarded the George Sand Memorial Prize in 2013. Inspired by Sand’s scientific explorations, I continued to examine engagements between the novel and the natural sciences, in particular in the works of Sand, Flaubert and Zola. This led to significant findings such as unexpected links drawn by thinkers of the time between transformist theories and reincarnation. This research was funded by the British Society for the History of Science and the Carnegie Trust.  I have also examined the cultural impact of bacteriology on attitudes towards dirt and hygiene in the second half of the nineteenth century. 

Invited talks 

University of St Andrews Modern Languages Research Seminar, 31 January 2024, French Literature and Gut Humanities

Australasian Health and Medical Humanities Network, 7 December 2023, 'Gut, Brain, and Environment in 19th Century French Literature and Medicine'

Medical Humanities Discussion Group, 27 January 2021 'Digestion and brain work in Huysmans and Zola'

University of Durham, 18 February 2019 OWRI-funded Bodies, Texts Nations research group

History of Medicine Seminar, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, 29 January 2019

Panellist, University of St Andrews, 20 November 2018,  New Directions in Literature and Sciences

Keynote Speaker, King's College London, 10 November 2018,  Tummy Trouble 2018

University of Oxford, 5 June 2018 What is health? It is chocolate!’: Chocolate, medicine, and writing in nineteenth-century France  (Science, Medicine and Culture in the 19th Century Seminar)

University of Strasbourg, 16 May 2018    « George Sand et l'alimentation: Les Maîtres sonneurs », ("Edere et audire" Seminar)                 

 

Reviews of Vision in the Novels of George Sand:

'this unprecedented study [...] is an exemplar of the richness of interdisciplinary research' (Meredith Lehman, George Sand Studies)

'Vision in the Novels of George Sand is conceptually profound in its articulation of vision and the visual; at the same time, it is lucidly written and accessible. The book also casts a wide net, relating the concept of vision to literary esthetics, social utopianism, painting, and scientific investigation. [...] Vision in the Novels of George Sand is an ambitious and successful monograph. It has much to offer even the seasoned Sand scholar. Meticulously researched and clearly written, it makes a robust contribution to nineteenth-century French literary studies.' (Pratima Prasad, H-France Review)

‘Mathias has written a well-structured, articulate, and convincing work. She demonstrates an impressive mastery of Sand’s œuvre and draws on a significant corpus of literary theory and history, as well as Sand criticism, in order to illuminate Sand’s original conceptions of vision. Mathias’ examples […] are remarkably effective and analyzed with fine attention to detail. […] Vision in the Novels of George Sand is a fascinating study, wide-ranging in scope.  It offers not only an original perspective on Sand’s work but also a renewed challenge to the clichéd categories of literary history.’ (Mary Jane Cowles, Nineteenth-Century French Studies)

‘Manon Mathias’s elegant and insightful study, Vision in the Novels of George Sand, presents a scrupulously researched and beautifully written exploration of the ideas of physical and abstract vision in George Sand’s oeuvre. Going far beyond its modest title both in the scope of its analyses and in its intellectual range, Mathias’s monograph brings refreshing new perspectives to our understanding of the most important female author in nineteenth-century France.’ (Alexandra K. Wettlaufer, Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature)

‘Mathias's well-researched and comprehensive book on Sand's distinct syncretic approach to visuality makes a substantial contribution to our understanding of nineteenth-century realism’ (Aimée Boutin, French Studies)

 Reviews of Gut Feeling:

“This collection is an excellent example of interdisciplinary medical humanities scholarship [...] Highly recommended for anyone interested in the ideological, political and metaphorical significance of digestive health in nineteenth-century culture.” (Professor Hannah Thompson, Royal Holloway, University of London, UK)

'Gut Feeling And Digestive Health In Nineteenth-Century Literature, History And Culture is a book that brings to the fore the cultural origins of this gut-brain pairing. Mathias and Moore achieve this by bringing eleven scholars from varying fields of literature, science and politics to explore the range of aspects encompassing the gut, the mind and digestion, in order to illustrate how this was an area of scientific and medical breakthrough in the nineteenth century. These innovative discoveries, paired with traditional perceptions, exemplify the centrality of discourse surrounding the gut-brain axis at this time. Therefore, this collection of essays successfully brings together diverse platforms that discuss the gut in the nineteenth century.' (Arabella Henderson, Durham University)

 

Publications

List by: Type | Date

Jump to: 2024 | 2022 | 2020 | 2018 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2008 | 2007
Number of items: 22.

2024

Mathias, M. (2024) Gut, Brain, and Environment in Nineteenth Century French Literature and Medicine. Series: Routledge Studies in Literature and Health Humanities. Routledge. ISBN 9781032427812 (Accepted for Publication)

2022

Mathias, M. (2022) Chocolate and the French novel: modernity, language, nature. Modern and Contemporary France, (doi: 10.1080/09639489.2022.2134324) (Early Online Publication)

Mathias, M. (2022) Allégories de l’estomac au xixe siècle: littérature, art, philosophie. Sous la direction de Bertrand Marquer. French Studies, (doi: 10.1093/fs/knac118)[Book Review]

2020

Mathias, M. (2020) A disease-free world: the hygienic utopia in Jules Verne, Camille Flammarion and William Morris. In: Shuttleworth, S., Dixon, M. and Taylor-Brown, E. (eds.) Progress and Pathology: Medicine and Culture in the Nineteenth Century. Manchester University Press, pp. 127-152. ISBN 9781526133687

2018

Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (Eds.) (2018) Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture. Series: Palgrave studies in literature, science and medicine. Palgrave Macmillan: Cham. ISBN 9783030018566

Mathias, M. (2018) Digestion and brain work in Zola and Huysmans. In: Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (eds.) Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture. Series: Literature, Science and Medicine. Palgrave, pp. 155-176. ISBN 9783030018566

Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (2018) The gut feelings of medical culture. In: Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (eds.) Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture. Series: Palgrave studies in literature, science and medicine. Palgrave Macmillan: Cham, pp. 1-14. ISBN 9783030018566 (doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-01857-3_1)

Mathias, M. (2018) Autointoxication and historical precursors of the microbiome–gut–brain axis. Microbial Ecology in Health and Disease, 29(2), 1548249. (doi: 10.1080/16512235.2018.1548249)

Moore, A. M., Mathias, M. and Valeur, J. (2018) Contextualising the microbiota–gut–brain axis in history and culture. Microbial Ecology in Health and Disease, 30(sup1), 1546267. (doi: 10.1080/16512235.2019.1546267) (PMID:30455619) (PMCID:PMC6237169)

Mathias, M. (2018) Recycling excrement in Flaubert and Zola. Forum for Modern Language Studies, 54(2), pp. 224-243. (doi: 10.1093/fmls/cqx040)

Mathias, M. (2018) Pre-Darwinian species change: reincarnation and transformism in George Sand’s Évenor et Leucippe. Journal of Literature and Science, 11(1), pp. 33-49. (doi: 10.12929/jls.11.1.03)

2016

Mathias, M. (2016) Sand, Flaubert, Cuvier: writing time and nature. French Studies, 70(4), pp. 519-534. (doi: 10.1093/fs/knw163)

Mathias, M. (2016) 'L’esprit, le cœur et les bras”: Rethinking art as labour in George Sand. Modern Language Review, 111(1), pp. 104-120. (doi: 10.5699/modelangrevi.111.1.0104)

2015

Mathias, M. (2015) Vision in the Novels of George Sand. Series: Oxford modern languages and literature monographs. Oxford University Press: Oxford. ISBN 9780198735397 (doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735397.001.0001)

2014

Mathias, M. (2014) Mise en scène et visualisation dans les romans de George Sand. In: Nesci, C. and Bara, O. (eds.) Écriture, Performance et Théâtralité dans l’œuvre de George Sand. Series: Bibliothèque stendhalienne et romantique. ELLUG: Grenoble. ISBN 9782843102691

2013

Mathias, M. (2013) Between text and image: negotiating the visual in a selection of George Sand’s novels. In: Guyon, L. and Watts, A. (eds.) Aller(s)-Retour(s): Nineteenth-Century France in Motion. Cambridge Scholars Publishing: Newcastle upon Tyne, pp. 79-95. ISBN 9781443847643

Mathias, M. (2013) Crystallography in Sand, Stendhal, Pictet, and Baudelaire. Dix-Neuf, 17(2), pp. 141-155. (doi: 10.1179/1478731813Z.00000000031)

2012

Mathias, M. (2012) ‘Meiddio Byw’: Agwedd y llenor at fywyd yng ngohebiaeth George Sand a Gustave Flaubert, Kate Roberts a Saunders Lewis = [‘Daring to live': Work-life balance in the world of the writer]. Gwerddon, 12, pp. 79-96.

Mathias, M. (2012) Y Llythyr a'r Llyfr. Astudiaeth Feirniadol o Ohebiaeth George Sand a Gustave Flaubert, Kate Roberts a Saunders Lewis’, [Literary Letters. A Comparative Study of the Correspondence of George Sand and Gustave Flaubert, and Kate Roberts and Saunders Lewis]. In: Hallam, T. and Price, A. (eds.) Ysgrifau Beirniadol XXXI. Gwasg Gee: Bethesda, pp. 9-30. ISBN 9781904554172

2011

Mathias, M. , O’Sullivan, M. and Vorstman, R. (Eds.) (2011) Display and Disguise. Series: Modern French Identities. Peter Lang: Oxford. ISBN 9783034301770

2008

Mathias, M. (2008) Nanon (1872): une défense du capitalisme? Réflexions sur la signification de l’argent dans l’œuvre ainsi qu’autour de l’œuvre. George Sand Studies, 28, pp. 57-64.

2007

Mathias, M. (2007) “Dyn dewr, gwraig dda”: deuoliaeth ym mywyd a gwaith George Sand = [“A brave man, a good woman”: dualities in the life and works of George Sand]. Taliesin, 132, pp. 66-77.

This list was generated on Wed Nov 20 19:59:56 2024 GMT.
Number of items: 22.

Articles

Mathias, M. (2022) Chocolate and the French novel: modernity, language, nature. Modern and Contemporary France, (doi: 10.1080/09639489.2022.2134324) (Early Online Publication)

Mathias, M. (2018) Autointoxication and historical precursors of the microbiome–gut–brain axis. Microbial Ecology in Health and Disease, 29(2), 1548249. (doi: 10.1080/16512235.2018.1548249)

Moore, A. M., Mathias, M. and Valeur, J. (2018) Contextualising the microbiota–gut–brain axis in history and culture. Microbial Ecology in Health and Disease, 30(sup1), 1546267. (doi: 10.1080/16512235.2019.1546267) (PMID:30455619) (PMCID:PMC6237169)

Mathias, M. (2018) Recycling excrement in Flaubert and Zola. Forum for Modern Language Studies, 54(2), pp. 224-243. (doi: 10.1093/fmls/cqx040)

Mathias, M. (2018) Pre-Darwinian species change: reincarnation and transformism in George Sand’s Évenor et Leucippe. Journal of Literature and Science, 11(1), pp. 33-49. (doi: 10.12929/jls.11.1.03)

Mathias, M. (2016) Sand, Flaubert, Cuvier: writing time and nature. French Studies, 70(4), pp. 519-534. (doi: 10.1093/fs/knw163)

Mathias, M. (2016) 'L’esprit, le cœur et les bras”: Rethinking art as labour in George Sand. Modern Language Review, 111(1), pp. 104-120. (doi: 10.5699/modelangrevi.111.1.0104)

Mathias, M. (2013) Crystallography in Sand, Stendhal, Pictet, and Baudelaire. Dix-Neuf, 17(2), pp. 141-155. (doi: 10.1179/1478731813Z.00000000031)

Mathias, M. (2012) ‘Meiddio Byw’: Agwedd y llenor at fywyd yng ngohebiaeth George Sand a Gustave Flaubert, Kate Roberts a Saunders Lewis = [‘Daring to live': Work-life balance in the world of the writer]. Gwerddon, 12, pp. 79-96.

Mathias, M. (2008) Nanon (1872): une défense du capitalisme? Réflexions sur la signification de l’argent dans l’œuvre ainsi qu’autour de l’œuvre. George Sand Studies, 28, pp. 57-64.

Mathias, M. (2007) “Dyn dewr, gwraig dda”: deuoliaeth ym mywyd a gwaith George Sand = [“A brave man, a good woman”: dualities in the life and works of George Sand]. Taliesin, 132, pp. 66-77.

Books

Mathias, M. (2024) Gut, Brain, and Environment in Nineteenth Century French Literature and Medicine. Series: Routledge Studies in Literature and Health Humanities. Routledge. ISBN 9781032427812 (Accepted for Publication)

Mathias, M. (2015) Vision in the Novels of George Sand. Series: Oxford modern languages and literature monographs. Oxford University Press: Oxford. ISBN 9780198735397 (doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735397.001.0001)

Book Sections

Mathias, M. (2020) A disease-free world: the hygienic utopia in Jules Verne, Camille Flammarion and William Morris. In: Shuttleworth, S., Dixon, M. and Taylor-Brown, E. (eds.) Progress and Pathology: Medicine and Culture in the Nineteenth Century. Manchester University Press, pp. 127-152. ISBN 9781526133687

Mathias, M. (2018) Digestion and brain work in Zola and Huysmans. In: Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (eds.) Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture. Series: Literature, Science and Medicine. Palgrave, pp. 155-176. ISBN 9783030018566

Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (2018) The gut feelings of medical culture. In: Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (eds.) Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture. Series: Palgrave studies in literature, science and medicine. Palgrave Macmillan: Cham, pp. 1-14. ISBN 9783030018566 (doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-01857-3_1)

Mathias, M. (2014) Mise en scène et visualisation dans les romans de George Sand. In: Nesci, C. and Bara, O. (eds.) Écriture, Performance et Théâtralité dans l’œuvre de George Sand. Series: Bibliothèque stendhalienne et romantique. ELLUG: Grenoble. ISBN 9782843102691

Mathias, M. (2013) Between text and image: negotiating the visual in a selection of George Sand’s novels. In: Guyon, L. and Watts, A. (eds.) Aller(s)-Retour(s): Nineteenth-Century France in Motion. Cambridge Scholars Publishing: Newcastle upon Tyne, pp. 79-95. ISBN 9781443847643

Mathias, M. (2012) Y Llythyr a'r Llyfr. Astudiaeth Feirniadol o Ohebiaeth George Sand a Gustave Flaubert, Kate Roberts a Saunders Lewis’, [Literary Letters. A Comparative Study of the Correspondence of George Sand and Gustave Flaubert, and Kate Roberts and Saunders Lewis]. In: Hallam, T. and Price, A. (eds.) Ysgrifau Beirniadol XXXI. Gwasg Gee: Bethesda, pp. 9-30. ISBN 9781904554172

Book Reviews

Mathias, M. (2022) Allégories de l’estomac au xixe siècle: littérature, art, philosophie. Sous la direction de Bertrand Marquer. French Studies, (doi: 10.1093/fs/knac118)[Book Review]

Edited Books

Mathias, M. and Moore, A. M. (Eds.) (2018) Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture. Series: Palgrave studies in literature, science and medicine. Palgrave Macmillan: Cham. ISBN 9783030018566

Mathias, M. , O’Sullivan, M. and Vorstman, R. (Eds.) (2011) Display and Disguise. Series: Modern French Identities. Peter Lang: Oxford. ISBN 9783034301770

This list was generated on Wed Nov 20 19:59:56 2024 GMT.

Grants

2023              Society for French Studies Prize Research Fellowship 

2022              Research Reinvigoration Award (£31,079)

2021               Royal Society of Edinburgh Network Grant (£15,500)

2018                Society for Social History of Medicine (£311)

2018               British Society for the History of Science (£300)

2017               British Academy Small Research Grant (£8,840)

2017                Society for French History Conference Grant (£500)

2017                British Society for Literature and Science Small Research Grant (£400)

2016                Society for French Studies Conference Grant (£300)

2016                British Society for the History of Science (£300)

2016                Carnegie Research Incentive Grant (£4,300)

2015                British Society for the History of Science Research Grant (£300)

2014                Carnegie Trust Research Grant (£2,500)

2007–2010      Saunders Lewis Fellowship (£7,500)

2007-2010       Fully funded doctorate, AHRC

Supervision

Supervising:

Donna Wilson, Translating narratives of autism

  • Wilson, Donna
    Translating narratives of autism: an autoethnographic study.

Sophie Maddison, Urban Interconnections in the Works of Zola and Serao

Teaching

 

Nineteenth-century France is a deeply invigorating period to study and teach and I enjoy developing new courses that draw on exciting new work in nineteenth-century studies. For example, I have launched an Honours option on Food in French Culture, inspired by my research project on digestive health. I also enjoy teaching all aspects of language and have experience of teaching grammar; composition; and translation into and out of French at all levels.

I currently convene the following courses:

French Language 2; Food and Culture in France

 

 

Research datasets

Jump to: 2022
Number of items: 1.

2022

ROSS, K. , Keith, N. , Abbott, L., Adams, C., Aitken, E., Aslett, O., Basra, S., Bell, I., Bradley, J., Brown, T., Brown, W., Chen, R., Cheskin, L., Corrie, R., de Vries, E., Defty, E., Drake, H., Dunlop, H., Emadi, A. , Evans, J. , Everett, S., Feng, Z., Fraser, A., Gallacher, K. , Gaynor-Kirk, E., Halsey, C. , Harris, F., Hu, J., Hush, G., Jamieson, N. , Jameison, V., Jones, R. , Just, L., Lembo, T. , Lloyd, B., Ma, C.-L., Macdonald, S. , Mathias, M. , McAra, M., McCaffrey, B., Mccluskey, L.-A., Mchattie, L.-S., Mcneill, E., Milliken, A., Mogford, D., Morris, G., Nicoll, M., O'Brien, T., Onwuka, T., Papanastasatou, M., Perry, M. , Prosser, Z., Proudfoot, B., Raman Komnedath, S., Robinson, J. , Sleight, R., Smith, P., Stricevic, M., Tharp, B., Thoresson, V., Thorne, J., Vansteenhouse, H., Welisch, G. and Wu, O. (2022) Symbiotic Futures: Health, Well-being and Care in the Post-Covid World. [Data Collection]

This list was generated on Thu Nov 21 05:23:18 2024 GMT.

Additional information

 UNIVERSITY ROLES 

 EXTERNAL ROLES

  • 2024: Carnegie Trust Research Assessor
  • 2023-: Editorial Board, Humanities and Social Sciences Communications 
  • 2022: AHRC Peer Review College 
  • 2017–: Editorial Panel, French Studies Bulletin
  • 2021-: Fellow of the Royal Historical Society
  • 2021-: Mentor, University Council of Modern Languages Early Career Academics
  • 2021: Project team advisor, Lindsay Middleton, Glasgow Medical Humanities Network Early Career Foundation Award, 'Dishes of the Sick Room'