Finn Manders

My thesis “Commonplacing Health and the Body in Early Modern England” is an LAHP funded Collaborative Doctoral Award between UCL and the Wellcome Collection. It examines commonplace books in relation to the development of everyday ideas about health and the body, with sources drawn from the Wellcome and other specialist libraries. 

I am interested in the social and cultural histories of early modern Scotland and England, with a focus on the late seventeenth century. I believe that attention to gender is fundamental to the practice of early modern cultural History, and my work draws heavily from scholarship on women’s writing and gender history. It is also situated in the history of medicine and manuscript studies, and benefits from an intersection of exciting new work across the field of early modern history. Most importantly perhaps, I love working with manuscripts, and find it a real privilege that the bulk of my work involves spending time with unique texts created by individuals over 300 years ago.

My undergraduate dissertation focused on representations of the female body in early modern Scotland. I also spent a good deal of my time at university involved in outreach and widening participation, so after my undergraduate studies, I pursued these interests for two years as a full-time Schools Liaison Officer for Emmanuel College, Cambridge. I started my postgraduate studies in 2022 with an MPhil by Research at the University of Glasgow, where I examined representations of time in early modern Scottish recipe books. 

PhD

Supervisors: Elaine Leong (Primary), Angus Gowland (Secondary), Julia Nurse (Wellcome Collection, CDA supervisor), Elma Brenner (Wellcome Collection, CDA supervisor) 
Working Title: Commonplacing Health and the Body in Early Modern England 
Expected Completion: 2027

Scholarships and Prizes

  • PhD: London Arts & Humanities Partnership (AHRC) Scholarship.  
  • MPhil: Edna Stark Scholarship.
  • Undergraduate: Sir James Holt Prize (Fitzwilliam College, 2020), W F Reddaway Prize (Fitzwilliam College, 2020), Highly Commended: Outstanding Student Contribution to Education Award (University of Cambridge, 2019)

Teaching

  • 2024 – HIST007 Writing History (Y1 undergraduate module)

Widening Participation

  • 2024 – Tutor for the Brilliant Club (KS2, 2 placements)
  • 2020-2022 – Schools Liaison Officer (Emmanuel College, Cambridge)
  • 2017-2020 – Widening-participation focused student ambassador, tutor, mentor and student charity volunteer (University of Cambridge, Fitzwilliam College, Kent Academies Network, Lumina, Fitzwilliam College JCR, InsideUni, SchoolsConnect Cambridge).

Conferences & Other Speaking Events

Presenter 

a young woman with brown hair and a black top smiles

Email: finnella.manders.23@ucl.ac.uk
X: @history_finn 

RPS Profile

Qualifications

  • 2023: MPhil by Research, History, University of Glasgow
  • 2020: MA (Cantab), History, University of Cambridge. Class I.