Women's Studies Group 1558 – 1837
Women's and gender studies in the early modern period and long eighteenth century
We have an upcoming Zoom seminar on Thursday 6th November, 2025. ZOOM 18:45 FOR 19.00 – 20.00 (GMT).
The papers to be presented are:
Valerie Schutte: Queen Mary I of England and portrait medals in print.
Conor Byrne: Representations of the executions of British Queens in early modern images.
Yihong Zhu: Women at night: readers, writers, pleasure-seekers, and night-walkers in eighteenth-century London.
All members are invited to attend. The Zoom link will be sent via the members list.
We have an upcoming seminar taking place on Saturday 4th October, 2025. In-Person: Foundling Museum, 40 Brunswick Square, London, WC1N 1AZ, Saturday 13.00 for 13:30 – 16:30, British Summer Time (GMT + 1)
The papers to be presented include:
Julia Hamilton: Anna of Denmark and the origins of the Stuart sequence.
Pilar Botías Dominguez: Cathartic privacy: war, exile and melancholia in Margaret Cavendish’s Sociable Letters.
Gillian Williamson: Elizabeth Inchbald: a life in lodgings.
All members are invited to attend.
The Women’s Studies Group 1558–1837 is pleased to announce the speakers for their seminar series 2025–26.
The group has two kinds of meeting for seminars.
In-person seminar meetings. These take place at the Foundling Museum, 40 Brunswick Square, WC1N 1AZ, UK, on Saturday afternoons. We will be allowed into the room at 1.00 pm, to give us time to sort out paperwork and technology, but sessions will run from 1.30 pm – 4.30 pm. Please arrive between 1.00 pm – 1.30 pm. The Foundling is a wheelchair accessible venue, and directions for getting to the Museum can be found here, including for those who are partially sighted. Seminars are free to WSG members. Non-members are welcome and are kindly requested to pay the Museum entrance fee and make a donation of £2 for refreshments. Those attending the seminars are welcome to look round the museum before or after.
ZOOM seminar meetings. These take place on Thursday evenings and will be hosted by a member of the WSG committee. They run from 7.00 pm – 8.30 pm, with the waiting room opening at 6.45 pm. Please be aware, you must be a member of the WSG to gain access to the Zoom sessions. The links are distributed through our WSG mailing list 24-hours before the event.
Women’s Studies Group 1558–1837, Seminar Schedule 2025–2026
Saturday 4 October 2025
In-person, Foundling Museum London 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30, British Summer Time (GMT +1)
Julia Hamilton: Anna of Denmark and the origins of the Stuart sequence.
Pilar Botías Dominguez: Cathartic privacy: war, exile and melancholia in Margaret Cavendish’s Sociable Letters.
Gillian Williamson: Elizabeth Inchbald: a life in lodgings.
***
Thursday 6 November 2025
ZOOM 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT)
Valerie Schutte: Queen Mary I of England and portrait medals in print.
Conor Byrne: Representations of the executions of British Queens in early modern images.
Yihong Zhu: Women at night: readers, writers, pleasure-seekers, and night-walkers in eighteenth-century London.
***
Saturday 6 December 2025
In-person, Foundling Museum London 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30 (GMT)
Breeze Barrington: ‘Versifying Maid[s] of Honour’: Mary of Modena’s artistic legacy.
Diane Clements: ‘A very anxious and affectionate mother’: dealing with personal indebtedness in Georgian England.
Rhian Jones: ‘For what signifies an absent friend?’ Epistolary friendship between women and men in England, c. 1650-1750.
***
Thursday 15 January 2026
ZOOM 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT)
Stephen Spiess: Trans Allegoresis: Margaret Cavendish’s ‘Assaulted and Pursued Chastity’.
Gillian Beattie-Smith: Creating women’s literary identities: the Tour of Scotland.
Vicki Joule: Travelling and performing the self: Delarivier Manley and the ‘Stage’ coach.
Brianna Robertson-Kirkland: The other Mrs Corri: Camilla Corri’s musical legacy in Edinburgh.
***
Saturday 7 February 2026
In-person, Foundling Museum London 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30 (GMT)
Esther Villegas de la Torre: Seventeenth-century women scholars: an interdisciplinary, comparative approach.
Nora Rodriguez Loro: The rhetoric of royal panegyrics: Medbourne’s dedication of St Cecily (1666) to Catherine of Braganza.
Sarah Clarke: Catharine Pelzer’s years in Exeter in the 1840s: from child prodigy to adult musician. Clutching at straws.
***
Thursday 12 March 2026
ZOOM 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT)
Sarah Barthélemy: Spiritual retreats and women in early modern France.
Helena Queirós: Mediated bodies, devotional scripts: intermedial practices in early modern convents.
Laura Giuliano: Lady Anna Miller (1741-1781): a question of connoisseurship.
Teresa Rączka-Jeziorska: A Polish museum in an English garden. Romantic collection of multinational items of Princess Izabella Czartorska née Flemming.
***
Thursday March 19 2026
ZOOM 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT)
Elisabetta Marino: Mary Shelley and biography, between history and romance.
Ramit Samaddar: Sophia Goldborne in Colonial Bengal: Phebe Gibbes’s Hartly House, Calcutta.
Charlotte Vallis: The role of French Ambassadors at the courts of Elizabeth Petrovna and Catherine II.
Lisa VandenBerghe and Isabelle Lémonon-Waxin: Victorine de Chastenay: a scholar, an archive, a digital edition
For further information including abstracts, see our seminars page, or contact the organiser Carolyn D. Williams, cdwilliamslyle@aol.com. To join the WSG, see our membership page.
| Day/Date/Time | Event | Details |
| Saturday 4 October 2025 13:30 – 16:30 (BST) GMT+ 1 | In-person seminar Foundling Museum,40 Brunswick Square, London WC1N 1AZ | Julia Hamilton: Anna of Denmark and the origins of the Stuart sequence. Pilar Botías Dominguez: Cathartic privacy: war, exile and melancholia in Margaret Cavendish’s Sociable Letters. Gillian Williamson: Elizabeth Inchbald: a life in lodgings. |
| 28 October 2025 19:00 – 20:00 (GMT) | WSG Reading Group: Her Stories | Frances Brooks’ ‘History of Montague’ |
| Thursday 6 November 2025 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT) | Online seminar via Zoom | Valerie Schutte: Queen Mary I of England and portrait medals in print. Conor Byrne: Representations of the executions of British Queens in early modern images. Yihong Zhu: Women at night: readers, writers, pleasure-seekers, and night-walkers in eighteenth-century London. |
| Saturday 6 December 2025 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30 (GMT) | In-person seminar Foundling Museum, 40 Brunswick Square, London WC1N 1AZ | Breeze Barrington: ‘Versifying Maid[s] of Honour’: Mary of Modena’s artistic legacy. Diane Clements: ‘A very anxious and affectionate mother’: dealing with personal indebtedness in Georgian England. Rhian Jones: ‘For what signifies an absent friend?’ Epistolary friendship between women and men in England, c. 1650-1750. |
| Thursday 15 January 2026 19:00 – 20:30 GMT | Online seminar via Zoom | Stephen Spiess: Trans Allegoresis: Margaret Cavendish’s ‘Assaulted and Pursued Chastity’. Gillian Beattie-Smith: Creating women’s literary identities: the Tour of Scotland. Vicki Joule: Travelling and performing the self: Delarivier Manley and the ‘Stage’ coach. Brianna Robertson-Kirkland: The other Mrs Corri: Camilla Corri’s musical legacy in Edinburgh. |
| Saturday 7 February 2026 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30 (GMT) | In-person seminar Foundling Museum, 40 Brunswick Square, London WC1N 1AZ | Esther Villegas de la Torre: Seventeenth-century women scholars: an interdisciplinary, comparative approach. Nora Rodriguez Loro: The rhetoric of royal panegyrics: Medbourne’s dedication of St Cecily (1666) to Catherine of Braganza. Sarah Clarke: Catharine Pelzer’s years in Exeter in the 1840s: from child prodigy to adult musician. Clutching at straws. |
| Sunday 8 March 2026 | International Women’s Day | Details to be confirmed. WSG in collaboration with the Foundling Museum. |
| Thursday 12 March 2026 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT) | Online seminar via Zoom | Sarah Barthélemy: Spiritual retreats and women in early modern France. Helena Queirós: Mediated bodies, devotional scripts: intermedial practices in early modern convents. Laura Giuliano: Lady Anna Miller (1741-1781): a question of connoisseurship. Teresa Rączka-Jeziorska: A Polish museum in an English garden. Romantic collection of multinational items of Princess Izabella Czartorska née Flemming. |
| Thursday 19 March 2026 | Online seminar via Zoom | Elisabetta Marino: Mary Shelley and biography, between history and romance. Ramit Samaddar: Sophia Goldborne in colonial Calcutta: Phebe Gibbes’s Hartly House, Calcutta. Charlotte Vallis: The role of French Ambassadors at the courts of Elizabeth Petrovna and Catherine II. Lisa VandenBerghe and Isabelle Lémonon-Waxin: Victoria de Chastenay: a scholar, an archive, a digital edition. |
| Saturday 18 April 2026 (GMT) | Workshop | An opportunity to present and discuss your research interests. |
| Saturday 16 May 2026 | Summer Visit | Ham House visit. A NT property, former home of Catherine & Elizabeth Murray. |
The Women’s Studies Group 1558-1837 is a small, informal, multidisciplinary group formed to promote women’s studies in the early modern period and the long eighteenth century. Established in the 1980s, the group has enabled those interested in women’s and gender studies to keep in touch, hear about one another’s research, meetings and publications, and meet regularly to discuss relevant topics. We organize regular meetings and an annual workshop (see membership application form) where members can meet and discuss women’s studies topics. This season we shall also be hosting two book launches for publications by our members. We can offer advice and opportunities to engage in activities that increase opportunities for publication or enhance professional profiles in other ways. The WSG is open to men, women, and non-binary people, students, faculty, and independent scholars, all of whom are invited to join the group and give papers.
The group now has two kinds of meetings for seminars.
In-person seminar meetings. These will take place at the Foundling Museum, 40 Brunswick Square, WC1N 1AZ, UK, on Saturday afternoons. We will be allowed into the room at 1.00 pm., to give us time to sort out paperwork and technology, but sessions will run from 1.30 – 4.30 pm. So please arrive a little early if you can.
ZOOM seminar meetings. These will take place on Thursday evenings and will be hosted by a member of the WSG committee. They will run from 19:00 – 20:30 GMT , with the waiting room opening at 18.45 GMT.
Topics can be related to any aspect of women’s studies: not only women writers, but any activity of a woman or women in the period of our concern, or anything that affects or is affected by women in this period, such as the law, religion, etc. Male writers writing about women or male historical figures relevant to the condition of women in this period are also a potential topic. Papers tackling aspects of women’s studies within or alongside the wider histories of gender and sexuality are particularly welcome; so are topics from the early part of our period. We would also welcome how-to presentations for discussion: examples of suitable topics would include, but are not limited to, grant applications, setting up research networks, becoming a curator, co-authorship, using specialised data, and writing about images. Papers should be 20-25 minutes.
| Dates of seminar meetings: | |
| Saturday 4 October 2025 | In-person, Foundling Museum London 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30, British Summer Time (GMT +1) |
| Thursday 6 November 2025 | ZOOM 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT) |
| Saturday 6 December 2025 | In-person, Foundling Museum, London 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30 (GMT) |
| Thursday 15 January 2026 | ZOOM 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT) |
| Thursday 12 March 2026 | ZOOM 19:00 – 20:30 (GMT) |
| Saturday 7 February 2026 | In-person, Foundling Museum, London 13:00 for 13:30 – 16:30 (GMT) |
Find out more about us on https://womensstudiesgroup.org
Please reply to 2wsgevents@gmail.com with expressions of interest and draft titles, listing all the seminar sessions when you are available to present your paper by 31 April 2025.
Final titles and abstracts will be expected to follow by the end of May 2025.
Women's Studies Group 1558 - 1837 