Ben Clarke received his doctorate from the University of Oxford, and has taught at universities in the United States, Britain and Taiwan. His first monograph focused on George Orwell, class, and community (Orwell in Context: Communities, Myths, Values, Palgrave Macmillan 2007); his second is a broader treatment of anti-imperialist, feminist, and working class activism and experimentation in modernist and intermodernist writing (manuscript in progress; requested by Palgrave Macmillan). He has published articles on subjects including Englishness, the representation of mining communities, the idea of the public intellectual, and anthropological accounts of Taiwan. He is currently working on a co-written study of the pioneering cultural critic and theorist Richard Hoggart, which will be published by Blackwell next year. He is also working to recover marginalized texts (feminist, anti-imperialist, Jewish, and working-class writing) with new editions of three currently out-of-print interwar novels.

Degrees
D.Phil. University of Oxford.
MSt. University of Oxford
B.A. (Hons., First). University of Oxford

Primary Areas of Research/Teaching
British and Irish literature, 1900-1950
Working-class writing
Critical theory (particularly postcolonial, feminist, Marxist)
Political rhetoric
Western representations of the Asia-Pacific region (particularly Taiwan), 1860-1939

Courses Taught
3000: History of British Literature to 1700
2000: Interpreting Literature
1200: Composition
1100: Composition

Selected Publications and Presentations
Book
Understanding Richard Hoggart. Co-authored with Stuart Rawnsley and Michael Bailey [Blackwell, 2010]

Orwell in Context: Communities, Myths, Values. Palgrave Macmillan, 2007

Articles
“Richard Hoggart and the Politics of Autobiography.” Michael Bailey ed., Richard Hoggart: Culture and Critique [forthcoming,Critical, Cultural and Communications Press, 2010]

“Among the Headhunters: Janet McGovern and Anthropology in Taiwan.” Studies in Travel Writing. 2009 13:3, 251-270.

“George Orwell: Politics, Rhetoric and the Public Intellectual.” Studies in the Humanities. 2008 35:2. 231-49.

“‘Noble Bodies’: Orwell, Miners and Masculinity.” English Studies. 2008 89:4. 427-46

“To think fearlessly: Richard Hoggart and the Politics of the English Language.” Re-reading Richard Hoggart. (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2008)

“‘But the barrier is impassable’: Virginia Woolf and Class.” Anna Burrells et. al., eds., Woolfian Boundaries. (Clemson, SC: 2007)

“Orwell and Englishness.” Review of English Studies. 2006 57: 83-105

“Taiwan and the Production of Identity.” Gerd Sebald, Michael Popp and Jan Weyand, eds., GrenzGänge - Bordercrossings. (Münster: Lit Verlag, 2006)

“On Realism, or explaining novels to Lyotard.” Thomas Dörfler and Claudia Globisch eds., Postmodern Practices (Münster: Lit Verlag, 2002)

“Orwell and the Evolution of Utopian Writing.” Alberto Lázaro, ed., The Road from George Orwell: His Achievement and Legacy. (Bern: Peter Lang, 2001). 225-250

Editions
Simon Blumenfeld, Jew Boy [proposal under review at Penguin]

Clemence Dane, The Arrogant History of White Ben [proposal under review at Virago]

Jack Hilton, Caliban Shrieks [proposal under review at Trent Editions]

Additional Publications
Review of Christine Berberich, The Image of the English Gentleman in Twentieth-Century Literature. [forthcoming, Studies in the Novel]

Review of Chris Hopkins, English Fiction in the 1930s. Review of English Studies. 2008 59: 653-654

“Utopias/Dystopias” Jennifer Speake, ed., The Literature of Travel and Exploration: An Encyclopaedia (Chicago/London: Fitzroy Dearborn). 2003