This event has now finished.
  • Date and time: Sunday 12 June 2022, 7pm to 9pm
  • Location: In-person only
    SPARK:York (Map)
  • Admission: Free admission, booking required

Event details

Thought body image and acceptance were 21st-century issues? Think again! 

Join Francesca Killoran and Charlotte Goodge of the Universities of York and Kent as they explore ideas around body positivity and body acceptance from the early 18th century to the present day. 

After a brief introduction on their research into 18th-century female obesity and sex work, Charlotte and Fran will lead an open and friendly dialogue accompanied by a zine-making session.

They will be using examples from Harris’s List of Covent Garden Ladies (1760-1795), a bawdy pamphlet which Fran affectionately refers to as the ‘Argos catalogue of sex workers’. Released every year in the run up to Christmas, this was a bestseller across Georgian London. Each woman was listed with her name, location and a description. Together with the audience, Fran and Charlotte will use this as a lens to discuss body issues and acceptance through history.

Image credit: © The Trustees of the British Museum

This event is suitable for 18+ only. 

 

About the speakers

Francesca Killoran is in the final year of her MPhil in English Literature at the University of York. Her research focuses on sex work in the eighteenth century.

Charlotte Goodge is a second-year CHASE-funded PhD student at the University of Kent. Her doctoral project aims to articulate eighteenth and early nineteenth-century understandings and depictions of the corpulent (‘fat’) woman in medical, literary and visual culture.

Partners

University of York logo AHRC CHASE logo

Venue details

  • Wheelchair accessible