A warm welcome to Claire Turner, who joins the Platform as a 2025-26 Bridging Fellow in the Affective Experience Lab and the Department of History. Claire is a historian of medicine and the senses, and her current research centres on sensory experiences and understandings of cancer in the early modern period. She was previously a 2024-25 Postdoctoral Fellow with the Society for Renaissance Studies and a Digital Engagement Fellow at the University of Leeds. During her Bridging Fellowship, Claire will be developing her research project on the sensescapes of cancer (1700-1950) and working on her monograph, ‘Plague and the Senses in Early Modern London’ (contracted with Manchester University Press).
1. If your research was a film, what would the title be?
The Sickest Sense.
2. What will you be doing during your Bridging Fellowship?
For the first half of the fellowship, I’ll be finishing off my current and recent research projects. I’ll be writing my monograph on ‘Plague and the Senses in Early Modern London’, which will be published with Manchester University Press. I’ll also be publishing various pieces on my current postdoctoral research on ‘Cancer, Identity, and the Senses in Early Modern England’. In the second half of the fellowship, I’ll be developing my new research project on ‘The Sensescapes of Cancer, c.1700-1950’.
3. What expertise and experiences will you be drawing on during the fellowship?
As a historian interested in sensory experiences, I’ll be drawing on my experience of working with a range of archival and historic materials in an innovative and embodied way. I am also interested in creative facilitation, and I’ve worked closely with several museums and colleges to deliver interactive and immersive workshops and exhibitions. During the fellowship, I’d like to apply these skills to my new research project.
4. Why are you excited about working in The Platform?
I’m looking forward to the opportunity to work as part of an interdisciplinary team and learn about new research methodologies relevant to the medical humanities. I’m also excited to work with The Platform because they have such great connections with a range of clinical groups both within and outside of academia. The thing I am most looking forward to is networking with scholars in the Affective Experience Lab, where I’m hoping to develop my research skills in sensory studies.
5. What changes would you like to see as a result of your research?
In terms of the research itself, I’d like to see an increased awareness of the significance of the senses as an avenue through which to explore health and disease in the past, present, and future. I’d also like to see more attention being paid to male experiences of cancer, both as patients and carers.
But I’d also like to see more awareness in how important the senses are in experiences of illness today. I’m particularly keen to draw attention to the impact that chemosensory impairments can have on the day-to-day lives of cancer patients, their families, and their carers.
6. What interests or hobbies do you have outside your research that might surprise people?
I like mixing house and tech music, abstract photography, contemporary fiction, and hiking.
