Parkinson, Isabel

Academic background

Isabel graduated from Worcester College, Oxford, in 2019 with a BA in German and Philosophy (First Class), before completing an MA in Translation Studies at the University of Sheffield, where she earned a Distinction. After her MA, she spent a year working at a sixth form college in an outreach and pastoral capacity, before returning to Oxford in 2021 to begin her DPhil in Medieval and Modern Languages.

Teaching

Isabel will be offering Paper VIII modules including Literature and Psychoanalysis, ‘Postwar Restoration Frenzy’ in Austria, Representing Trauma, and the Subject in the Metropolis.

Research interests

Isabel’s doctoral research examines English translations of a selection of German language novels, including Irmgard Keun’s Das kunstseidene Mädchen and Gilgi, as well as Sasha Marianna Salzmann’s Außer sich. She focuses on consciousness narratives in which authors attempt to (and sometimes struggle to) articulate the mind of a gendered subject, investigating how, and how successfully, these efforts have been translated into English.

She is conducting this research under the supervision of Dr. Georgina Paul at St Hilda’s College, and her work is generously supported by the Clarendon Fund, the OOC AHRC DTP Scholarship, and the St Hugh’s College Flora Welch Scholarship.

Recent Publications

(forthcoming) ‘Mind Your Language! Profanity and Promiscuity in Two English Translations of Irmgard Keun’s Das kunstseidene Mädchen (1932)’, Journal of Languages, Texts and Society, 7 (2024)