Emily Cockayne

I came to the UEA in 2009, after lecturing at Oxford University, and for the Open University. I am a cultural historian, focusing on interpersonal relationships, material culture, nuisances and domestic and street environments in England. Unusually, I am not focused on a specific time period, but have written about historical experiences from the late-medieval period, until modern times. I have four published books: Hubbub. Filth, Noise & Stench in England (2007), Cheek by Jowl. A History of Neighbours (2012), and Rummage: a History of the Things we have Reused, Recycled and Refused to let go (2020). I have also worked on the history of deafness, the human senses, early civic planning, and dogs in the late medieval and early modern period. My fourth monograph, Penning Poison (OUP, 2023) is about anonymous letter writing and poison pen letters, 1760-1939.

I have a website: https://www.rummage.work/

• Cultural history
• Neighbouring
• Material culture
• Recycling, history of
• material reuse, history of
• Neighbourhoods, history of
• Interpersonal relationships, history of
• Libel, history of
• Obscenity, history of
• Genealogical research
• Letter writing, anonymously, history of
• Animals in cities, history of
• Senses and sensations, history of
• Sounds and noise, history of
• Deafness, history of
• Victorian plastics