Eleanor Barraclough Explained

Eleanor Barraclough
Alma Mater:Churchill College, Cambridge (MA, MPhil, PhD)
Discipline:Environmental history
Workplaces:Bath Spa University
Durham University

Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough is a British historian, broadcaster and writer. [1]

Much of her work explores the cultures, literatures and languages of the medieval north, particularly Viking Age history and Old Norse-Icelandic literature. She is the author of Embers of the Hands: Hidden Histories of the Viking Age (Profile, 2024)[2] and Beyond the Northlands: Viking Voyages and the Old Norse Sagas (Oxford University Press, 2016).[3] She also co-edited Imagining the Supernatural North (University of Alberta Press, 2016).[4]

Eleanor Barraclough studied at the University of Cambridge, in the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic, where she earned an MA (Cantab), MPhil, PhD.[5] She then moved to the University of Oxford, where she was a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow in the Faculty of English,[6] and an Extraordinary Junior Research Fellow at The Queen’s College.[7] From there she moved to Durham University, where she was associate professor in Medieval History and Literature.[8] She is currently Senior Lecturer in Environmental History at Bath Spa University.[9] She held an AHRC Leadership Grant from 2020–2024,[10] for a multidisciplinary study of forests in early northern Germanic cultures.

In 2013, Barraclough was chosen as one of ten BBC / AHRC New Generation Thinkers,[11]  in a competition to develop a new generation of academics who can bring the best of university research and scholarly ideas to a broad audience through the media and public engagement. Since then, she has presented many documentaries on BBC Radio 3 and 4, for series such as Costing the Earth, On Your Farm, Sunday Feature and Open Country.[12]

Barraclough was a regular presenter on Radio 3’s Free Thinking[13]  and hosted three series of the Time Travellers podcast for Radio 3’s Essential Classics.[14]  She also presented BBC Four’s Beyond the Walls: In Search of the Celts.[15] In 2020, Eleanor was a judge for the Costa Book Award for Biography.[16] In 2019[17] and 2020,[18] she was a judge for the BBC Countryfile Magazine Awards. When she appeared as a guest on Radio 3’s Private Passions, her music choices included ‘Rotlaust tre fell’ by Wardruna.[19] Thanks to her BBC documentaries, she has jammed with Viking musicians,[20] dunked herself in a frozen lake in search of immortality,[21] and been knighted with a walrus penis bone in the Arctic.[22]

Barraclough lives in London.

Works

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Eleanor Barraclough Official Website . Eleanor Barraclough . 28 August 2024.
  2. Web site: Embers of the Hands . Profile Books . 28 August 2024.
  3. Web site: Beyond the Northlands: Viking Voyages and the Old Norse Sagas . Waterstones . 28 August 2024.
  4. Web site: Imagining the Supernatural North . University of Alberta Press . 28 August 2024.
  5. Web site: Dr Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough . University of Cambridge . 28 August 2024.
  6. Web site: Dr Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough awarded a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship . University of Cambridge . 28 August 2024.
  7. Web site: BBC honours Queen’s College junior fellow . The Oxford Student . 28 August 2024.
  8. Web site: Academia - Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough . Eleanor Barraclough . 28 August 2024.
  9. Web site: Academia - Eleanor Barraclough - Bath Spa University . Bath Spa University . 28 August 2024.
  10. Web site: Into the Forest: Woods, Trees and Forests in the Germanic-Speaking Cultures of Northern Europe, c. 46 BC - c. 1500. . UK Research and Innovation . 28 August 2024.
  11. Web site: New research, new broadcasters - Radio 3 announces New Generation Thinkers . BBC . 28 August 2024.
  12. Web site: Broadcasting - Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough . Eleanor Barraclough . 28 August 2024.
  13. Web site: Free Thinking . BBC Radio 3 . 28 August 2024.
  14. Web site: Time Travellers . BBC Radio 3 . 28 August 2024.
  15. Web site: Beyond the Walls: In Search of the Celts . BBC Four . 28 August 2024.
  16. Web site: Judges Announced for 2020 Costa Book Awards . Costa Coffee . 28 August 2024.
  17. Web site: BBC Countryfile Magazine Awards 2019 . Countryfile . 28 August 2024.
  18. Web site: BBC Countryfile Magazine Awards 2020 . Countryfile . 28 August 2024.
  19. Web site: Private Passions . BBC Radio 3 . 28 August 2024.
  20. Web site: Sunday Feature . BBC Radio 3 . 28 August 2024.
  21. Web site: A step-by-step guide to ice bathing . BBC Radio 3 . 28 August 2024.
  22. Web site: The Supernatural North . BBC Radio 3 . 28 August 2024.
  23. Reviews for Imagining the Supernatural North:
  24. Reviews for Beyond the Northlands:

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