Tania Shew

My PhD research forms an analysis of the politicisation of personal romantic relationships within the British and American women's suffrage movements. I am investigating the extent to which the tenets behind the mantra 'the personal is political', traditionally associated with mid-late twentieth-century trans-Atlantic feminism, can in fact be traced back to the previous wave of feminist activism. I am exploring which suffrage campaigners, why, where and when subverted their own personal relationships with men as a feminist symbol or political tactic and the implications of these patterns for suffrage historiography. I am interested in what this evidence contributes to the following themes: the tactics of the women’s suffrage movement, the parameters of suffragists’ political agency, suffrage approaches to sexual and marital inequality, the relative importance of the vote within first wave feminism and Victorian and Edwardian conceptualisations of the role of the female citizen.  

'President's Doctoral Scholar Award' University of Manchester, 2018-2021

'Rose Prize' for highest ranking student in History, University of Sussex, 2016