Naomi Wood

About Me

I'm a religious and social historian in the first year of my PhD. I am working on a thesis with the developing title: "Piety Promoted': The everyday lives and experiences of Quaker women in a transatlantic religious community, c1650-1750'.

I have been awarded funding for my doctorate by the Warwick Postgraduate Research Scholarship and am privileged to be working under a dual supervision with Bernard Capp and Mark Knights.

I received both my BA in History (2009) and my MA in Religious and Social History (2010) from the University of Warwick. My MA was supervised by Bernard Capp, who first introduced me to the Quaker movement and has supported my fascination with the movement ever since. My final dissertation entitled "So the Lord brought his Judgements upon all': Providence, Punishment and Quakerism, c.1650-1700' gave me the opportunity to undertake a detailed study of the movement and also gave me my first taste of the extensive records of the movement held at Friends House in London. I was awarded the John Elliot prize for 'Most outstanding History MA 2009-2010' for my dissertation.

Between finishing my Masters in 2010 and starting my PhD in October 2011, I worked as an Electronic Content Editor for the educational publisher Nelson Thornes, based in my home town of Cheltenham in Gloucestershire. Since finishing at the company I have continued to be employed as a freelance copyeditor, development editor and proof-reader.

About my research

I'm interested in the role of women and gender in dissenting communities. My current area of focus is on seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Quaker women in England and America, with specific focus on two important regions of the movement at this time - for England, the North West, with specific reference to Lancaster and for America, Philadelphia. In both these regions, early female converts are a fascinating subject of study, not only because they often converted to the movement without the consent of husbands or fathers, but also because their work on behalf of the Society of Friends transcended contemporary views about gender and the position of women within society.

Despite a well-established pedigree of histories on the Quaker movement and its female preachers, there is a distinct absence of the more ‘ordinary’ Quaker woman from the historical record. In fact, few discussions account for the important role that the non-itinerant Quaker woman had in supporting her local meeting and community and in sustaining the movement during years of intense persecution and declining numbers.

The areas that my research will address are:

Quaker women's networks and methods of communication
Women's influence in the Quaker marriage and courtship process
Motherhood and the role of Quaker women in childrearing and education
Women's work within the local, national and international Quaker community
The integration and tensions that female converts had with the non-Quaker community

More information about my research can be found here.

Education

2011-2014 PhD History, University of Warwick

2009-2010 MA Religious and Social History, University of Warwick (Distinction)

2006-2009 BA History, University of Warwick (First Class Hons)

Grants and Awards

2011-2014 Warwick Postgraduate Research Scholarship

2012 University of Warwick American Study and Student Exchange Committee (ASSEC)

2012 Royal Historical Society Postrgraduate Research Support Grant

2009-2010 Winner of the Sir John Elliot prize for 'Most Outstanding History MA, 2009-2010'

Publications

'Review of Susan E. Klepp and Karin Wulf (eds.), The Diary of Hannah Callender Sansom: Sense and Sensibility in the Age of the American Revolution (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2010)', in Quaker History. (Forthcoming).