Jane Tolmie
Associate Professor
Gender Studies; English
Cross-appointed to the Department of English; Affiliated with Cultural Studies
DPhil (Performance and Gender Studies), Oxford University
PhD (English and Comparative Literature), Harvard University
AM (English and Comparative Literature), Harvard University
MA (English), Yale University
BA, Yale University
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Research interests: comics and sequential art, feminism, queer theory, theatre and performance, reproductive justice, science fiction, fantasy, critical disability studies, art activism
This CFP for a special issue in the open-access, peer-reviewed journal _Humanities_ on feminism and comics studies is now open, guest edited by Jane Tolmie, see: Special Issue Information
Jane Tolmie (PhD Harvard, DPhil Oxon, Rhodes Scholar) is a medievalist and literature and comics specialist with research interests in: fan studies, performance and theatre (medieval and modern); sequential art; science fiction and fantasy; feminist, queer, and gender theory; autobiography/self-narration; and social justice. Her current research projects engage with critical disability studies and storytelling, and reproductive justice in popular culture. She supervises MA and PhD students in a range of disciplines including Gender Studies, English, Cultural Studies, and Education.
She is a poet, feminist activist, blogger (HuffPo), and a member of Informed Opinions. She regularly contributes interviews on topics in feminist studies and popular culture, e.g. “Do trigger warnings create a safe space for students, or coddle them?” Interview. CBC Radio The Sunday Edition. 29 November, 2015.
In connection with her work in popular culture, in this case the practice of fanvidding, she is an advocate of public and academic engagement with fandom; see appendix O of a case brought before the U.S. Copyright office at the library of Congress in 2011.
She is cross-appointed to English and affiliated with the graduate program in Cultural Studies.
Selected Publications
“Sarah Leavitt’s Tangles: Teaching Queer Caregiving Memoir on Disability, and Pedagogy as Resistance.” Feminist Encounters: A Journal of Critical Studies in Culture and Politics. 8:2, 2024.
Contagious Imagination: The Work and Art of Lynda Barry. Ed. Jane Tolmie (University Press of Mississippi, 2022).
Drawing from Life: Memory and Subjectivity in Comic Art. Ed. Jane Tolmie. (University Press of Mississippi, 2013). Nominated for 2014 Eisner award.
Laments for the Lost in Medieval Literature. Ed. Jane Tolmie and M. J. Toswell. Medieval Texts and Cultures of Northern Europe. (Brepols Press, 2010).
The Book of Vole is an ongoing poetry/art project in 2023 and the only creative project included here, done in collaboration with Canadian artist Perry Rath and discussed briefly here.
- Jane Tolmie and Perry Rath, collaborative art/poetry exhibit at the Vancouver Art Institute, April 3-June 29, 2016.
- Jane Tolmie. “Book of Vole (excerpts).” Imaginarium 3: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing. Ed.Sandra Kasturi and Helen Marshall. ChiZine 2015
- “Experiments in Autobiography: The Book of Vole (excerpts).” Strange Horizons. 2013.
“York: The Slaughter of the Innocents.” Ed. & Intro. The Broadview Anthology of Medieval Drama. Ed. Christina M. Fitzgerald and John T. Sebastian. Broadview. 2013.
“Masculinities in Canadian Literature.” Jane Tolmie and Karis Shearer. Canadian Perspectives on Men and Masculinities. Ed. Jason Laker. OUP: 2010.
“Public Scandal and Private Pain: Joseph's Quite Reasonable Doubts.” Performance, Drama and Spectacle in the Medieval City. Ed. Catherine Emerson, Adrian Tudor, Mario Longtin. Leuven: Peeters, 2010.
“Modernism, Memory and Desire: Queer Cultural Production in Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home.” Topia: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies. 22, 2009.
“Eve in the Looking-Glass: Interpretive Labour in the Anglo-Norman Adam play.” lectio difficilior: European Online Journal of Feminist Exegesis. 2, 2009.
“Silence in the Sewing Chamber: Le Roman de Silence.” French Studies. 63:1, 2009.
“Medievalism and the Fantasy Heroine.” Journal of Gender Studies.15:2, 2006. 145-59
“Goading, Ritual discord and the deflection of blame.” Journal of Historical Pragmatics: Ritual Language Behaviour. Vol.4., No.2. 2003. 287-301.
“Framing Persuasion: Eve and the Fall of the Verbal Order.” Mediaevalia: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Medieval Studies Worldwide. Vol. 20, 2001. 93-118
“Dave Duncan.” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Canadian Fantasy and Science-Fiction Writers. Ed. Douglas Ivison. A Bruccoli Clar Layman Book, The Gale Group, 2002. 75-90
“Tongue in Cheek: Treating Cannibalism in Science Fiction.” Wit’s End. 1995. 6-9