Clara May is a doctoral Assistant at the University of Neuchâtel, where she is working on a thesis on the imagination and evocation of the presence of perfume in eighteenth-century French artistic production. The project proposes, on the one hand, to identify the cultural, social, aesthetic and moral issues of perfume and, on the other hand, to analyze the relationship between sight and smell in French artistic practices of the period.

Jan Van Dijkhuizen is an Associate Professor of English Literature at the University of Leiden. He has recently started a new project called POEM, funded by the NWO, on 'The Poetics of Olfaction in Early Modernity'. This will trace how the language of smell was used to convey ideas about the ineffable and the relationship between humans and the natural environment. It will also work with teachers, poets, spoken word artists, novelists, and scent designers to design nose-wise lesson programmes for teaching literature in secondary schools.

Lucy McGourty is a PhD student at Leiden University. Her research examines the role of smell in early modern Dutch and English literature. Her PhD project is part of POEM.

Manon Raffard is a PhD candidate at the University of Burgundy. In their paper they will be exploring the topic ‘Olfaction Theory in 19th century France: disputes, controversies, ideologies’. Her research focuses on the interactions between olfaction and the production of knowledge in French culture and Literature between 1857 and 1914. Although primarily working within sensory studies, she also touches on cultural history, material studies, and plant humanities (among others). She is also the editor-in-chief of the scientific journal Éclats, indexed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ).

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For any questions, please contact: will.tullett@york.ac.uk.