Biography
Jo Croft is a Senior Lecturer in English Literature, specialising in psychoanalysis, spatial theory, and eco-criticism. She completed her Phd. on ‘Adolescence and Writing: Locating the Borderline’ at Sussex University. Since publishing Our House: The Representation of Domestic Space in Modern Culture in 2006 (edited, with Gerry Smyth) Croft’s research has centred on ‘material mobilities’ (especially ‘hoarding’, ‘beachcombing’, ‘gleaning’ and ‘swimming’). She is currently writing a monograph entitled Dreaming on Car Park Beach: The Eco-poetics of Matter and Movement. She is developing her research using ‘cabinet’ based installations, and audio-visual formats. Her short films about swimming have been screened at conferences, and as part of an exhibition about swimming (‘Nofio’) at Aberystwyth Art Centre.
Publications
Journal article
Croft J. 2019. “The cruelty towards others like ourselves… is difficult to imagine here as you turn to swim your twentieth length”: Swimming and Dreaming of Elsewhere with John Berger Turney R, Van Noord G. Cultural Politics, Public Url
Croft J. 2018. Gleaning and Dreaming on Car Park Beach Humanities, 7 :33-33 DOI Publisher Url Public Url
Film
2017. Plastic waste flows between us
Chapters
Croft J. 2016. Youth culture and style British Cultural Identities :153-182 9781138951129 DOI
Croft JS. 1998. 'Writing the Adolescent Body' Campbell J, Harbord J. Psycho-politics and Cultural Desires :1-230 Taylor and Francis. London
Croft JS. 1997. 'Looking Up the Adolescent in Freud's Index' Simms K. Ethics and The Subject volume 8 :1-286 Rodopi Press. Amsterdam
Croft J. 'Churning, Processing, Holding On: A Hoarder’s Syntax.' Chapter in The Temporalities of Waste; Out of Sight, Out of Time Allon F, Barcan F, Eddison-Cogan K. The Temporalities of Waste: Out of Sight, Out of Time Routledge
Croft JS. 'From Wayward Youth to Teenage Dreamer: Between the Bedroom and the Street' Bentley N, Johnson B, Zieleniec A. Teenage Dreams: Youth Subcultures in Fiction, Film and Theory Palgrave Macmillan
Croft JS. ‘A Life of Longing Behind the Bedroom Door: Adolescent Space and the Makings of Private Identity’ Smyth G, Croft J. Our House: The Representation of Domestic Space in Modern Culture :209-226 Rodopi. Amsterdam
Croft J. 'A Life of Longing Beyond the Bedroom Door: Adolescent Space and the Makings of Private Identity' Smyth G, Croft J. Our House: The Representation of Domestic Space in Modern Culture Rodopi. Amsterdam and New York 9 789042019690
Croft JS. '"Go hang yourself, you who have never been comfortably seated and eating an olive": The Taste and Defiance of an Adolescent Body' Syrotinski M, MacLachlan I. Sensual Reading: New Approaches to Reading in Its Relations to the Senses :7-350 Bucknell University Press. Lewisburg
Book
Smyth GA, Croft JS . Our House: The Representation of Domestic Space in Contemporary Culture Smyth GA, Croft J. 1 :11-268 Rodopi. Amsterdam Publisher Url
Conference publication
Croft JS. The Hoarder Next Door and The Hoarder in Me: Phobic Exchanges between People and Stuff Fear and Loathing: Phobia in Literature and Culture
Croft JS. '"The Dilapidation of the Box was Poignant" (Denton Welch): Narratives of Accumulation and Loss (or what Hoarders can tell us about Feelings)’ Historical Perspectives on Loss, Grief and Pain
Croft JS. 'Unpacking my Hoard: A Talk About Literary Hoarding (or “Too many feelings about too many books”) Perversions of Paper
Croft JS. ‘“The Things seemed to be living for me especially”: a moving story of Denton Welch and his stuff’ Material Culture in Action: Practices of Making, Collecting and Re-enacting
Croft JS. ‘Gleaning, Dreaming and Encountering Hyper Objects on the Way to Work’ Supernatural Cities: Exploring the Urban Mindscape
Croft JS. 'Towards an Eco-Poetics of "Car Park Beach"’ 6th Science and Technology Studies’ Italia Conference on ‘Socio-Technical Environments
Exhibition
Croft J. NOFIO/SWIMMING - exhibition held at Aberystwyth Arts Centre, Sat 17 March to Sat 26 May 2018. Author Url Public Url
Engagement & Impact
Conference presentation:
Plastic waste flows between us, The lives and afterlives of plastic, Massey university New Zealand http://perc.ac.nz/wordpress/the-lives-and-afterlives-of-plastic/, Co-produced with Dr Jo Croft video Online video presentation. 2017