Dr Jessica Hancock

Biography

Dr Jessica Clare Hancock is Head of Learning and Teaching at the University of Winchester. She is Programme Leader for the MA in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, and CASTLE (Celebration and Accreditation Scheme for Teaching and Learning Expertise) - Winchester's scheme for achieving HEA Fellowship.

Prior to joining Winchester, Jessica was a lecturer in Educational Development at City, University of London where she taught and led modules on the MA in Academic Practice, and created bespoke support for PhD researchers who teach at City, including designing the Establishing a Teaching Persona programme.

Jessica has taught in Higher Education for over a decade, including at Glasgow Caledonian University, the University of Portsmouth, Brunel University and the University of Oxford.

Her background is in literature, and her ARHC-funded doctoral research, at the University of Oxford, examined gender identity in re-writings of the medieval Scandinavian Völsung legend (also the inspiration for Wagner's Ring Cycle operas). The texts analysed in her thesis included The Poetic Edda, Völsunga saga, William Morris' The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs, J. R. R. Tolkien's The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún and Melvin Burgess' young-adult novels Bloodtide and Bloodsong.

Publications

 In my feelings: Emotion, compassion and teaching development for PhD students, Educational Developments 21(1), 2020, pp. 5-8 

Masculinities in Old Norse Literature (Boydell and Brewer, 2020) (co-edited with Gareth Lloyd Evans) 

‘That which a hand gives a hand or a foot gives a foot’: Male Kinship Obligations in the Heroic Poetic Edda and Völsunga saga’ in Masculinities in Old Norse Literature (Boydell  and Brewer, 2020) 

‘Introduction’ and ‘Afterword: The Ethics and Urgency of Studying Old Norse Masculinities’  in Masculinities in Old Norse Literature (Boydell and Brewer, 2020) (co-written with Gareth Lloyd Evans) 

Engaging with Liminalities and Combating Toxicity: a Compassionate Approach to  Developing Professional Identities for PhD Students who Teach, Journal of Perspectives in Applied Academic Practice, 6(3), 2019, pp. 6674. doi:10.14297/jpaap.v6i3.380. 

‘It can’t be found in books’: how a flipped-classroom approach using online videos can  engage postgraduate students in dissertation writing, Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education 16, 2019, Available at:  https://journal.aldinhe.ac.uk/index.php/jldhe/article/view/485 

'Who’s afraid of an electric torch?: Reimagining the Viking world in contemporary picturebooks', in The Vikings Reimagined (De Gruyter, 2019)

‘Ekki fellr oss þat ór minni’: Völsunga saga as a Memory of the Heroic Poetic Edda, Proceedings for the 15th International Saga Conference (Aarhus, Aarhus University Press,  2012) 

Conference workshops

Compassionate identities through student play: creative approaches to contesting the harms of HE (Playful Learning, Leicester University: July 2019).

GTAs and compassion as a professional behaviour (GTA Developers' Forum, University of Bristol: June 2019).

‘It Engraves in Your Head Better’: International Students, Academics and Critical Writing (Association of Learning Development in Higher Education, University of Hull: April 2017)

Invited papers

How to Mechanise Your Dragon: Technology in Rewritings of the Völsung Legend (Viking Society Annual Conference, University of Birmingham: February 2016)

Education  

 Getting your DUCKS in a row for effective reflection (Intercultural Reflection on Teaching Conference, Durham University [Online]: July 2021)

 The playful pivot: how a compassionate approach to teaching was moved online (Learn at City Conference, City, University of London [Online]: June 2021)

  Teaching development during the digital pivot: experiences from City staff  (Learn at City Conference, City, University of London [Online]: June 2021)

Compassion, identity and training for PhD students who teach (SEDA, Belfast: May 2019) 

Standing on Top to Watch Over: Identity and Postgraduate Student Transitions to Good  Academic Practice (European Educational Research Association, Bolzano University:  September 2018). 

Good academic practice: a student identities approach (Association of Learning Development  in Higher Education [ALDinHE] annual conference, University of Leicester: April 2018) 

Enhancing the Student Experience of Culturally Diverse Groups (Higher Education  Institutional Research conference, Robert Gordon University: September 2017) 

‘Professor Please Read and Tell Me What I Should Be Doing?’: How International Students  Navigate the Requirement to Write Critically (European Association for Teaching Academic  Writing, Royal Holloway University, June 2017) 

‘Widen My Horizon’ or a ‘Bitter Experience’?: Group Writing and Cultural Diversity  (Writing Development in HE Biennial Conference, Plymouth University: June 2016) 

An Exploration of Group Work and Peer Assessment: A Case Study of Culturally Diverse  Groups (CABS Learning, Teaching and Student Experience Conference, Aston University,  April 2016) 

‘Share the Good Way for Learning’: International Students’ Social Interpretation of the  Learning Experience (ALDinHE annual conference, Heriot Watt University: March 2016) 

Towards a Stronger Partnership: Working with Students with BTEC Entry Qualifications in  HE (ALDinHE annual conference, Solent University: March 2015) 

You Can’t Always Do What You Want: The Practicalities of Non-subject-specific Academic  Support (ALDinHE annual conference, University of Huddersfield: March 2014) 

Literature  

 Masculinities and Virginity within Marriage in Ælfric's Lives of Saints (International Medieval Congress, University of Leeds [online]: July 2021)

 Helga, it was really nothing: gender and illicit love in the skáldasögur (17th International  Saga Conference, Reykjavík and Reykholt: August 2018) 

‘Hjarta Högna, bróður míns, blóðugt’: Male Familial Relationships in the Poetic Edda and  Völsunga saga (International Medieval Congress, University of Leeds: July 2017) Girls and Boys: Gendered Re-imaginings of the Norse World in Children’s Literature (Rediscovering the Vikings, University of Cork: November 2016) 

Gender and the Supernatural in Snorri’s Völsung Legend (Colsonoel, University of Oxford,  May 2014) 

The Male Body and Performance in William Morris’ Sigurd the Volsung (London 19th  Century Conference, UCL: 2014) 

‘But You Are a Girl’: Gender and Technology in Melvin Burgess’ Bloodtide and Bloodsong  (The Middle Ages in the Modern World, University of St Andrews: June 2013) ‘A Saddlebag Full of Science’: Technologies of Identity in Melvin Burgess’ Bloodtide (Child  and the Book 2013, University of Padua, Italy: March 2013) 

Valði hon þeim stórar brynjur: Ideologies of Femininity in Völsunga saga (Student  Symposium, Aarhus University, Denmark: March 2013) 

‘No longer ‘as little as a leaf’: Völsunga saga’s alternative construction of Guðrún’  (CCASNC, University of Cambridge, February 2013)

‘Ekki fellr oss þat ór minni’: Völsunga saga as a Memory of the Heroic Poetic Edda (International Saga Conference, Aarhus University, Denmark: August 2012) The Poetic Edda Transformed: Shape-shifting in Völsunga saga (MEMSA, University of  Durham: July 2012) 

Traumatic Identities in Sigurd the Volsung (Narratives of Victorian and Neo-Victorian  Trauma, University of Portsmouth: June 2012) 

Poetics and Performance: Morris’ Politics of Identity in Sigurd the Volsung (English Faculty  Graduate Conference, University of Oxford: June 2012) 

‘Sigurðr Norðan’: Echoes of the Volsung Legends in the Fornaldarsögur (ONORS,  University of Oxford: May 2012) 

The Courtly Dragon-Slayer: Heroic and Chivalric Masculinities in Völsunga saga (Interactions and Identity, University of Southampton: March 2012) 

‘Ónýtom orðom at bregða’: Insults and Identity in the Heroic Poetic Edda (COLSONOEL,  University of Oxford: May 2011) 

Performing Marriage: the Legends of the Virgin Spouses in Ælfric’s Lives of Saints (Medieval Symposium, University of Cardiff: June 2009)