Alexandra Shepard

Professor Alexandra Shepard is a Professor of Gender History in the History department at the University of Glasgow. Her research addresses the social, cultural and economic history of early modern Britain, with a particular emphasis on gender relations and the relationship between gender and class. She has published extensively in this field, including two major monographs: Meanings of Manhood in Early Modern England (2003) and Accounting for Oneself: Worth, Status and the Social Order in Early Modern England (2015), which won the prestigious Leo Gershoy Award.

Professor Shepard's research interests focus on the intersection of gender, class, and social status in early modern England. She has pioneered approaches that examine how individuals, particularly women, navigated social structures and legal systems. Her work often analyzes language of self-description deployed by witnesses in court to understand creditworthiness and social order. She is particularly interested in women's agency before the law and gender dynamics in the early modern economy. Current research includes a book project on childcare, family and economy in Britain, 1650-1850.

Her recent publications reveal a consistent focus on women's economic agency, legal status, and social roles in early modern society. The articles demonstrate a methodological approach that combines social, legal, and gender history to uncover how ordinary people, especially women, participated in and shaped economic and legal systems. There is a clear trajectory from her earlier work on masculinity to her more recent focus on women's experiences and agency.

• Leo Gershoy Award - for Accounting for Oneself: Worth, Status and the Social Order in Early Modern England
• Philip Leverhulme Prize (2004)

Professor Shepard is actively involved in supervising PhD students and has secured significant research funding for her projects. She is currently Co-Investigator on an AHRC funded project on 'Women Negotiating the Boundaries of Justice: Britain and Ireland, c.1100-c.1750' and leader of a Leverhulme International Network Grant on 'Producing Change: Gender and Work in Early Modern Europe'. Her current PhD students are working on diverse topics including violent men and masculinity in Scotland, radical manhood in the English Revolution, married women and the law in Scotland, and women's rebellion in the Tudor period.