Matthew Symonds

Matthew Symonds is a Senior Research Fellow at University College London and CELL’s Technical Research Officer, responsible for software architecture across CELL projects. He serves as Co-Investigator on the AHRC-funded Shaping Scholarship and was Co-Principal Investigator on the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation-supported Archaeology of Reading in Early Modern Europe.

His academic training includes history studies at University College London and the University of Cambridge, culminating in a PhD on Grub street culture: the newspapers of Nathaniel Mist c.1715–c.1745, analyzing Jacobite journalism and seditious libels.

Symonds' research centers on late seventeenth-century cultural history, the history of information, and miscommunication of ideas, with current work exploring cosmopolitan reading. His interdisciplinary approach bridges early modern book history and digital humanities, particularly through CELL's scholarly infrastructure.

As Director of UCL's MA in Early Modern Studies, he co-convenes core modules Reframing the Renaissance and Forging the Early Modern, while teaching specialized courses like From the Archive to the Hard Drive: IT for Graduate Research and Web 0.1: Early Modern Information Culture.

His accolades include the RSA Digital Innovation Award for the Archaeology of Reading project, recognizing transformative digital scholarship in humanities.

Symonds supervises PhD research on early modern receipt books and Jacobite folk culture, actively recruiting students at the intersection of book history and digital methodologies. He leads CELL's technical development, driving innovation in digital scholarly resources for early modern studies.