Rosalind Smith

Rosalind Smith is the Chair of English at the Australian National University and Director of the Centre for Early Modern Studies. Her research focuses on early modern women’s writing, exploring intersections of form, politics, and history in genres like the sonnet and modes such as complaint. She also investigates textual practices (e.g., marginalia) and their roles in rewriting literary histories. Her secondary research examines true crime in Australia and women’s engagement with true crime narratives in the English Renaissance.

Her work highlights how early modern women in England, Scotland, and France used writing to shape literary, social, political, and religious cultures of the 16th and early 17th centuries. The Centre for Early Modern Studies, under her leadership, serves as a hub for advancing interdisciplinary research in this field.