Dr. Diane Atkinson

Diane Atkinson, (Dr. Di to her Study Abroad students) has a huge passion for history, especially women’s social history from the 1600s to the present day. 

Her M.A in Life-writing is from the University of East Anglia, her Ph.D. was awarded by the University of London. Her work in television, radio and podcasting is driven by her commitment to sharing and interpreting the lived lives of British women. Her book Love and Dirt: the Marriage of Arthur Munby and Hannah Cullwick considers class and gender in the context of a forbidden Victorian marriage between a gentleman and a servant; Elsie and Mairi Go To War: Two Extraordinary Women on the Western Front told   for the first time of the only women who served on the front line during the First World War ; The Criminal Conversation of Mrs Norton described the sexual double standards of Victorian Britain and the  work of Caroline Norton, the architect of the first feminist legislation in Parliament and a profound influencer of legislation against the inequality suffered by Victorian wives. Diane’s latest book Rise Up, Women! The Remarkable Lives of the Suffragettes is the definitive account of the British militant women’s suffragette campaign, a biography of a hundred brilliant activists.  

Diane sets her students the highest standards. She lives to teach and teaches to live.