Dr Beth Dodd

Bio:

Dr Elizabeth S. Dodd

Role 
Programme Leader for Postgraduate Programmes in Theology, Ministry and Mission
Lecturer in Christian Doctrine

Usual office hours & location 
Tuesday-Thursday
(on Maternity Leave from December 1, 2023)

About
Beth is Programme Leader for Postgraduate Programmes in Theology, Ministry and Mission and Lecturer in Christian Doctrine at Sarum College.

She studied at the Universities of Oxford (MA), Edinburgh (MTh) and Cambridge (PhD) and has taught in theological education and ministerial training since 2012, covering roles as director of studies, BA programme leader and MA programme leader, among others. She is also a research associate at the Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture.
Beth is a child of two Baptist ministers and daughter of the Lake District fells and spends her time when not theologizing looking after her young children.

Research interests
Beth’s research is in the area of theology and poetry, with a particular focus on lyric voices from the Psalms to sonnets to the modern spoken word. Her monograph on The Lyric Voice in English Theology (T&T Clark, 2023) explores the musical logic of words as a response to the beauty of God, the passionate cry of the heart in prayer, the prophetic message of saying ‘I’ and the pastoral implications of speaking in fragments.

Poetry of particular interest includes Anglo-Saxon lyrics, lullaby carols, Anne Locke, John Donne, George Herbert, Thomas Traherne, Mary Carey, William Blake, John Clare, Gerard Manley Hopkins, R.S. Thomas, Geoffrey Hill, Linton Kwesi Johnson, Jean ‘Binta’ Breeze, Gillian Allnutt, Warsan Shire, George the Poet and Stormzy.
She is currently writing a Grove book on Logos theology, working on an anthology of Black spiritual poetry with Fr Jarel Robinson Brown and developing a research network on lyric theology.

Teaching
Beth teaches at undergraduate and postgraduate levels in the areas of Christian Doctrine and History, Theological Methods, Research Methods and Theology, Arts and Culture.

Supervision
I welcome enquiries from prospective PhD students interested in Christian doctrine, Reformation and post-Reformation theology, theology and the arts and theological aesthetics.

Possible areas for research projects could include theology and lyric poetry, including Black poetry, performance poetry and the spoken word; narrative theology, theological dramatic theory or theopoetics; poetry and prayer; the doctrine of providence; Logos theology; innocence in Christian thought.

Professional Memberships & Responsibilities
Convenor, Theology and Lyric network
Research Associate, Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture
Society for the Study of Theology (committee member 2017-2019)
Editorial Board, Grove Doctrine
Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

List of Publications
The Lyric Voice in English Theology (London: T&T Clark, 2023)
‘Why Lyric? A Theological Perspective’, T&T Clark Handbook of Theology and the Arts, ed. Imogen Adkins and Stephen Garrett (London: T&T Clark, 2024)
‘Silence, Breath, Body, Cry: Poetry and Prayer’, ‘Poetry and Prayer’, The T&T Clark Companion to Christian Prayer, ed. Ashley Cocksworth and John C. McDowell (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2021)
‘John Clare’s Romantic ‘I’: A Prophetic Poetics of Testimony’, Prophetic Witness and the Reimagining of the World, ed. Mark S. Burrows, Hilary Davies, Jospehine von Zitzewitz (London: Routledge, 2020)
‘Spoken Word and Spirit’s Breath: A Theopoetics of Performance Poetry’, Literature and Theology (Autumn 2019)
Luke 1:46-55: ‘The Magnificat’ and Genesis 3:22-24: ‘Expulsion and Exile’, The Visual Commentary on Scripture (www.thevcs.org
Boundless Innocence in Thomas Traherne’s Poetic Theology: “Were all Men Wise and Innocent…” (Farnham: Ashgate, 2015)
Elizabeth S. Dodd and Carl E. Findley III (eds), Innocence Uncovered: Literary and Theological Perspectives (London: Routledge, September 2016)
Elizabeth S. Dodd and Cassandra Gorman (eds), Thomas Traherne and Seventeenth-Century Thought (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 2016).