Rachel Foxley

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+44 (0) 118 378 6005
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Associate Professor
Director of Postgraduate Studies in History
Postgraduate supervision
I would welcome enquiries on topics relating to the political thought of the English revolution, and early modern political thought more generally (particularly the reception of Greek and Roman thought, and issues of gender and the household in early modern thought).
Teaching
Undergraduate
Part One Option: Radicalism and Protest in Britain: from the Levellers to Occupy
Part Two Option: People, Power and Revolution: Political Culture in seventeenth-century England
Part Three Topic: Ireland in the seventeenth century: colonisation, conflict and identity
Special Subject: England without a King, 1649-1660
Research centres and groups
I am a member of the interdisciplinary Early Modern Research Centre, and am involved in the international network for the Legacy of Greek Political Thought, based in the Classics department.
Research projects
My work focuses on the history of political language and political thought, particularly in seventeenth-century England. My PhD and first book were on the Levellers, and looked at the way in which this remarkably audacious network of activists and pamphleteers adapted and reworked the less radical thought of the parliamentarian cause which they had supported. My more recent and current work focuses particularly on the writings of the English republican writers of the seventeenth century, including John Milton, James Harrington, Marchamont Nedham, Henry Neville, and Algernon Sidney. I am working on a book on their complex and perhaps conflicted treatments of the idea of democracy, and have published several shorter pieces on them. I have an abiding interest in the reception of classical ideas in early modern Europe, which is highly relevant to this project, and I am co-editing the Brill's Companion to the Legacy of Greek Political Thought with David Carter and Elizabeth Sawyer. I am also interested in the gendered aspects of political texts and political thought, and hope to focus on this more in future work.
Publications
- Foxley, R. (2022) The possibility of democratic republicanism: The Levellers, Milton, and Harrington. In: Krause, S. and Jörke, D. , (eds.) Republicanism and Democracy. Contributions to Political Science Springer , Cham. pp. 57-79. ISSN: 2198-7289 ISBN: 9783031157790 | doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-15780-6_4
- Foxley, R. (2022) The Roman republic and the English republic. In: Arena, V. , Prag, J. , Stiles, A. , (eds.) A Companion to the Political Culture of the Roman Republic. Wiley-Blackwell , Chichester. pp. 40-51. ISBN: 9781444339659 | doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9781119673675.ch3
- Foxley, R. (2022) Liberty and hierarchy in Milton’s revolutionary prose. In: Dawson, H. and De Dijn, A. , (eds.) Rethinking Liberty before Liberalism. Cambridge University Press , Cambridge. pp. 79-99. ISBN: 9781108844567
- Foxley, R. (2020) 'Innovation' and revolution in seventeenth-century England. In: Goff, B. and Simpson, M. , (eds.) Classicising Crisis. Taylor and Francis ISBN: 9780815361770
- Foxley, R. (2019) The Levellers and the English constitution in the English civil war. In: Genet, J. , (eds.) Des chartes aux constitutions: Autour de l'idée constitutionnelle en Europe (12e-17e siecle). Editions de la Sorbonne , Paris. ISBN: 9791035102784
- Foxley, R. (2019) Imagining citizenship in the Levellers and Milton. In: Cuttica, C. and Peltonen, M. , (eds.) Democracy and Anti-Democracy in Early Modern England 1603-1689. History of European Political and Constitutional Thought Brill , Leiden. ISBN: 9789004385986
- Foxley, R. (2018) ‘More precious in your esteem than it deserveth’? Magna Carta and seventeenth-century politics. In: Goldman, L. , (eds.) Magna Carta: History, context and influence. IHR Shorts School of Advanced Study, University of London, Institute of Historical Research , London. pp. 61-78. ISBN: 9781909646889
- Foxley, R. (2016) Sparta and the English Republic. Classical Receptions Journal , 8 (1). pp. 54-70. ISSN: 1759-5142 | doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.1093/crj/clv015
- Foxley, R. (2015) Varieties of parliamentarianism. In: Braddick, M. , (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of the English Revolution. Oxford Handbooks in History Oxford University Press , Oxford. pp. 414-429. ISBN: 9780199695898
- Foxley, R. (2015) From native rights to natural equality: the agreement of the people (1647). In: Hammersley, R. , (eds.) Revolutionary Moments: Reading Revolutionary Texts. Bloomsbury Academic , London. pp. 11-18. ISBN: 9781472517203 | doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781474252669.0008
- Foxley, R. (2015) The logic of ideas in Christopher Hill's English revolution. Prose Studies: History, Theory, Criticism , 36 (3). pp. 199-208. ISSN: 0144-0357 | doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01440357.2014.994727
- Foxley, R. (2013) ‘Due libertie and proportiond equalitie’: Milton, democracy, and the republican tradition. History of Political Thought , 34 (4). pp. 614-639. ISSN: 0143-781X
- Foxley, R. (2013) Democracy in 1659: Harrington and the Good Old Cause. In: Tapsell, G. and Taylor, S. , (eds.) The Nature of the English Revolution Revisited. Studies in Early Modern Cultural, Political and Social History Boydell and Brewer , Woodbridge. pp. 175-196. ISBN: 9781843838180
- Foxley, R. (2013) Marchamont Nedham and mystery of state. In: Mahlberg, G. and Wiemann, D. , (eds.) European contexts for English republicanism. Politics and Culture in Europe, 1650–1750 Ashgate , Farnham. pp. 49-62. ISBN: 9781409455561
- Foxley, R. (2013) The Levellers: radical political thought in the English Revolution. Politics, culture and society in early modern Britain Manchester University Press , Manchester. pp 304. ISBN: 9780719089367
- Foxley, R. (2012) The Levellers: John Lilburne, Richard Overton, and William Walwyn . In: Lunger Knoppers, L. , (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Literature and the English Revolution. Oxford Handbooks of Literature Oxford University Press , Oxford. pp. 272-286. ISBN: 9780199560608
- Foxley, R. (2012) Freedom of conscience and the ‘Agreements of the People’. In: Baker, P. and Vernon, E. , (eds.) Foundations of freedom: The Agreements of People, the Levellers and the constitutional crisis of the English Revolution. Palgrave Macmillan , Basingstoke. pp. 117-138. ISBN: 9780230542709
- Foxley, R. (2012) Radicalism in early modern England: innovation or reformation?. In: Bagchi, B. , (eds.) The politics of the (im)possible: utopia and dystopia reconsidered. Sage Publications , London. pp. 62-69. ISBN: 9788132107347
- Foxley, R. (2011) Oliver Cromwell on religion and resistance. In: Prior, C. and Burgess, G. , (eds.) England's wars of religion, revisited. Ashgate , Farnham, UK. pp. 209-230. ISBN: 9781409419730
- Foxley, R. (2007) Problems of sovereignty in Leveller writings. History of Political Thought , 28 (4). pp. 642-660. ISSN: 0143-781X
- Foxley, R. (2007) Royalists and the New Model Army in 1647: circumstance, principle and compromise. In: McElligott, J. and Smith, D. , (eds.) Royalists and Royalism during the English Civil Wars. Cambridge University Press , Cambridge. pp. 155-174. ISBN: 9780521870078
- Foxley, R. (2006) 'The wildernesse of tropes and figures': figuring rhetoric in Leveller pamphlets. The Seventeenth Century , 21 (2). pp. 270-286. ISSN: 0268-117X
- Foxley, R. (2006) Gender and intellectual history. In: Whatmore, . and Young, . , (eds.) Palgrave advances in intellectual history. Palgrave advances Palgrave MacMillan , Basingstoke, UK. pp. 189-209. ISBN: 9781403939005 | doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.1057/9780230204300
- Foxley, R. (2004) John Lilburne and the citizenship of 'free-born Englishmen'. The Historical Journal , 47 (4). pp. 849-874. ISSN: 1469-5103 | doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0018246X04004005