Browse Stanford University | Stanford Profiles

Fiona Alene Clunan

Juris Doctor Student, Law
Other Tech - Graduate, Hoover Institution

Contact Info
Mail Code: 8610
fclunan@stanford.edu

BioAmanda Coate is a Ph.D. candidate in History at Stanford University. She works on the cultural and intellectual histories of early modern Europe. She is particularly interested in the history of famine and hunger, animal-human interactions, the history of medicine and related fields of knowledge, and how people have conceptualized human nature and the extremes of human behavior, such as survival cannibalism. Her dissertation, "Experiences and Meanings of Hunger in Early Modern Europe, c. 1550-1700," examines early modern European cultural understandings of hunger and food scarcity. Using a wide range of sources (including diaries, sermons, news pamphlets, and medical literature), her dissertation tracks the multifaceted ways in which early modern Europeans experienced, portrayed, and comprehended their own and others’ hunger. Her work has been supported by Stanford University's School of Humanities and Sciences, the Europe Center at Stanford University, the Program in History and Philosophy of Science at Stanford University, and the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies at Stanford University.

Amanda's article, "An Elephant in Dublin: Animals and Knowledge in the Late Seventeenth Century," was recently published in the journal Early Science and Medicine. She has been a writer for the blog Synapsis: A Health Humanities Journal, and has written and recorded a podcast episode, "Cannibalism at the Siege of Sancerre," for the French History Podcast. Amanda is also enthusiastic about fostering appreciation for history and the humanities through teaching and is currently working on completing an Associate Level Teaching Certificate from Stanford's Center for Teaching and Learning.