Sarah Frontiera

• MA English Language and Literature, Loyola Marymount University
• BA (Honors) English Language and Literature, Oxford University

My research focuses on the agency of animal commodities in the global nineteenth century. Animal bodies were processed into a variety of raw materials that subsequently had second lives as domestic commodities. These animal commodities ranged from billiard balls and piano keys to illuminants, soaps, and industrial lubricants. My work restores to these animal products an agency that the Victorians themselves recognized and with which they negotiated. My dissertation, Proximate Bodies: Animal Commodities in the Global Nineteenth Century, examines these commodities in the context of not only their consumption as domestic goods but also their manufacture. The racialized subjects that labored in proximity to these animal materials were discursively conflated with these commodities, resulting in a proximity that was a provocative mix of agency and affect. My project draws on a disciplinarily diverse archive, including nineteenth century poetry and prose, painting and advertisements, as well as ephemera, periodicals, and user manuals.