Rachel Podd is a Doctoral Candidate at Fordham University, working with Dr. Maryanne Kowaleski. A native Texan, Rachel recieved her BA in History, magna cum laude, from Trinity University in 2012. She then attended the University of York, gaining an MA in Medieval History, graduating with honors after working with Dr. Jeremy Golberg on her thesis, “Non Compos Mentis: The Mentally Impaired Heiresses of Late Medieval England”. Her doctoral dissertation, “Health in Late Medieval England: The Impact of Age, Sex, and Income on the Lived Experience” combines primary source evidence including miracle collections, medical treatises and law codes, with bioarchaeological evidence and approaches pioneered by medical anthropologists to interrogate how medieval people defined and managed health. Her other research interests include the role of women and empirics in the medical marketplace, reproductive stress, and conceptions of impairment in England and Iberia.
She has worked in a variety of archives, including the Borthwick, the British and Wellcome Libraries and the National Archives in England, the Diocesan Archives in Girona, Barcelona and Vic, and the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington D.C.. This coming year she will be visiting the Huntington Library in San Marino California as the recipient of the North American Conference on British Studies-Huntington Library Fellowship.
Rachel has presented at a variety of conferences and seminars, including the North American Conference for British Studies, the American Association for the History of Medicine and the late medieval seminar at the Institute for Historical Research in London.
Her full curriculum vitae is available for download on the sidebar to the left.
Social Media Posts and Print Mentions
Patrick Verel “Parallels Between Plagues Past and Present Highlighted in Partnership with Bronx Science,” Fordham News (June 2020)
“Fordham Medievalist Grad Student, Rachel Podd, Lectures on Pandemics to Students at the Bronx High School of Science,” Fordham Department of History Blog (May 2020)
“Graduate Student Rachel Podd receives the NACBS-Huntington Library Fellowship for British Studies“, Fordham Department of History Blog (May 2020)
“Tobias Hrynick, Nicholas DeAntonis, and Rachel Podd Recieve Fellowships“, Fordham Department of History Blog (April 2020)
“Postcard from Spain – Rachel Podd on Archival Research in Girona” Fordham Department of History Blog (October 2018)
“The Medieval England Conference” Fordham Department of History Blog (April 2018)
“Postcard from Rachel Podd, Digging Up Medieval Bones in Poland,” Fordham Department of History Blog (August 2017)
“Meet the Winners of the Loomie Prize for 2015“, Fordham Department of History Blog (February 2015)
Plagues and Peoples: Health and Disease in Medieval Europe 