Jessie Stanier

While I predominantly have a background in philosophy, I have always had an interest in interdisciplinary research. In the final year of my BA in Politics & Philosophy at the University of Exeter, I started reading about phenomenology, philosophy of time, and embodiment. After dabbling in journalism and copywriting, I decided to pursue this growing interest across the channel in Belgium.

There I studied for an MA in Philosophy at KU Leuven, for which I wrote a thesis on phenomenology and ageing.

I joined the first cohort of PhD students at the Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health in September 2018.

Highlights of my career to date

It was a major highlight to chair the organising committee of the 2019 Postgraduate Medical Humanities Conference at Exeter, working to provide a friendly and inclusive environment for students to share their interdisciplinary research.

I have been lucky enough to be working alongside Rachel Purtell on a pilot project about patient experiences of hospital, and to be exploring avenues for engaged research with various community partners about experiences of transition in later life.

Naturally, starting at WCCEH has been another big highlight!

My research

My PhD project is a transdisciplinary phenomenological study of ageing and older age. While I am reading philosophical and gerontological texts as part of my research, engagement with ageing communities will overarch and inform the phenomenological work.

The aim of my research is to collaborate with various publics affected by the lived realities of ageing, in order to shed new light on normative determinants of ageing and how they affect lived experiences and possibilities for older people.

Something about me you can’t Google!

I love rock-climbing so you can often find me at the Quay climbing centre, trying to convince people to get out on that lovely Dartmoor granite or extolling the virtues of the pink tricam.