Rate My Professor Jana Funke

Professor Jana Funke is Professor of Modern Literature and Sexuality Studies in the Department of English and Creative Writing at the University of Exeter. Her research focuses on modernist literature and culture, the history of sexuality and sexual science, feminist theory, gender studies, queer theory, and medical humanities. She serves as one of the Coordinators of the University's LGBTQ+ Staff Network. Funke has directed several major research projects that bridge academic scholarship with public engagement. In 2025, she co-directs the AHRC-funded 100 Years of The Well of Loneliness project, which recovers the hidden history of Radclyffe Hall's once-banned novel through international collaboration. Previously, she was Joint Investigator on a Wellcome Trust-funded seven-year project on the cross-disciplinary history of sexual science from 1890 to 1940, titled Rethinking Sexology, co-directed with Professor Kate Fisher. She co-directed the Transformations project with Gendered Intelligence, producing the Adventures in Time and Gender podcast and website, and the Out and About: Queering the Museum project with the Royal Albert Memorial Museum. In 2014, she participated in the AHRC and Wellcome Trust-funded New Generations in Medical Humanities Programme.

Funke has an extensive publication record in her fields. She co-edited Interrogating Lesbian Modernisms: Histories, Forms, Genres with Elizabeth English and Sarah Parker (Edinburgh University Press, 2023) and completed the first scholarly edition of Radclyffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness with Hannah Roche (Oxford University Press, 2024). Other key works include The World and Other Unpublished Works by Radclyffe Hall (Manchester University Press, 2016), Sculpture, Sexuality and History: Encounters in Literature, Culture and the Arts co-edited with Jen Grove (Palgrave, 2019), Sex, Gender and Time in Fiction and Culture co-edited with Ben Davies (Palgrave, 2011), and a special journal issue on Feminist Encounters with the Medical Humanities co-edited with Sherri Lynn Foster (2018). Her contributions extend to public-facing initiatives such as Orlando: The Queer Element, Transvengers, Dangerous Influences, and displays for the Wellcome Collection’s Institute of Sexology Exhibition. Funke is committed to accessible research and collaborations with non-academic audiences. She is currently on research leave for 2025/2026.