Devoney Looser


Devoney Looser is an American literary critic and Jane Austen scholar. She is Foundation Professor of English at Arizona State University, where she focuses on women's writing and the history of the novel.

Early life and education

Looser was born and raised in White Bear Lake, Minnesota, where her mother first introduced her to Jane Austen's work. Looser attended and graduated from Hill-Murray School in Maplewood, Minnesota in 1985.
As a first-generation college student, Looser received a Bachelor of Arts in English from Augsburg College in 1989 and later earned her doctorate in English with a certification in women's studies from Stony Brook University.

Career

After stints at Indiana State University, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, Louisiana State University, and the University of Missouri, Looser accepted a faculty appointment at Arizona State University in 2013. Her first book was "British Women Writers and the Writing of History, 1670-1820" which examined British women writers and their contributions to historiography. She followed this up with "Women Writers and Old Age in Great Britain, 1750-1850" in 2008.
In 2017, Looser published her third book titled "The Making of Jane Austen." This book focused on how Austen's popular influencers shaped her reputation, including as "a transnational figure used in support of women’s suffrage." Looser also brought back into view a forgotten fictional pen portrait of Austen published in an 1823 issue of The Lady's Magazine.
In 2018, Looser was appointed a Foundation Professor of English for her outstanding faculty accomplishments. In the same year, she was also awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Humanities Public Scholar award to research the sisters Jane and Anna Maria Porter. It is scheduled for publication in 2021 by Bloomsbury.