Dr. Sara Brown

Sara Brown has been a High School teacher for over twenty years and currently works full time in Rydal Penrhos School in North Wales, where she teaches English to ungrateful teenagers. She is the co-ordinator there for the International Baccalaureate English Language & Literature, and Theory of Knowledge courses, and is overall supervisor for the final year students’ Extended Essay requirement. Sara also acts as Teaching and Learning mentor in school, promoting and guiding the advancement of skills and continuing professional development in each of the teaching faculties. In addition to her teaching duties, she and her husband run one of the school boarding houses, which currently holds twenty-two teenage boys. Sleep is definitely for the weak.

Besides her BA in English and History, Sara has a Masters degree in International History from the London School of Economics, for which she wrote a thesis on ‘The Problem of the Gold Standard in International Politics and Economics in the Nineteenth Century’. She completed her Ph.D. in Literature at Salford University. Entitled ‘From Abjection to Alchemy in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth Legendarium’, the thesis explores the way in which Tolkien was responding to the anxieties of the post-war world in the mid twentieth century, drawing on (amongst others) the theories of Julia Kristeva and Donna Haraway. She believes it’s a real page-turner. Sara has given a number of lectures at various conferences on the topics of Tolkien, fantasy fiction and fandom, the latter being one of her guilty pleasures.

Sara has been a member of staff at Mythgard Academy since 2013, acting as Preceptor on a wide range of courses. She is also on the Board, representing the Language and Literature Faculty. She is currently supervising two students through their Master’s thesis process and looks forward to helping many more students to complete their qualification.