Dr Ally Louks just hit a new milestone, and people online have mixed feelings about it. She’s a teacher at Cambridge who recently finished her Ph D, but it’s not just the degree that got folks talking-it’s the unusual topic she picked for her research.
What happened?
Dr Louks announced that she passed her dissertation defense with no corrections needed. Normally, this kind of news might fly under the radar, but once she mentioned what her thesis was about, the internet woke up. Her paper is called ‘Olfactory Ethics: The Politics of Smell in Modern and Contemporary Prose’, and revealing that title stirred quite a bit of chatter online.
Some people on social media wrote off studying smell in literature as pointless, while others thought it was pretty clever-pointing out how it explores parts of human experience and society that often get ignored, like class, race, gender dynamics.
She shared a picture of herself dressed in red holding her thesis and said, “Thrilled to say I passed my viva with no corrections and am officially Ph Done.” Her big smile made it clear how proud and thankful she felt for reaching this goal.
The thesis and analysis:
Dr Louks gave some insights from her thesis titled “Olfactory Ethics: The Politics of Smell in Modern and Contemporary Prose”. In the first chapter, she looked at how smells are used to show social class differences – especially around homelessness – pulling examples from George Orwell’s work and other media.
Her abstract also talked about using an intersectional approach to olfactory oppression in literature. It examined how scent gets portrayed in writing and plays a role in power dynamics connected to gender, class, race, even species hierarchies. The abstract said, “This thesis studies how literature registers the importance of olfactory discourse-the language of smell and the olfactory imagination it creates-in structuring our social world.”
It went on to say, “The broad aim of this thesis is to offer an intersectional and wide-ranging study of olfactory oppression by establishing the underlying logic that facilitates smell’s application in creating and subverting gender, class, sexual, racial, and species power structures.”
In its first chapter Dr Louks’ thesis explored how smells signal class divisions using Orwell’s writings along with popular culture references concerning homelessness.
The aftermath:
Even though Dr Louks’ academic success is impressive on its own, what really grabbed attention was the unique subject matter. A bunch of people were pretty shocked by what she studied. One person asked in disbelief: “Smell’s role in social power structures? Is this for real?” Another dismissed it saying something like: “I can’t imagine spending years on something this intangible.”
Thousands dropped by her page reacting with surprise or sometimes mockery over such an odd choice for a Ph D topic. One commenter even wrote: “This is why someone telling you they’re a Ph D from some formerly elite university means nothing anymore.”
But not everyone was negative-some folks defended Dr Louks pointing out how fresh her idea was. One user noted: “Overlooked aspects like the smell in literature can tell us a lot about human perception,” while another praised her bravery saying: “It’s bold to take on something so unconventional, who knows what implications it could uncover?”
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