Jessica Murray is a Lecturer in English and Literary Studies, and Gender Studies, in the School of Humanities at the University of Western Australia, where she completed her PhD in 2022. Her doctoral thesis, 'Trials of Conscience in Victorian Law and Literature,' traces modulations in the meanings of the word 'conscience' to examine interactions between Victorian law and literature. The thesis argues that while increasingly positivist and utilitarian legal discourses shifted away from conscience—now associated with morally inflected interiority and the pronoun 'I'—literary representations manifest anxieties about the law's power to shape or corrupt individual conscience, the influence of legal language on articulating moral crises, and reflexive self-judgments.

Murray's research explores the word and idea of conscience in the nineteenth century at the intersections of literature, law, moral philosophy, and science, with particular interest in George Eliot's writings and nineteenth-century conceptions of language. Key publications include the peer-reviewed article 'Conscience' in Victorian Literature and Culture (2023), '(Mis)reading Characters in Middlemarch' in George Eliot Review (2024), and the conference contribution 'Conscience and George Eliot's Daniel Deronda' (2025). She was runner-up for the George Eliot Fellowship Essay Prize (2024). At UWA, Murray coordinates units such as GEND1901 Beyond 'Gender Wars,' ENGL1902 Reading Bodies, ENGL2200 Jane Austen and Her Legacy, and GEND3904 Queer Theory (2025), and tutors ENGL1002 Literary Classics and ENGL3604 Victorian Dreams. Her teaching excellence is recognized by the Commendation for Excellence in Teaching Award (Humanities, 2024), Commendation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning (Humanities, 2023), and Humanities Excellence in Teaching Award for Tutors and Sessional Staff (2021).

Professional Email: jessica.murray@uwa.edu.au