Alison Milbank


Alison Grant Milbank is a British Anglican priest and literary scholar specialising in religion and culture. She is Canon Theologian at Southwell Minster and professor at the University of Nottingham in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies.

Early life and education

Milbank was born Alison Grant Legg on 10 October 1954. She studied theology and English literature at Girton College, Cambridge, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1978; as per tradition, she proceeded to a Master of Arts degree in 1981. She undertook a year of teacher training with the University of Cambridge and completed her Postgraduate Certificate in Education in 1979. She then undertook postgraduate research at the University of Lancaster, completing her Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1988.

Career

Academic career

She was the John Rylands Research Institute Fellow at the University of Manchester and, after temporary lectureships at Cambridge and the University of Middlesex, taught in the English department at the University of Virginia in the United States for five years. She is now an associate professor at the University of Nottingham in the department of theology and religious studies.
Milbank's research and teaching focuses on the relation of religion to culture in the post-Enlightenment period, with particular literary interest in non-realist literary and artistic expression, such as the Gothic, the fantastic, horror and fantasy. Most recently, she has published a book on the Catholic poetics of J. R. R. Tolkien and G. K. Chesterton. She is currently working on a book which will trace the theological history of the emergence of the Gothic from the pre-Reformation period to the present day.

Ordained ministry

From 2005 to 2006, Milbank trained for ordained ministry on the East Midlands Ministry Training Course. She was ordained in the Church of England as a deacon in 2006 and as a priest in 2007. From 2006 to 2009, she served her curacy at Holy Trinity Church, Lambley, Nottinghamshire, as a non-stipendiary minister. Since 2009, she has been a priest vicar at Southwell Minster.

Personal life

In 1978, the then Alison Legg married the theologian John Milbank. He is one of the principal exponents of radical orthodoxy.

Selected works