Dr Sheila Sweetinburgh is an Associate Lecturer in Medieval & Early Modern Studies in the School of English of the University of Kent, in Canterbury, England.

After a career in agriculture, she came to the University of Kent to study as an undergraduate and postgraduate where I developed a burgeoning interest in social and cultural medieval history. Using the extensive and high quality documentary sources that survive for the Cinque Ports, Canterbury and several other towns in Kent, as well as materials for the countryside, she has published numerous articles and several books on medieval society. These deal thematically with a wide range of issues from charity and the use of material culture to institutional and personal identity.