Dr Deborah Oxley is a university lecturer in social history and a fellow of All Souls College. Her key research interests are on height and health in history; body mass – a new frontier in anthropometrics; micro-economics of the household; study of Australian convicts (inc. gender studies, comparative coercive labour systems, labour markets, colonial economic development, and migration); nineteenth-century Britain and Ireland, focussing on the impact of economic change on the economy and society, in particular, the microeconomics of the household, living standards, health and welfare, and the history of crime and punishment.