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News of Fellows - 2008

Professor Jonathan Bate

  • had his book Soul of the Age: A Biography of the Mind of William Shakespeare selected as one of the Economist's 'Pick of the Pile' 2008 (Economist, 4 December 2008)
  • appeared on BBCR4's Front Row discussing Shakespeare's place within the culture of the Elizabethan age (27 October 2008)
  • participated in a discussion on the value of research in the arts and humanities research today, and how 'value' should be defined (Research in the Arts – Why bother? ', part of the Battle of Ideas festival organised by the Institute of Ideas (16 October 2008)
  • wrote, in the inaugural June issue of the new on-line magazine Standpoint, on trends in university funding for research and teaching and the need for reform ('The Wrong Idea of a University' Standpoint, June 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R4's In Our Time, discussing why King Lear has come to be regarded as the greatest of Shakespeare's tragedies (28 February 2008)

Professor John Barton has been elected as a Foreign Member of the Norwegian Academy of Arts and Sciences (Det norske Videnskaps-Akademi).

Professor Maxine Berg appeared on BBC R3's Night Waves, discussing global history (8 January 2008)

Professor Joseph Bergin has been elected a member of the Academy's Council, its governing body. He is Professor of History, University of Manchester (17 July 2008)

Professor Tim Besley

Lord Bingham, former Senior Law Lord, condemned the 2003 invasion of Iraq as a 'serious violation of international law' in a speech at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law, 17 November 2008 ('Top judge: US and UK acted as 'vigilantes' in Iraq invasion', the Guardian, 19 November 2008)

Professor Simon Blackburn

  • delivered the keynote speech at the 2008 Interational Balzan Foundation symposium, 'Truth, Science & Religion', on the topic of ‘Truth and Ourselves: the Elusive Last Word’ (16-17 May 2008)
  • has been elected an Honorary Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (announced 28 April 2008)

Professor Tim Blanning appeared on In Our Time, discussing the Baroque style in painting, music, architecture and sculpture in the 17th and 18th centuries (20 November 2008)

Professor Vernon Bogdanor

Professor Alan Bowman appeared on BBC R4's Material World, discussing the Vindolanda Texts, and the development of new techniques to make them more legible (10 January 2008)

Professor Nicholas Boyle has been elected a member of the Academy's Council, its governing body. He is Schröder Professor of German, University of Cambridge (17 July 2008)

Revd Canon Professor David Brown has been elected a member of the Academy's Council, its governing body. He is Professor of Theology, Aesthetics and Culture, University of St Andrews (17 July 2008)

Professor Dame Averil Cameron has been appointed as a member of the 2007 Wolfson History Prize jury

Professor David Cannadine

  • presented 'The Palace and the Beeb', an examination of the BBC's 75-year relationship with the royal family (Archive Hour, BBCR4, 11 October 2008)
  • was one of a group of historians invited to a dinner at 10 Downing Street in honour of President George W Bush’s last official visit to the UK (15 June 2008)
  • began a new series of A Point of View, in which he reflects on a topical issue from the standpoint of an historian (BBC R4, weekly from 4 January 2008)
  • has been appointed as a member of the 2007 Wolfson History Prize jury

Professor Bernard Capp

  • will be appearing on Who Do You Think You Are? (BBC One, late October) in conversation with actor Kevin Whately about one of his 17th century ancestors.
  • appeared, with Professor Nicholas Rodger on the BBC Two series Thames Shipwrecks, telling the story of HMS London, which blew up and sank in 1665.

Professor Michael Chisholm

  • wrote on the governance implications of the creation of nine further unitary authorities ('Fears for tiers', www.PublicFinance.co.uk, 23 May 2008)
  • has published Botched Business (co-authored with Steve Leach), an analysis of the creation of additional unitary Councils in England between 2006 and 2008 (22 May 2008)

Professor Ian Christie appeared on BBC3's Nightwaves programme, discussing the importance to Russian cultural history of the Soviet Pioneers, currently being revived by Vladimir Putin (17 March 2008)

Professor David Clark has been appointed Clinical Adviser to the Department of Health's National Programme for Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (1 April 2008)

Professor John Cleland was made CBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours 2008, for services to Social Science

Professor Linda Colley

Professor Stefan Collini

  • appeared in BBC R3's Nightwaves, discussing writing non-fiction for the general reader (21 February 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R4's Start the Week programme discussing the popularity of non-specialist factual writing (18 February 2008)

Professor Nicholas Cook has been elected a member of the Academy's Council, its governing body. He is Professorial Research Fellow in Music, Royal Holloway, University of London (17 July 2008)

Professor David Crystal

  • defended mobile phone texting in an interview on BBCR4's Today programme, pointing out that research showed that texting both presupposes and contributes to literacy (7.20am, 24 October 2008)
  • was interviewed on the impact of 'text speak' on the literacy of young people (Gr8 db8r takes on linguistic luddites, The Guardian, 16 September 2008)
  • delivered a lecture on 'The Future of English' exploring how new varieties of English are emerging among its 2 billion speakers around the world in connection with the development of The English Project, part of the Olympics cultural programme (reported in the Times, 21 February 2008, lecture delivered on 5 March 2008)

Professor Sir Barry Cunliffe

  • gave the Albert Reckitt lecture on archaeology at the Academy in October, covering 2,000 years of settlement and land use in Wessex. His Europe Between the Oceans, (9000 BC – AC 1000) has recently appeared. (23 October 2008)
  • was interviewed on the discovery of one of the largest and best preserved Roman villas in Britain at Brading on the Isle of Wight, where he is head of excavation ('Britain's biggest Roman villa uncovered on Isle of Wight', The Times, 19 August 2008)

Professor Wendy Davies was made OBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours 2008 for services to Research in the Humanities and to Higher Education.

Professor Ian Diamond, Chief Executive of the Economic and Social Research Council, delivered a lecture on ‘Strategies to enhance international partnerships in research and knowledge transfer’ at 'The Internationalisation of Higher Education', a Festschrift conference for Professor Sir Colin Campbell, Vice Chancellor of the University of Nottingham (lecture is available to download from www.policyreview.tv, 16 September 2008)

Professor James Durbin has been awarded the Royal Statistical Society's Guy Gold medal, awarded to those who are 'judged to have merited a signal mark of distinction by reason of their innovative contributions to the theory or application of statistics' (2 July 2008).

Professor Ronald Dworkin QC has been elected as a member of the American Philosophical Society (announced 26 April 2008)

Professor Christopher Dyer was made CBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours 2008, for services to Scholarship. (16 June 2008)

Professor Terry Eagleton

  • celebrates John Milton's role as an activist, propagandist and political figure of the English Revolution on the 400th anniversary of his birth. ('Milton's Republic', Guardian, 9 December 2008).
  • has been appointed to a chair in the department of English and creative writing at Lancaster University and to a similar post at the National University of Ireland, Galway ('Eagle lands: literary critic snapped up by rivals after forced retirement' THE, 23 October 2008)
  • has formally retired from his post as lecturer in English literature at the University of Manchester (THE, 21 August 2008)
  • considered the role of suffering in Christianity, and, in particular, in the Passion of Christ (Lent Talks, BBC R4, 20 February 2008 - transcript and audio versions available)

Professor Richard Evans

  • delivered a lecture on 'The Third Reich at War' at the London School of Economics, as part of the Space for Thought Inaugural Lecture Series (4 November 2008, details from LSE)
  • appeared on BBCR4's Start the Week, discussing the social, cultural and political history of Germany during the Second World War (Start the Week, 27 October 2008)
  • delivered the first of this year's Leo Baeck Lectures, discussing the difficulties of writing a history of the Third Reich at War, how he approached the subject, and what his principal arguments are (25 September 2008, Leo Baeck Institute, London)
  • has been appointed as a member of the 2007 Wolfson History Prize jury

Professor David Feldman has been appointed an honorary Queen's Council (reported by the Ministry of Justice, 10 March 2008)

Professor Sir Lawrence Freedman

  • had his book, A Choice of Enemies: America Confronts the Middle East, selected as one of the Economist's 'Pick of the Pile' 2008 (Economist, 4 December 2008)
  • discussed the intractability of the problems of the Middle East on BBCR4's Start the Week (7 July 2008)

Professor Uta Frith and her husband, Professor Chris Frith, are unique among British scholars in that they are both Fellows of the British Academy and the Royal Society. No other married couple has achieved this honour.

Professor Chris Frith debated whether or not the brain is over-rated from the standpoint of a neuroscientist (NightWaves, BBCR3, 27 October 2008)

Professor Michael Fulford's work at Roman Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum) has revealed evidence of widespread burning and abandonment of wells in the period 50-75 AD, possibly associated with the rebellion of Boadicea (60-61 AD) - destruction on this scale caused by her rebellion has not hitherto been found so far southwest (Boadicea’s revenge served hot, The Times, 29 September 2008)

Professor Dame Hazel Genn

  • delivered the 2008 Hamlyn lectures at University College London in November and December, on the topic of 'Judging Civil Justice'. The lectures reviewed the state of civil justice and the role of the judiciary in the light of changes over the last 20 years, asking whether 'civil justice is withering away'? (27 November to 4 December 2008; a poster and synopsis are available to download)
  • as been elected chair of the Academy's Communications and Activities Committee to take office from July 2009. She is Professor of Socio-Legal Studies, University College London (17 July 2008)

Professor Jonathan Gershuny was interviewed on his work on how people spend their time and what it says about us (Professor of the washing-up, The Guardian, 30 September 2008)

Professor John Goldthorpe is described in the December 2008 issue of Prospect magazine as the 'doyen of sociologists of social mobility' - and quoted as regarding equality of opportunity as a greater policy priority than mobility. ('More mobile than we think', Prospect, December 2008)

Professor Stuart Hall contributed to 'The Partisan Coffee-House', the story of a short-lived but influential left-wing coffee house set up in London's Soho in 1958. (BBCR4, 4 December 2008)

Professor Fred Halliday contributed to a discussion on the creation of 'sovereign wealth funds' by governments, and their use to invest in other countries (Sovereign Funds, BBC R4, 21 and 28 February 2008)

Professor Norman Hammond writes on archaeology for The Times. His recent columns have included

Professor David Hand assumed office as President of the Royal Statistical Society on 1 January 2008

Professor Seamus Heaney

  • appeared in a special edition of Front Row, talking about the process of creating poems, the influence of the Troubles on his life and his work, and effects of a stroke he suffered in 2006 (BBCR4, 14 November 2008)
  • has composed a stanza in honour of the centenary of Queen's University, Belfast. The verse was unveiled by HM the Queen on the occasion of her visit to Northern Ireland on 19 March 2008 (reported on the Queen's University, Belfast website)
  • wrote on the threat to Tara, an ancient site sacred to pagans and Christians in Ireland, that is under threat from the construction of a motorway (Seamus Heaney laments loss of Ireland’s ancient spirit to onward march of the Celtic Tiger, The Times, 3 March 2008)

Professor Peter Hennessy

  • presented 'The Human Button',in which he spoke to the people who have operated Britain's nuclear deterrent over the years and today, including military commanders, politicians and former Vulcan bomber crew members (BBCR4, 2 December 2008, repeated 7 December 2008)
  • gave evidence to the Public Administraton Select Committee on the Constutional Renewal Bill (11 June 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R3's Nightwaves programme, discussing Never Had It So Good, the latest play from Howard Brenton (26 March 2008)
  • commented on the National Security Strategy, published on 19 March 2008 (Blink and you'd miss it. Brown said sorry, Independent, 23 March 2008)

Professor Miles Hewstone has been awarded, in collaboration with a team of academics, a Leverhulme Trust Research Programme Award of more than £1m, for a project entitled 'Ethno-religious diversity and social trust in residential and educational settings (reported 29 September 2008)

Professor John Hills has been has been appointed by Harriet Harman, Lord Privy Seal, as Chair of the National Equality Panel, an independent panel of academic experts . The panel has been invited to provide Government with an independent report into inequality in Britain by the end of November 2009. (reported 10 September 2008)

Professor Gertrude Himmelfarb was profiled ('Gertrude Himmelfarb: Brown's guru', Independent, 3 November 2008)

Professor Eric Hobsbawm

  • contributed to 'The Partisan Coffee-House', the story of a short-lived but influential left-wing coffee house set up in London's Soho in 1958. (BBCR4, 4 December 2008)
  • has been made an honorary citizen of Vienna (reported on the International Balzan Prize website) (18 January 2008)

Professor Julian Jackson delivered a series of audio essays on the impact of the 1871 Paris Commune and the long shadow it has cast on social, cultural and political life in France (The Essay, BBC R3, 28 January-1 February 2008)

Professor Catriona Kelly appeared on BBC3's Nightwaves programme, discussing the importance to Russian cultural history of the Soviet Pioneers, currently being revived by Vladimir Putin (17 March 2008)

Professor Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England,

Professor Peter Kornicki, who held the 2007-2008 Sandars Reader in Bibliography at Cambridge, delivered the 2008 Sandars Lectures on 'Having difficulty with Chinese? - the rise of the vernacular book in Japan, Korea and Vietnam' (10-13 March 2008)

Professor Adam Kuper examined how modern anthropology is underpinned by the idea that an individual's beliefs and activities should be understood in terms of their own culture (The Essay, BBCR3, 19 November 2008)

Professor Lord Richard Layard

  • was interviewed about his role as the Government's 'happiness tsar' ('Will this man make you happy?', The Guardian, 24 June 2008)
  • has been appointed Programme Adviser to the Department of Health's National Programme for Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (1 April 2008)

Professor Hermione Lee

  • co-presented (with Julian Barnes) a short series on Victorian writers and artists who travelled to France (Misfits in France, BBCR4, 23 and 30 October 2008)
  • discussed English Romanticism from William Wordsworth to Thomas Hardy with Duncan Wu, Paul Farley and Kate Kennedy (BBCR3 Proms Literary Festival, 19 July 2008)
  • has been elected President of Wolfson College, Oxford, taking up her post on 1 October 2008 (reported on Wolfson's website, 11 February 2008)

Professor Sir Neil MacCormick has retired from the Regius Chair of Public Law and the Law of Nature and Nations at the University of Edinburgh. He is to take up a Visiting Lectureship at New York University, as well as continuing both as President of the International Association for Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy and as Special Advisor on Europe and External Affairs to Alex Salmond, Scottish first Minister (March 2008)

Professor Stephen Machin

  • is described in the December 2008 edition of Prospect magazine as co-author of an analysis of decline in social mobility that 'has, arguably, had more influence on public debate than any academic paper of the last 20 years'. ('More mobile than we think', Prospect, December 2008)
  • has been has been appointed by Harriet Harman, Lord Privy Seal, as a member of the National Equality Panel, an independent panel of academic experts . The panel has been invited to provide Government with an independent report into inequality in Britain by the end of November 2009. (reported 10 September 2008)

Professor April McMahon

  • has been elected a member of the Academy's Council, its governing body. She is Vice Principal and Head of College of Humanities and Social Science, University of Edinburgh (17 July 2008)
  • has been appointed Vice-Principal and Head of the College of Humanities and Social Science at the University of Edinburgh. (New Head of College announced, 6 May 2008)

Professor Nico Mann, deputy President of ALLEA, participated in ‘European diversities – European identities’, the 4th annual Humanities in the European Research Area conference, a partnership between the European Science Foundation and European research funders in the humanities, which brings together scholars and policy-makers to discuss and develop the role of humanities in contemporary society. (8-9 October 2008)

Professor Shula Marks contributed to In Defence of Learning: The Past and the Present, a conference held at the Academy to mark the 75th anniversary of CARA (Council for Assisting Refugee Academics), which was founded in 1933 by a group of scholars and scientists, including Academy Fellows William Beveridge and John Maynard Keynes. (4-5 December 2008)

Professor David Marquand's book, Britain Since 1918: The Strange Career of British Democracy, has been selected as one of the Economist's 'Pick of the Pile' 2008 (Economist, 4 December 2008)

Professor Gordon Marshall was profiled in the Times Higher Education Supplement, in which he comments on Government politics on widening participation in higher education and his vision for the University of Reading, of which he is Vice-Chancellor (3 April 2008)

Professor Doreen Massey joined a panel to discuss how reality and fantasy combine to create our experience of the modern city (Thinking Allowed, BBCR4, 24 August 2008)

Professor Sir Arnaldo Momigliano (1908-1986), renowned historian of the classical world and scholar of ancient and modern historiography, will be the subject of a series of colloquia in London and in Pisa from October 2008 to May 2009, on the centenary of his birth and twenty years after his death. (The Legacy of Arnald Momigliano, Warburg Institute, 18 October 2008 in Pisa; 7 February and 30 May 2009 in London)

Professor John Morrill delivered a lecture on 'The Peoples' Revolution: Rethinking Britain's Wars of Religion' at the Center for British Studies, University of California, Berkeley, to mark the inauguration of the Center's new director (18 September 2008)

Dr Joseph Needham (1900-95), the great historian of Chinese science and technology, who deepened understanding in the west of the pioneering achievements of Chinese science over the centuries, is the subject of a major new biography by Simon Winchester (Bomb, Book and Compass: Joseph Needham and the Great Secrets of China, Viking, 2008).

Baroness Onora O'Neill

  • was made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society for her 'great eminence working in fields related to statistics' (2 July 2008).
  • appeared on BBCR4's Thinking Allowed, discussing trust in public and private life (2 July 2008)
  • President of the British Academy, chaired an independent inquiry into the safety of maternity services in England, published by the King's Fund on 29 February 2008 (reported in The Observer, 24 February 2008; full text of the report is available online)

Professor Anne Phillips received a Special Recognition award from the Political Studies Association. (25 November 2008)

Professor Paul Preston

  • participated in the BBCR3-organised Festival of Free Thinking, discussing the UK's relationship with Europe ('Us, Them and Europe', Festival of Free Thinking, Liverpool, 2 November 2008)
  • has been elected a corresponding member of Institut d’Estudis Catalans (Catalan Academy of Arts and Sciences) (he has previously been awarded Premi Trias Fargas for the publication of Idealistes sota les bales (shortly in appear in English as We Saw Spain Die. Foreign Correspondents in the Spanish Civil War) and the Gran Cruz de la Orden de Isabel la Católica (Spain’s highest civilian decoration) for his work on Spanish history)

Professor David Reynolds

  • presented Armistice, an examination of the events leading up to the end of WW1 from the German point of view (BBC4, 3 and 8 November 2008)
  • wrote and presented 'America: Empire of Liberties', a major new series on the history of the USA (BBCR4, weekday afternoons, 15 September to 24 October 2008)
  • presented Summits, a three-part documentary series in which he will uncover the behind-the-scenes stories of summit meetings that have shaped history (BBC4, from 30 January 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R3's Nightwaves, discussing political summitry (29 January 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R4's Start the Week, discussing the role of summitry in international relations (7 January 2008)

Professor Christopher Ricks joined a panel chaired by Ian McMillan to take a new look at the poetry, life and times of A. E. Housman (BBCR3 Proms Literary Festival, 29 July 2008)

Professor Sir Adam Roberts, President-Elect of the British Academy

  • participated in an International Institute for Strategic Studies discussion meeting on 'Selective Security: War and the United Nations Security Council since 1945' (29 October 2008, details from IISS)
  • presented a paper on 'The Termination of Military Occupations' at an Expert Meeting convened by the International Committee of the Red Cross, Geneva.
  • is co-editor of The United Nations Security Council and War: The Evolution of Thought and Practice since 1945 (Oxford University Press) which is being launched in June 2008 at meetings in Oxford, London and New York
  • discussed the future of Kosovo as an independent state, and the diplomatic implications of its creation ('Tomorrow Kosovo is expected to declare independence', Today programme, BBC R4, 16 February 2008 (audio file))
  • gave a series of three lectures at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, on 'Law and Norms in an Age of Asymmetric Warfare'. (April 2008)

Professor Nicholas Rodger appeared, with Professor Bernard Capp, FBA, on the BBC Two series Thames Shipwrecks, telling the story of HMS London, which blew up and sank in 1665.

Professor Alan Ryan, writing in his regular THE column

  • expressed doubts about University League Tables (THE 29 May 2008)
  • noted the way that, unlike in the UK, in the US small higher educations colleges can thrive and enjoy high reputations (THE, 24 April 2008)

Professor Amartya Sen

  • considered the role of mathematics in economics and other social sciences (In sum, not everything adds up, Guardian, 15 March 2008)
  • has been appointed by Nicholas Sarkozy, President of France to a committee of experts examining alternative ways of measuring economic growth, including quality of life factors ('Sarkozy seeks le feel-good factor', The Times, 10 January 2008)

Professor Avi Shlaim

Professor Lord Robert Skidelsky

  • wrote on the breakdown of the global financial system, and the need for the 15 November meeting of the G-20 to focus on exchange rates as much as reform of banking regulation (A dangerous free-for-all, The Guardian, 11 November 2008 )
  • took part in an Emergency IQ2 Spectator Debate on the topic 'Georgia and Ukraine should be allowed to join NATO', arguing against the motion. (25 September 2008, Royal Geographical Society; further details are available from Intelligence2)
  • analysed the recent historical background to the difficult relationship between the UK and Russia ('David Miliband must stop playing with fire', The Times, 28 August 2008)
  • has been identified as a world 'thought leader' by Project Syndicate, an initiative intended to bring distinguished voices from across the world to local audiences, strengthening the independence of printed media in transition and developing countries, and upgrading their journalistic, editorial, and business capacities (latest article added March 2008)

Professor Quentin Skinner

Professor Karen Sparck Jones, who died in 2007, was honoured in this year's British Computer Society Lovelace Lecture, delivered by Ann Copstake, Reader in Computational Linguistics in the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, on 'What do we mean? Computational approaches to natural language semantics' (15 May 2008)

Professor Jon Stallworthy participated in an evening of readings, talks, music and discussion looking at the important role poetry plays in First World War remembrance (11 November 2008, Imperial War Museum)

Professor George Steiner

  • spoke on ‘Literature and Culture’ at this year's Edinburgh International Book Festival, discussing memory and his efforts 'to ensure his remains intact', and his recent My Unwritten Books, described as 'the swan song of a master writer and thinker, perhaps the greatest living man of letters of our time'. ('Sean Connery, George Steiner, Alfred Brendel: what's the link?', The Times, 28 August 2008)
  • delivered a talk on those subjects he has been unable to write about, and the reasons why (chaired by Professor Marina Warner) (11 February 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R4's Front Row, discussing his various unwritten books, and the reasons he didn't write them (24 January 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R3's Night Waves, discussing his new work, which imagines all the books that he hoped to write, but never did (8 January 2008)

Professor Lord Nicholas Stern

  • addressed a meeting of senior members of the Greek business community in Athens to warn of the impact of climate change on southern Europe (28 November 2008, reported in Cyprus News International)
  • was interviewed on the likelihood of acheiving a new global environment deal at the climate conference in Copenhagen in 2009 ('Nicholas Stern', Prospect, July 2008)
  • has been appointed President-elect of the European Economic Association (reported 30 June 2008)
  • has spoken out in support of the the Climate Change Bill, currently before the House of Lords and called for the UK to give a lead to other countries in meeting the challenge of reducing global emissions ('Britain, climate change leaders', Times, 22 February 2008)

Professor Joseph Stiglitz

  • had his book, The Three Trillon Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq  Conflict' (co-authored with Linda J. Bilmes), selected as one of the Economist's 'Pick of the Pile' 2008 (Economist, 4 December 2008)
  • wrote on the 15 November meeting of the G-20 and the opportunity it presents for European leaders to create a new global financial order (Financial crisis: Europe's leaders can seize this opportunity to fill the leadership gap, The Telegraph, 11 November 2008 )
  • discussed whether the money markets can be relied upon to be self-correcting and the need for regulation (Today programme, BBCR4, 22 September 2008 [audio file])
  • discussed whether science has fallen victim to the pressures of commercial funding with Professor John Sulston, winner of the Nobel Prize for Physiology/Medicine (Today programme, BBCR4, 5 July 2008)
  • has been appointed by Nicholas Sarkozy, President of France to the chair of a committee of experts examining alternative ways of measuring economic growth, including quality of life factors ('Sarkozy seeks le feel-good factor', The Times, 10 January 2008)
  • was interviewed on the long-term world-wide economic impact of the Iraq War ('The true cost of war', The Guardian, 28 February 2008)
  • appeared BBC R4's Start the Week, discussing how the cost of the Iraq War could have been so significantly underestimated (25 February 2008)
  • appeared on BBC R3's Nightwaves, discussing the true cost of America's war in Iraq, and its wider economic consequences (26 February 2008)

Professor Dame Marilyn Strathern, who has recently been re-elected as Mistress of Girton College, Cambridge, recently handed out prizes to schoolchildren in Delhi who had demonstrated creative abilities outside of the standard curriculum (reported 24 September 2008)

Professor Lord Stewart Sutherland

  • as Chair of the the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee, has released a report on the decline in the study of sysematic biology ('Taxonomy is classified as discipline in critical decline', THE, 21 August 2008)
  • is undertaking an inquiry into the problems surrounding the delivery of the KS 2 and 3 National Curriculum tests leading to the delay in their delivery. He will report to Qfqual and the Department for Children Schools and Families. (16 July 2008)

Professor Oliver Taplin gave a platform talk on the relationship between Greek tragedy and vase paintings (Pots and Plays, Lyttelton Theatre, 11 January 2008)

Professor Charles Taylor profiled and interviewed (Prospect, 31 January 2008)

Sir Keith Thomas has been appointed as Chair of the 2007 Wolfson History Prize jury

Sir John Vickers, President of the Royal Economic Society, chaired the Society's annual conference (held at the University of Warwick 17-19 March)

Professor Christopher Wickham has been elected Publications Secretary to take office from July 2009. He is Chichele Professor of Medieval History, All Souls College, Oxford (17 July 2008)

Professor Marina Warner

Baroness Mary Warnock

  • wrote on the influence the various homes she has lived in have had on her lifestyle (Property Magnet, THE, 6 November 2008 )
  • was profiled in Life and Work, the magazine of the Church of Scotland, in which she discussed her views on the end-of-life choices of people with Alzheimer’s Disease and other forms of dementia (Life and Work, October 2008)
  • expressed support for the House of Commons in passing the Human Fertilisation and Embryology bill unamended (reported in THE, 29 May 2008).
  • discussed the requirement for a national human bioethics commission given the structures already in place ('Parliament must retain moral authority over science', Observer, 13 January 2008)

Dr Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury,

  • was interviewed by the Guardian on, among other things, his book Dostoevsky: Language, Faith and Fiction (‘Cross Purposes’, Guardian, 8 October 2008; audio version also available)
  • called for fresh scrutiny and regulation of the financial world, arguing that attitudes to finance are becoming, in a real sense, idolatrous. ('Face it, Marx was partly right about capitalism', The Spectator, 24 September 2008)
  • participated in the anniversary celebrations at the Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes, becoming the first Anglican Primate to preach there (BBC News, 24 September 2008; the full text of his sermon is available from the Archbishop's official website)
  • joined BBCR3 presenter Susan Hitch to discuss conflicting ideas about spiritual regeneration and existentialism as embodied in the characters of his literary hero, the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky (BBCR3 Proms Literary Festival, 20 August 2008; transcript and audio version available from www.archbishopofcanterbury.org)
  • wrote on the church's responsibility for climate change ('A new spiritual politics of limits', The Guardian, 26 July 2008)
  • paid tribute to the Rev'd Professor Henry Chadwick, FBA, the leading Anglican scholar ('Henry Chadwick', The Guardian, 19 June 2008)
  • was interviewed by Lord Chris Smith on GMTV's Sunday programme (15 June 2008, transcript available from www.archbishopofcanterbury.org)
  • reflected on the tenth anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement (Archbishop's Easter Message, 19 March 2008)
  • delivered a lecture entitled 'Faith, Reason and Quality Assurance - Having Faith in Academic Life' on the university as a society (21 February 2008, as part of the "A World to Believe in - Cambridge Consultations on Faith, Humanity and the Future" Sessions, full text available)
  • sparked a lively debate about the accommodation of religious legal codes (Interview, BBC R4 World at One (audio), 7 February 2008); full text of lecture)
  • presented an illustrated essay on Augustine as a teacher of the inner life, as part of a series on the aspects of Augustine's life and work which continue to move and engage the reader (The Essay, BBC R3, 15 January 2008)

Lord Woolf, former Chief Justice of England and Wales, has published the report of his committee’s investigation into the the ethical practices of BAE Systems, which was commissioned by BAE Systems in the context of controversy over business practices in the international arms trade. (7 May 2008)

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