There are worse plights than being drawn back into the world of C Wright Mills. I have been re-reading The Power Elite, as some will be aware. On page 245 of my old edition from undergraduate days I chanced upon two statements on the sociological undertaking that like so much else in his output continue… Read More »
What I here call the ‘jigsaw model’ of logics, relations and configurations still makes sense to me. It is, however, easier to define than to illustrate via application. ‘Does it work?’ is the question. Just for a change I am going to introduce it by reference to the sociology of health and illness. Models in… Read More »
I have alluded to a publication or two issuing from the epilepsy research. Neither of these was my first, and therein lies a tale or two. Anthony Hopkins was keen that we give a joint talk to the neurology section of the Royal Society of Medicine. We had no results, but hey! They were his… Read More »
In 1978 I was appointed full-time lecturer at the Middlesex Hospital Medical School, which was to be my base until UCL chewed up and spat out a few bits before swallowing the rest whole in 1987. My office was a dark, dusty, dingy room in, if I recall rightly, Hanson Street. In my desk I… Read More »
This is for me a blog with a difference. Ever since my undergraduate days, 1968-71, I have been attracted to the writing of C Wright Mills. It is of course a common form of magnetism. For a variety of reasons I have re-read his The Power Elite, a report and analysis of America’s ‘governors’ in… Read More »
I did not meet Margot Jefferys immediately on crossing the threshold at Bedford College in 1972. Based then in Peto Place, it was George Brown’s office I entered. But this was her Unit, and I came to know her well and to appreciate – no, more than that – the deftness of her political touch,… Read More »
We had moved to a rented flat – 45 Sandown Lodge – in Epsom in 1972. In fact we could have moved anywhere south of the Thames, it just happened that an opportunity arose in Epsom. We were to spend nearly 20 years there as our family multiplied. Three of our four daughters were born… Read More »
As my allotted three year stint as a research officer at St Bart’s neared its end, the Dean of Charing Cross Hospital Medical School contacted George Brown to enquire about any suitable candidates for a half-time lectureship in sociology. The appointee would join David Blane who already occupied a half-time post there and had no… Read More »
Asher Tropp at Surrey had urged us to get our hands dirty doing research rather than sign up for a taught Masters. Now, esconced at Bedford College and taking stock, I began to wonder if anyone lacking Margot and George’s M.Sc in medical sociology could land a teaching post! But in the meantime I had… Read More »
Such was my enjoyment of philosophy at Surrey that I determined to continue my studies. Pat Smart suggested that I apply for the B.Phil at Oxford and garnered the enthusiastic support of Daniel O’Connor at Exeter. In the event – once again – I tripped up in my examinations (it seems, embarrassingly for an academic,… Read More »