bbkThe Birkbeck magazine Issue 23, Spring 2008

A clean sweepThe research keepingbacteria from your door

Teaching & research

Partnership to find pain treatments 1Crystallography teams up with Pfizer

Sure Start strengths and weaknesses 2Research leads to changes ingovernment scheme

A year in the life of Birkbeck Stratford 3Significant milestone reached

Reflections upon a changing climate 4Research on managing the risk offlooding

Babylab speaks up 5Funding for national autism network

Master’s report

Responding to change 6

College news

Automation for the nation 8Computer Science celebrates 50 years

Open and shut case 9Law students praised by leading judge

Obituaries 10

Waste not want not 11Environmental news

Alumni news

First class male 12Talk of essays rules the Prego household

No excuses 15The Mayor of Tower Hamlets

PhD on the brain 16Przemek Tomalski on life in aworld-class lab

In person

A law unto themselves 19Gordon Lynch on the Archbishopof Canterbury

Features

A life of grime 20Jane Nicklin on being a consultantfor How Clean is Your House?

Ocean’s delve 22Charlie Underwood on the discovery ofthousands of sharks’ teeth in Morocco

Free trade nation 24Frank Trentmann on how free tradeonce stood for justice and peace

Intimacy & responsibility 26MatthewWeait on efforts to eliminatediscrimination of people living with HIV

Letters 28Books and events 29

Contents � Issue 23

Birkbeck is a world-class research and teaching institution, a vibrant centreof academic excellence and London’s only specialist provider of eveninghigher education. Its academic reputation also attracts many traditional,full-time postgraduate and research degree students.

Welcome to issue 23 of BBK. Aswell as celebrating the first yearof Birkbeck Stratford on page 3,we raise a glass to ComputerScience in its 50th year on page 8.Law graduate Genet Amare alsohas a lot to celebrate after goinginto labour during her final examlast year. She tells her story onpage 16. Meanwhile we also hearfrom Ann Jackson, Mayor of TowerHamlets and Philosophy student,on page 15. In ‘A Law UntoThemselves’ on page 19, ProfessorGordon Lynch says history willalmost certainly judge ArchbishopRowanWilliams more kindly thanmany of his recent critics havedone, while Dr Jane Nicklin tellshow she jumped at the chance ofbeing a consultant microbiologiston Channel Four’s How Clean isYour House? in the cover storyon page 20.As ever, we look forward toreceiving your commentsabout BBK.Catherine Stevens

General correspondenceExternal Relations,Birkbeck, University of London,Malet Street, London WC1E 7HXEditorial Catherine StevensT: 020 7079 0881E: c.stevens@bbk.ac.ukDesign James BrownE: james.brown@bbk.ac.ukBirkbeck SocietyCarly-Dee StewartT: 020 7631 6563E: alumni@bbk.ac.ukCover photograph: © Getty Images

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Teaching & research 1

In a bid to discover potential newtreatments for pain, multi-nationaldrug company Pfizer and Icagenare collaborating with Birkbeck’sProfessor Bonnie Ann Wallace andher research team in the Schoolof Crystallography. Utilising thecombined expertise of theparticipants to advance the field,the three partners will study thestructure of sodium ion channels –molecular ‘gates’ that regulate thesignals of nerve cells.“We will look at these ion channels

and how they can interact withdifferent drug compounds to see ifwe can alter how they act,” saysProfessor Wallace. “We hope to gaina greater understanding of theirstructure and function and how wecan influence their behaviour thatleads to pain disorders anddiseases.”“We are very pleased that

Pfizer and Icagen have initiateda collaboration with ProfessorWallace,” adds P Kay Wagoner,President and CEO of Icagen.“She is one of the world leadersin the structural biology of ionchannels and has particularexpertise in structural studiesof sodium channels."More proof of the School’s

glittering research reputation camewith the news that cancer treatmentspecialists have based a team atBirkbeck to study the structure ofproteins to aid the discovery ofanti-cancer drugs. Cancer ResearchTechnology (CRT) has recruitedAndrew Turnbull to lead thenew unit at the School ofCrystallography. Dr Turnbullpreviously lead a team in the X-raycrystallography group at theStructural Genomics Consortium atOxford University. The organisation,owned by Cancer Research UK, aimsto maximise the benefits of publiclyfunded research to cancer patients.Dr Nicholas Keep, Dean of the

Faculty of Science at Birkbeck,says: “Crystallography is anessential part of the drug discoveryand optimisation process. We aredelighted that CRT has recognisedour expertise in this field.”Tony Raynham, Head of Medicinal

Chemistry at CRT, adds: “Locatingour crystallographers at Birkbeckmeans we can take advantage oftheir world-class facilities.”Meanwhile, the Association of

Commonwealth Universities hasmade available up to eightscholarships for students fromCommonwealth countries to studyBirkbeck’s MSc in StructuralMolecular Biology web course. Thescholarships will cover 100% of thecourse fees.On average, the School takes eight

PhD students each year. Tim Stone,a current PhD student in ProfessorWallace’s group, was attracted bythe school’s research status. “TheSchool of Crystallography isinternationally recognised for itsexcellence and I feel privileged tobe associated with it,” he says.

Tim was a successful high schoolphysics teacher but, after 10 years,he felt the need for a change.“A PhD at Birkbeck suited meperfectly. My colleagues havediverse backgrounds; some havehad previous careers, others camestraight from their undergraduatedegree, and we all encompass arange of scientific disciplines.This creates a stimulating workenvironment.”Lastly, the Head of the School,

Professor Gabriel Waksman, hasbeen elected to the EuropeanMolecular Biology Organization(EMBO). Professor Waksman –also Director of the Birkbeck/UCLInstitute of Molecular Biology – isone of 50 EMBO members selectedannually on the basis of scientificexcellence. Joining this communityof leading scientists is a tribute tohis significant contribution to theadvancement of science.

Partnership to find pain treatmentsCrystallography teams up with Pfizer to cement world-class standing

Above: Cancer cells(Science Source/Science Photo Library)

For information about the School ofCrystallography, visit www.cryst.bbk.ac.uk

2 Teaching & research

MOONWATCH

The world’s space agencies should consider lunar-based observatories, maintained by people basedon the moon, as a viable method for expanding ourunderstanding of the universe. That is the messageDr Ian Crawford, School of Earth Sciences, deliveredat a special meeting of the Royal AstronomicalSociety in December. The discussion, ‘Astronomyfrom the Moon’, was organised jointly by Birkbeckand the Open University, bringing together leadingspace scientists from Europe and the US.“Space agencies are again planning to send humansto the moon so it’s a good time to examine thescientific benefits of lunar exploration,” saysDr Crawford. “The lunar far-side is probably the bestlocation in the solar system for radio astronomy, beingpermanently hidden from interference from earth.”Ian is also heavily involved in a number of nearer-term lunar science missions. He chairs the ScienceTeam for C1XS, an orbital X-Ray spectrometer thatwill fly on India’s first mission to the moon laterthis year. “Birkbeck is in the thick of this currentrenaissance in lunar science, both in the UK andinternationally,” he says.

A new Birkbeck book providesinsight into how the government’sSure Start Local Programmestowards ending child poverty wereexpected to function and how theyactually operated, in terms of theirstrengths, weaknesses, costs andearly detected effects on children,families and communities.The National Evaluation of Sure

Start: Does Area-based EarlyIntervention Work? was publishedin November 2007, edited byresearchers at Birkbeck’s Institutefor the Study of Children, Familiesand Social Issues.“The government invested a lot

of money in Sure Start LocalProgrammes,” says co-editor,Professor Jay Belsky, Director of theInstitute and Research Director ofthe evaluation. “It wanted to knowwhether the scheme was realising

its goals and how it could beimproved, so the governmentcommissioned our very largenational evaluation; many of theseresults are presented in the book.”Another co-editor, Professor

Edward Melhuish, ExecutiveDirector of the evaluation, adds:“The government has used ourresults to reformulate selectfeatures of Sure Start, moving fromthe original neighbourhood focus toa Children’s Centre focus, withclearer guidance on the nature ofservices.”This policy redirectionwas also influenced by the resultsof the government-funded EffectiveProvision of PreschoolEducation (EPPE) project thatProfessor Melhuish is involved in.Professor Belsky further points

out that while the new volumenicely summarises how Sure Start

Local Programmes operated beforechanges were implemented (i.e. upto 2006), a new report prepared byProfessors Melhuish and Belsky hasbeen published by the government,based on the group’s continuedinvestigation of the impact of SureStart Local Programmes – includingChildren’s Centres – on children andfamilies. This report, which cameout on 4 March, reveals markedchanges in the impact of Sure Startprogrammes from those reportedin the book.Professor Jacqueline Barnes, the

third co-editor of the volume, isworking on a separate government-commissioned evaluation ofthe Family-Nurse Partnership,developed in the US, whichfocuses on young first-timemothers receiving regular homevisits by specialist nurses.

Sure Start strengths and weaknessesBirkbeck research leads to changes in governmentchild poverty scheme

Teaching & research 3

Thursday 20 September 2007marked a significant milestone inthe College’s history when the firststudents turned up for class in eastLondon and Birkbeck Stratford wasborn. With over 600 enrolments inthe 2007–2008 academic year, theproject is already exceedingexpectations. The Master ofBirkbeck, Professor Latchman, said:“The Stratford project has been achallenging undertaking, involvingmany staff across the College. I amdelighted that our first year hasproved so successful. Six hundredenrolments is very impressive, andparticularly pleasing is the 20%increase in east London studentscoming to our Bloomsbury campus.With this excellent start I knowthat Birkbeck Stratford will gofrom strength to strength.”The project had two major

launches last spring. The first, atthe Goldsmiths Hall, involvedpotential donors and the businesscommunity. The second, atStratford Old Town Hall, hostededucation organisations,community groups, the media andeast London strategic partners.A high-profile, bright green,

marketing campaign with thestrapline ‘part-time university, full-strength qualifications’ capturedour unique offering of high-quality,research-intensive, eveningeducation. The campaign rolled outacross east London on buses andbillboards, and via door drops andin the local media. It encouragedmore than 4000 enquiries aboutBirkbeck in Stratford, including3000 requests for a Stratfordprospectus. About 1000 visitorsattended the open evenings in Juneand September; from research it isclear that this campaign wasinfluential in encouraging people totake the next step towards study.Birkbeck is grateful to the many

partners in east London which

have supported staff over the pastyear, in particular the project’smajor partner, the University ofEast London (UEL). Birkbeck hasvalued the local expertise of UEL,as well as the classroom space atits Stratford campus. NewhamCollege of Further Education andNewVic Sixth Form College haveoffered significant support. In theTheatre Royal Stratford East,Birkbeck found a kindred spirit,and the London Borough ofNewham, the London ThamesGateway Development Corporationand the Stratford RenaissancePartnership have also beenenormously supportive.The project has been lucky enough

to attract a variety of donors. Arange of attractive student bursarieshas been developed – supportedby Sir John Cass’s Foundation, theAldgate and Allhallows BarkingExhibition Foundation, the law firmDenton Wilde Sapte LLP, Man Groupplc Charitable Trust, and The Noon

Foundation – to enable students toovercome financial barriers.The Outreach and WP team have

made significant inroads, attendingevents at local schools, colleges,community groups, libraries andshopping centres to spread theword. The team will soon increaseto five, made possible with generoussupport from the Esmée FairbairnFoundation, the Paul HamlynFoundation and the Morgan StanleyInternational Foundation.Birkbeck is negotiating with the

London Borough of Newham toacquire a site for a new building inthe cultural quarter of Stratford,large enough to host a range ofpartners and joint activities to boosteducation provision in east London.Professor Philip Dewe,Vice-Master

of Birkbeck and Birkbeck Stratfordproject leader, says: “The success ofthe Stratford project is a tribute tothe many Birkbeck staff who havecontributed so much to make thedream an impressive reality.”

A year in the life of Birkbeck StratfordSignificant milestone reached as the first students attend classes in east London

Above: A prospectivestudent at BirkbeckStratford’s inauguralOpen Evening(Jon Moore)

4 Teaching & research

Reflections upon a changing climateGovernment funding given to research on managing the risk of flooding

Above: Floodingreaches criticallevels in Gloucesterduring July 2007(Getty Images)

Dr Eckard Michels has beenawarded the Werner-Hahlweg-Prizefor Military History 2008 for hisforthcoming biography of Germancolonial officer Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, who commanded theGerman forces in East Africa inthe First World War.The prize, for outstanding

research in military historycovering all periods and countries,is presented every other year bythe German Federal Office forArms and Armament, part of theGerman army. The award ceremonytakes place at the University ofPotsdam on 28 May.Dr Michels, the Philip Brady

Lecturer in Modern GermanStudies, submitted his manuscriptafter nine years of research in morethan 20 archives in Germany andBritain. “I always wanted to write abiography because it is consideredthe most rewarding genre,” he says.“I wanted to combine recent trendsin historiography with a renewedinterest in Germany’s colonialhistory and the role of the Prussianaristocracy.” His close examinationof the East African Campaign showsthat it was not, as is sometimesalleged, a chivalrous war, butinstead constituted a humanitariancatastrophe for the African civilianpopulations of Tanzania andMozambique. Lettow-Vorbeck’sforces enslaved hundreds ofthousands of Africans, of whichtens of thousands died ofexhaustion and disease.

Militaryhistory prize

The book, Ein preussischerKolonialoffizier: Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck(1870–1964) Eine Biographie, is publishedin mid-2008 by German publisherSchöningh

Birkbeck has won funding from theEngineering and Physical SciencesResearch Council, the UKgovernment’s leading agency forresearch in engineering and thephysical sciences, for a flood riskPhD which started in October 2007.Following the devastating floods in

parts of the UK last year this field ofresearch is highly relevant in today’suncertain environment.Thesupervision for the PhD is jointlyshared between Dr Diane Horn,School of Geography, and insurancerisk experts Willis Analytics.Theresearch focuses on providingimproved analysis of the possiblefrequency and severity of insuredflood losses in the Thames Gateway.Dr Horn says: “The Thames

Gateway is an ideal case study site,as it is geographically contained,with a clear and defined risk andthe potential for large losses inthe future. According to the

Government’s Communities Plan,160,000 new homes will be builtin the Thames Gateway area by2016 and this research will helpto inform current approaches toflood risk management.”Concern about flooding and the

management of flood risk in theThames Gateway has increased inrecent years due to the location ofinsured assets in flood risk areasand the possibility of increasinglosses. In particular, the insuranceindustry requires detailedinformation about the impact ofcatastrophic floods, the potentialrisk to the Thames Gateway andhow planning strategies will affectfuture insurance vulnerability.Matthew Foote from Willis

Analytics says: “The research projectrepresents an innovative approachto applying analytical techniques forinsurance risk assessment of futureflooding in the Thames Gateway.”

The Babylab team was invited to areception at Number 10 in honourof the Autism Speaks charity,hosted by Sarah Brown, the PrimeMinister’s wife, last autumn.Autism Speaks awarded theresearchers a £450,000 grant overfive years, raised from charitiesincluding The Henry Smith Charityand The Baily Thomas CharitableFund. This funding is to helpestablish a national network forthe study of baby siblings ofchildren with autism.Babylab co-ordinator Leslie Tucker

explains: “We are investigatingwhether there are differences indevelopment between infants whohave siblings with autism and thosewho do not. This may help identifythe early signs of the disorder,allowing for earlier, more effectiveintervention aimed at improving thequality of life for those who areaffected. Creating a nationalnetwork is important in bringingtogether researchers with commonaims and advancing scientificdiscoveries in this area.”Leslie took the opportunity at the

reception to explain the work ofthe Babylab (aka the Centre forBrain and Cognitive Development)to Gordon Brown, at the reception,which took place on 11 September.“He was very receptive and seemedenthusiastic about our work,” shesays. Some 250 children are beingstudied at 6-12 months and againat 2-3 years for the Babylab’s BabySiblings project, led by Director,Professor Mark Johnson.The Chair of Trustees of Autism

Speaks, Dame Stephanie Shirley, isa Fellow and alumna of Birkbeck. Ahighly successful business careerhas enabled her to put into practiceher conviction that business shouldgive something back to society.Having arrived in Britain as an

unaccompanied child refugee fromGermany in 1939, Dame Stephanie

started what is now the businesstechnology group Xansa on herdining-room table with £6 in 1962.After 25 years as Chief Executive,she retired as honorary LifePresident in 1993. Whilst manycorporate Boards beckoned, herfocus has increasingly beenphilanthropy in the arena ofautism (her autistic son Gilesdied age 35 in 1998).She has founded a number of

autism charities including AutismSpeaks in the UK. She says: “All ourefforts are directed at determiningthe causes of autism by 2014 andhalving the total cost of it by 2020.Birkbeck’s Babylab will be criticalto this over the next three years.”

Teaching & research 5

Babylab speaks upFunding for national autism network

If you would like your baby to take partin a Babylab study, call 020 7631 6258or email babylab@bbk.ac.uk, includingcontact details and your baby’s date ofbirth/due date

Above: In DowningStreet (from l-r)Babylab Director,Professor MarkJohnson, CentreCo-ordinator LeslieTucker and ResearchFellow, MayadaElsabbagh

Higher education policy expert,Professor Claire Callender, isundertaking research exploring thecareer paths of students andgraduates. Commissioned by theHigher Education Careers ServiceUnit and DIUS, this work focuses onstudents’ career decision-making.She is directing a national studyover four years of two groups ofpart-time undergraduates drawnfrom 25 institutions – includingBirkbeck. “We will survey thestudents’ employers about theirattitudes to part-time study,” saysProfessor Callender, who joinedBirkbeck in January.A second piece of research is

associated with her Fulbright NewCentury Scholarship (07/08). For thisshe spent last winter term atHarvard Graduate School ofEducation exploring what lessonscan be learned from the US forEngland’s emerging system ofstudent bursaries and scholarships.“The Fulbright programme has beenespecially exciting. It bringstogether 30 scholars from acrossthe globe to focus on issues ofequity and access in highereducation.”

Policy experton career paths

6 Master’s report

Since the last BBK, we have begunteaching in Stratford east Londonfor the first time.The BirkbeckStratford project, described by onemember of the Academic Board as‘the most ambitious project Birkbeckhas undertaken in 180 years’, isproving to be a resounding success.In an area which normally has the

lowest participation in highereducation in London, we have over600 enrolments on our certificate,diploma and degree programmesand many initially scepticalindividuals and organisations arenow clamouring to collaborate withus. Moreover, our intensive outreachand advertising campaign in eastLondon has resulted in a 20%increase in applications fromeast London boroughs to study atBirkbeck in Bloomsbury on courseswhich are not yet being offered inStratford.This contributed to arecord level of student applicationsfor the 2007-08 academic year,which meant that, for the firsttime in recent years, we fulfilledthe ambitious student numbertargets set in discussions with theHigher Education Funding Councilfor England (HEFCE).These successes have proved to be

highly important as we deal withthe effects of the government’sdecision to instruct HEFCE not tosupport universities for studentswho are studying for equivalent orlesser qualifications (ELQ) to thosewhich they hold already. Althoughstudents who have already startedtheir courses will not be affected,the College will not receive funding

from 2008–09 for new ELQ students.Not surprisingly, for an institutioncommitted to lifelong learning,approximately 40% of Birkbeck’sstudents fall into the ELQ categoryand the College could lose up to£8 million per year in funding oncethese proposals are fullyimplemented.Since these proposals were first

announced in September 2007,the College has pursued a dualapproach. Firstly, we havecampaigned strongly against thedecision on the grounds that itwill particularly affect individualswho are re-skilling to develop theircareers. Moreover, since the vastmajority of ELQ students studypart time, the loss of resourceswill severely affect the ability ofpart-time specialist institutionsto respond to the government’sskills agenda which will involveindividuals in employmentstudying part time.

Responding to change

Master’s reportDavid S Latchman

In our second and parallelapproach we have worked withHEFCE to mitigate the effect onBirkbeck should the decision beimplemented, taking advantage ofthe high opinion which HEFCE hasof us on the basis of many of ouractivities, particularly theStratford project.In initial proposals, HEFCE

announced a number of exemptionsfor particular subjects such asscience and languages, which willbenefit us, an additional amountfor the part-time sector of £20million pa, subsequently raisedto £30 million pa, and a pledgeto review annually the list ofexempted subjects. Moreover, theyalso proposed that, at least until2010–2011, institutions would besafety netted against the fullimpact of the ELQ proposals andtheir grant would be maintainedat the same level in cash terms tothat for 2007–2008.

Below: A bus travelsthrough Stratford,bearing the Birkbeckcampaign (Jon Moore)

Master’s report 7

Although these proposals arehelpful, they are obviously notsufficient either for the College orfor individuals who wish to studythe many non-exempted subjectsincluding computer science,management and law.We have, therefore, campaigned

intensively against the proposaland you may have seen the variousbriefings which we have issuedeither in paper form or on ourwebsite. The general effect of ourcampaign has been greatly to raisethe profile of Birkbeck and its work.Interestingly, 211 MPs (including 86Labour MPs) signed an Early DayMotion (EDM) calling on thegovernment not to damage Birkbeckand the Open University (OU). Thesame motion was the subject of anopposition day debate in the Houseof Commons in which speaker afterspeaker from all sides of the Housepraised Birkbeck and its work, asdid the Secretary of State, JohnDenham, and the Ministerresponsible, Bill Rammell.We have been joined, not only by

other universities but also by adisparate range of organisations,including the University andCollege’s Union (UCU), the NationalUnion of Students (NUS) and theConfederation of British Industry(CBI), whose Chief Executive,Richard Lambert, used his inauguralUniversities UK lecture to criticisethe government’s proposals.This widespread opposition

resulted in the Select Committeefor Innovation, Universities andSkills calling for a special inquiryinto the ELQ issue. I gave evidencein the first session alongside theOU, UCU and the NUS, while thesecond session featured theMinister, Bill Rammell, and theChief Executive of HEFCE, DavidEastwood. The Committeeapparently received 478 writtensubmissions to its inquiry of which

470 were against the government’sposition, seven were in favour andone was uninterpretable! We nowawait the Committee’s report.Meanwhile, we have pursued our

second approach through on-goingdialogue with HEFCE. We proposedthat Birkbeck should build on itssuccesses and position itself forthe post ELQ era by conducting astrategic review of how best tomove forward. This review wouldfocus on our current strengths andhow to build on these; for example,by engaging more with employersand widening participation byattracting individuals to BirkbeckBloomsbury from low participation

areas outside east London. HEFCEawarded us £200,000 to conductthis strategic review and weappointed Grant Thornton tocarry it out. It is intended that theresults of the strategic review willunderpin a major bid to HEFCE’sStrategic Development Fund (SDF)in the summer for additionalstudent numbers and recurrentfunding to recruit and retain suchstudents. Interestingly, ourapproach has been widely praisedby government and HEFCE withthe Minster, Bill Rammell, sayingthat Birkbeck has been a model ofhow higher education institutionsshould respond to change.The approach we have taken is

all the more important sincegovernment and HEFCE arecontinuing to implement the ELQfunding proposals despite thewidespread opposition. HEFCEheld a consultation on how (butnot whether) to implement theELQ funding withdrawal. Moreimportantly, John Denham, in hisannual grant letter to HEFCEindicated that they should‘carefully consider’ the position ofthe institutions most affected bythe ELQ funding withdrawal inallocating new student places.This is obviously important to usin terms of our potential bid to theHEFCE SDF for new funded places.I am confident, therefore, that the

College’s strategic policy will allowus to continue to flourish and fulfilour mission of assisting workingpeople to obtain the qualificationsthat are most relevant to them.This will involve working closelywith employers, recruiting first-time degree students from lowparticipation areas and findingways to support students who wishto study for ELQ qualificationsdespite the withdrawal ofgovernment support to theCollege for such students.

I am confident, therefore, that theCollege’s strategic policy will allowus to continue to flourish“ „

Automation for the nation

Birkbeck’s School of ComputerScience and Information Systemsis celebrating 50 years of teachingand research with an open dayfor alumni and guests on 21 May.In 1957 the Birkbeck Computer

Laboratory became the Departmentof Numerical Automation, makingit one of the UK’s first academiccomputing departments andteaching one of the first computingdegrees when it launched the MScin Numerical Automation.The School traces its roots back to

1946 when Andrew Booth, newlyappointed to JD Bernal’s laboratory,began to explore the automation ofthe time-consuming calculationsassociated with the interpretationof X-ray images of crystals.Booth’s first electronic computer,

SEC (Simple Electronic Computer),was completed around 1950. Hisbest known machine, APE(X)C, wasused by BTM Ltd (BritishTabulating Machine Company) asthe basis of the design of its HEC1computer, which evolved into theICT 1201. This machine was thebest-selling British computer at theend of the 1950s with nearly 100machines installed.Booth also built the world’s first

rotating storage device. In the late1940s he attempted to build aworkable disc. Let down bycontemporary engineering, he thensucceeded in building the world’sfirst drum store. Drum stores werewidely used in the 1950s for bothmain memory and backing store.In addition to these innovations,Booth published an algorithmfor a parallel multiplier, whichstill forms the basis of themultiplication circuits in a modernPC. He was also a pioneer in theuse of machines to assist in thetranslation between languages.In 1962 Booth left Birkbeck to

pursue a distinguished academiccareer in Canada. Following his

School of Computer Science celebrates 50 years of technological expertise

8 College news

Above: One of thefirst graduates,Norman Kitz (MScEngineering, 1951),working on the SimpleElectronic Computer(SEC) with a veryearly drum in themiddle of the picture

50th anniversary celebrations,Wednesday 21 May

All current and former staffand students are warmlyinvited to attend.To register, fill in the form atwww.dcs.bbk.ac.uk/50years2:30pm: Welcome by the Masterof Birkbeck, Professor DavidLatchman, and the Head of School,Dr Peter Wood. This will befollowed by talks from alumniabout computing at Birkbeckover the past 50 years4pm: An exhibition of researchprojects in the School, comprisingposters and software demos6:30pm: Talks about recentresearch conducted in the School

departure, the department ceasedits hardware activities, which werealready in decline as the costs ofa hardware laboratory escalated.The work on language translationcontinued, together with researchon numerical methods and otheraspects of computer science.The department also changedits name to the Department ofComputer Science.The appointment of Professor

Peter King as Head of Departmentin 1970 coincided with theemergence of database managementtechnology as a major component ofIT systems. King established thereputation of Birkbeck as a centreof expertise in data managementand applied artificial intelligence –research themes that continuetoday. In 1999, following a Collegere-organisation, the departmentbecame the School of ComputerScience and Information Systems.The 1990s and 2000s have seen a

growth of research in intelligentdata analysis, bioinformatics andweb technologies, in co-operationwith a number of major externalorganisations, as well as withcolleagues in neighbouringinstitutions. Of particular note arethe current partnerships with UCLin the area of bioinformatics andwith the Institute of Education atthe London Knowledge Lab – whichis exploring the future of learningwith digital technologies.Today the School continues as a

leading centre of expertise ininformation and knowledgemanagement, web technologies,computational intelligence, andbioinformatics and informationsystems development.

Dr Roger Johnson, Dean of SocialSciences, is compiling a history of theSchool. He welcomes photographs andreminiscences from alumni for an onlinegallery. Email memories@dcs.bbk.ac.uk

College news 9

Open and shut caseLaw students praised by leading judge

The School of Law’s mooting teamrecently beat both King’s CollegeLondon and Keble College Oxfordin the national debating contest,the Essex Court ChambersEnglish Speaking Union MootingCompetition. Entrants are requiredto argue hypothetical cases as if ina court of law.In the first round, Birkbeck took

on an experienced team from King'sCollege London on 10 December,with judge Christopher BroughamQC from South Square Chamberspresiding. Mr Brougham QC hasbeen involved in many key nationalcases, including representing SwissBank following the collapse of theRobert Maxwell empire.The Birkbeck competitors brought

a case to the Court of Appeal. MrBrougham QC not only allowed theappeal, but awarded victory to theteam – comprising Brian Barron(LLB third year) and MylesGardiner (LLB first yearaccelerated). The Law School’sProfessor Bill Bowring said theBirkbeck team was “highly

professional, well prepared atshort notice, and were the clearwinners. They were especiallycomplimented on their splendidbundle of authorities.”In the second round, Suzanne

Alyamani (LLB third year) joinedBrian Barron to represent Birkbeckand the pair were again successful,beating Keble College Oxford beforethe same judge. “Mr Brougham QCsaid that Brian was outstandingand outshone everyone else,” saysPatricia Costall, the School’sacademic support tutor andMooting organiser. “Suzanne is alsovery capable, and experienced,having represented the BirkbeckLaw School in America twice. This iswhat impresses me about Birkbeck– the absolute quality of the peoplewho choose to study or work here.”Round three takes the Birkbeck

team to Anglia Ruskin Universityfor a match that had to becompleted by 21 March. From 64teams at entry, Birkbeck are nowin the last 16. Birkbeck’s mootingenterprise is headed up by

Professor Bill Bowring, whorecently judged the Jessup Moot inMoscow. The team members weretrained by Philip King and ClareDowse, both Birkbeck graduatesand past mooting champions, nowsuccessfully practising barristers.The Essex Court Chambers

Mooting Competition has atradition of attracting the very bestlegal brains as its judges andproducing the next generation ofthem from its competitors. Itinvolves knock-out rounds acrossthe country. The semi-finals andfinal take place in London in June.Meanwhile, international law

firm Lovells has established linkswith Birkbeck. The firm is offeringa range of opportunities forBirkbeck law students, includingmentoring schemes, open days andwork shadowing.Finally, the School of Law was

shortlisted for a prestigiousWidening Participation Initiative ofthe Year award late last year. Theprize, which recognises work bythe academic support tutor andadministrative team to assiststudents at risk of dropping out, isawarded by the Times HigherEducation magazine and is backedby the Higher Education FundingCouncil for England. Sadly forBirkbeck, Napier University won,but there’s always another year.Since the launch of the School of

Law’s early referral scheme, thestaff have seen a noticeable upturnin retention, and students whowork with Patricia Costall prior tore-sits are three times more likelythan others to pass. Customisedsupport for students is organisedvia one-to-one tutorials, drop-ins,email and phone support, andexam workshops.

To find out more about Birkbeck’s Schoolof Law, visit www.bbk.ac.uk/law

Below: (From l-r) FarahNamroz Khan, Vice-President Elect of theLaw Society, PatriciaCostall and IsaacFabelurin, PresidentElect of the Law Society(Jon Wilson)

10 College news

ObituariesEllen Noonan, Jim Greaves and Sir Leslie Murphy

Learning, attracting around 400students each year.Ellen helped establish the

Birkbeck Counselling Association,which runs annual conferencesand a monthly forum, andpublishes the highly successfuljournal Psychodynamic Practice(Routledge). She became consultanteditor and was a pivotal member ofthe editorial team.A charismatic leader, her vision

and determination were vital insustaining her courses. However,she was not the kind of person whodemanded that people think thesame way she did.Ellen could be called a

charismatic leader, in that herdrive, vision and determinationwere vital in establishing andsustaining the counselling courseswhich she founded. However,reflecting something about theculture of Birkbeck, she was notthe kind of inspiring figure whodemanded that her colleagues andstudents think like she did. On thecontrary, she took great pleasure inhelping others to develop their ownways of thinking. Characteristically,her own highly influential andsharply observed book, CounsellingYoung People, was not requiredreading for her students. She wasmuch more interested in helpingher students, and teachingcolleagues, free themselves fromtheir own inhibitions and fear oflearning rather than indoctrinatingthem with her own ideas.Ellen retired from Birkbeck in

1999. She continued privateconsultancy, her work for thejournal, developed new interestsand activities, and played an activepart in the life of the BirkbeckCounselling Association. She will begreatly missed by her colleaguesand students.Dr Laurence Spurlingand Paul Terry

Jim Greaves

Jim Greaves (BSc Psychology1966), who died in April 2007, wasPresident of the Students’ Unionand Student Governor between1965-67, at a critical time forBirkbeck. The management wasseriously considering implementinggovernment policy to substantiallyexpand the number of full-timeundergraduate places. This wouldhave meant the end of the key roleof Birkbeck as a college for maturestudents. Jim led the students in avigorous campaign against this,with many academic staff, anddefeated the proposals. As a result,the traditional role of Birkbeck wasconfirmed and strengthened.Jim had to leave school aged 16

because of family circumstances,but was given a wonderfulopportunity to develop hisintellectual and professional lifeat Birkbeck. He went on to a careerat the University of Glamorgan. Heis survived by his wife Kathleen,whom he met at Birkbeck, and adaughter Claire. He will beremembered with great affectionby the graduates who campaignedwith him, many of whom hadremained close friends.Kathleen Greaves(BA History, 1966)

Sir Leslie MurphySir Leslie Murphy, who died on29 September aged 91, was an oilexecutive who became the lastLabour-appointed chairman of theNational Enterprise Board. He wasalso a founder-trustee of the SDP.Sir Leslie worked in the civil

service while taking eveningclasses in Mathematics at Birkbeck,becoming the first external studentto achieve a first-class degree. Hewas made a College Fellow in 1978.

Ellen NoonanStaff in the Faculty of LifelongLearning were saddened to hear ofthe death of Ellen Noonan on 23October 2007. Ellen’s relationshipwith Birkbeck goes back to 1972,when she set up the Certificate inStudent Counselling at what wasthen the Centre for Extra-MuralStudies, University of London. Heraim was to take psychoanalyticideas out of the consulting roomand into the workplace by trainingthose in the ‘people business’, suchas teachers, personnel managers,social workers and nurses.This very successful course laid

the foundation for the MSc inPsychodynamic Counselling, setup in 1994, which has now movedto the School of Psychology.Counselling courses continue to betaught in the Faculty of Lifelong

Above: Ellen Noonan(with thanks to PaulTerry)

College news 11

While working towards his MSc inEnvironmental Managementat Birkbeck, Mark Gough waspromoted from a part-timeresearch position at publishingcompany Reed Elsevier to becomeits Environment and Health andSafety Co-ordinator, responsible fordeveloping and co-ordinating thecompany’s initiatives and policies.Mark was previously an actor

(appearing in BBC film TheStudent Prince, the remake of TheLiver Birds and in several plays).However, he came to a point wherehe wanted to focus on his passionfor the environment.“When Reed Elsevier stopped

recycling I started carrying wasteto the local recycling centre on myway home from work. Themanagement saw me leaving thebuilding with a large white sackand pulled me in. I explained howimportant recycling was – quotingwhat I‘d learned in my Birkbecklectures – but was told there wasno budget. Not willing to take nofor an answer, I took a proposalback to the company, outlininglow cost recycling options,” Markcontinues. The business unit hewas working for asked him to talkto its head office about what morethe company could do. Ultimatelythis led him to the group’s globalhead office, where he proposedthey should hire an EnvironmentalCo-ordinator to organise thecompany’s approach to theenvironment. “They offered methe job and the rest is history.”Mark set up regular meetings to

discuss further improvementswith his colleagues. “I now run anetwork of 86 similar ‘gREenteams’ for Reed Elsevier in manycountries.” His dissertation alsolead to ongoing consultancy workfor Birkbeck. He helped establishthe College’s own EnvironmentalManagement Group, which is

responsible for ensuringcompliance with theenvironmental/sustainabilitypolicy statement agreed by thegovernors and signed by theMaster. “The EMS Group is havingsome success,” says Mark, “andthere has been a six-fold increasein the amount of waste recycledby the College.”

Environmental Management graduate, Mark Gough, on not taking no for an answer

Waste not want not

Master and SirProfessor Sir Timothy O'Shea BScPhD FRSE, who was Master ofBirkbeck from 1997 until 2002,was awarded a Knighthood in theQueen's 2008 New Year's HonoursList in recognition of his servicesto higher education.

Professor O’Shea graduated inMathematics and ExperimentalPsychology from Sussex and hasa PhD in Computer Science fromLeeds. He joined the OpenUniversity in 1978, his researchcentring on the educationalapplications of computers.Awarded a Personal Chair bythe OU in 1987, he became aPro-Vice-Chancellor in 1994.

While Master of Birkbeck he wasalso Provost of Gresham College(2000) and Pro-Vice-Chancellor ofthe University of London (2001),all held concurrently. He becamePrincipal and Vice-Chancellor ofthe University of Edinburgh inOctober 2002.

For updates on Birkbeck’s environmentalprogress go to the College Green websiteat www.bbk.ac.uk/sustain. If yourcompany or organisation would like tocontact Mark Gough through Birkbeck’sBusiness Relations Unit, call 020 76316593 or email employers@bbk.ac.uk

Alumni news 13

Talk of essays and seminars rules the Prego household

FIRST CLASS MALE

Jose Prego, 31, graduated last year fromBirkbeck with BA History of Art and hopesto carry on his studies at the College. Hissister is studying BA German at Birkbeck,and aims to complete this year, and hiswife, Fiona, is a Birkbeck Stratfordstudent on the Introduction toCounselling course.“I found out about Birkbeck through

my sister, Elisabete,” says Jose, who wasan office assistant at Windmill Organicswhen he enrolled on his BA. He is now ageneral office assistant in the post roomat Birkbeck. Originally from Portugal,Jose came to England to continuehis studies.“I studied fine art in Portugal in

secondary school and I was alwaysinterested in art theory but when Ifinished secondary school there wasn’tmuch happening. So I came to Londonwhen I was 20 with my sister because Iwanted something different – a newchallenge. After 11 years we are still here.I remember the day I received the letterthat I had been accepted at Birkbeck. Iwas really happy.”Jose soon got the hang of juggling work

and study because he had worked part-time as a student in Portugal. “It was veryhectic but if you are doing something youreally love, you make time,” he says. “Itried to do a bit every day, even if it wasjust one hour. If you get into a rhythm, youfind it easier. When you have to do anessay it’s really stressful, I cannot denythat. I must say, I did struggle with themin the beginning because I didn’t do muchessay writing in Portugal. Now it is

something that I really enjoy. I saw mywife doing an essay and I thought ‘I reallymiss this!’ It might sound crazy but it’strue. I really enjoy the learning process.”Jose’s wife is a dentist and is using the

Birkbeck Stratford counselling course as aspringboard possibly to change career.Says Jose: “Fiona enjoys her job but she

is thinking about the future because beinga dentist is very demanding physically foryour back and neck. There are a few peopleshe knows, including her boss, who havehad operations because of their work.”He adds: “She is really loving her

counselling course; it’s an area she is veryinterested in. I give her tips to encourageher and tell her to do her reading but Ican’t say too much because I was not theperfect student! There are things I wouldhave liked to do differently but the mainthing I’d advise people is to just enjoy it. Itopens your mind and gives you differentperceptions. It helps you on a personallevel too. Fiona has to submit an essaythis week on listening; she was never agood listener but now she is actuallybecoming good,” he laughs.In the future Jose hopes to get his teeth

into his favourite subject areas of dance,photography and film. He is also excitedabout his sister’s success. She is workingfor an arts performance agency thatspecialises in opera singing. “Most ofthe singers are from Germany so shecan practice the language,” he says.Jose is looking forward to seeing his

sister graduate this November. “Mygraduation day was brilliant so I’mreally looking forward to it.”

Left: Jose Prego, in Birkbeck’spost room (Christina Panagi)

14 Alumni news

Your teamSince the last edition of BBK theDevelopment and Alumni team hasbeen working hard to raise fundsfor the Alumni Fund, new staffposts, the Birkbeck Stratfordproject, as well as to stay in touchwith you, our alumni community.The team has expandedsignificantly since 2006, and wehave been able to increase ourfundraising potential as well asimprove upon the services we offerour alumni and friends.

£1+ million raisedWe are particularly pleased to haveraised over £1 million in funding forBirkbeck, thanks to the generosityof you, our alumni, a number ofcharitable trusts and foundations,and through the corporate socialresponsibility programmes of some

of the country’s leading businesses.Over 300 students have receivedfinancial support throughbursaries or scholarships in thelast year, a number of whom haveenrolled at Birkbeck Stratford.The generosity of our alumniand friends has been invaluable.Thanks to all of you who gaveyour support in the last year.

Alumni relationsLast autumn we launched the newversion of the alumni E-newsletter,E-bbk, to keep you informed ofevents, news and achievements atBirkbeck. Feedback has beenpositive. We are also lucky to havethe support of 35 alumni whofrequently volunteer at OpenEvenings to talk to prospectivestudents and act as Birkbeckambassadors.

Left: Bill West at work in Dagenham (Jon Moore)

STANDING TALLIt’s been more than 25 years since Bill West was in aclassroom, so he was understandably nervous abouthis first lectures at Birkbeck Stratford. “I was prettyapprehensive but the lecturers are friendly andapproachable.”Bill (42) is taking a foundation year Certificate in

Life Sciences, and works as a laboratory manager forTDG Chemicals at the Port of London. He receivesfinancial support from his employer, which pays forhis tuition fees.“Everyone at work has been very supportive,

particularly my managers. They encouraged me totake the course as part of my recent promotion. Atfirst it was hard to adjust, starting a new position atwork and beginning the course. Juggling everythingtook a couple of weeks to work out, but now I’m in aroutine, things are going really well. I use my lunchhour to catch up on my study, and go straight tolectures after work. Learning in the evening means Idon’t have to give up work so I don’t have to worryabout paying the mortgage and I can fit my studiesaround my home life.”

Latest developments in the Development and Alumni team

Community spirit

Telephone campaign 2008In February 2008 we held our thirdtelephone campaign to raise moneyfor the Alumni Fund. Thank you toall those who participated; for yourtime, suggestions, comments anddonations. It is wonderful that somany of our alumni and friendstake the opportunity to supportBirkbeck by donating moneytowards bursaries for studentswho would not otherwise be ableto study at the College, as well asthrough grants for projects in andaround Birkbeck where the need isgreatest. We will publish theresults of our fundraising effortsin the next issue of BBK magazine,but do look out for them in thenext E-newsletter too. If you do notsubscribe to the E-newsletter andwould like to, please get in touchand we will add you to the list.

If you would like toassist us byvolunteering at OpenEvenings, contributingto the Alumni Fund or ifyou’d simply like moreinformation about theactivities and benefitsoffered by theDevelopment andAlumni Office, pleaseemail us atalumni@bbk.ac.uk

Alumni news 15

Councillor Ann Jackson, Mayor ofTower Hamlets, is a third-yearBA Philosophy student at Birkbeck.She very much welcomes theCollege bringing its specialistpart-time evening teachingprovision to east London.“There are no excuses anymore.

Anybody who wishes to study nowhas the opportunity to attendclasses on their doorstep. I hopeTower Hamlets residents seeBirkbeck Stratford as a way toaccess the job market,” says Ann,who helped launch BirkbeckStratford at the Old Town Hall lastspring when she was DeputyMayor of Tower Hamlets.“The Borough currently has a

high unemployment rate – doublethe national rate. However, wealso have innovative and dynamiccompanies in the area, which aregreat employers. I hope people willenrol on courses that give them thequalifications they need in the jobmarket, as well as stimulate theirinterests and give them the selfbelief and motivation toachieve more.”Ann left school early but has

always been an avid reader who iscurious about life, culture andpolitical systems.“I always wanted to study

philosophy. I enjoy asking the bigquestions, such as, why are wehere? How can different groups livetogether? How do political systemsdevelop?”Her daughter, Maryann, who

enrolled at Birkbeck first, showedAnn the College prospectus andencouraged her to enrol. Maryannis now in her final year of the BScin Biological Sciences.Ann says: “When I read the

prospectus I said yes – this is forme. I am really surprised to findmyself enjoying things I thought Inever would.”She is also finding that her time

The Mayor of Tower Hamlets asks the big questions in life

No excuses

Below: Councillor AnnJackson

Birkbeck Stratford offers flexible,evening courses in east London,which has the lowest highereducation participation levels inthe London region. This ground-breaking project extends highereducation into the heart of the‘hard to reach’ communities byusing Birkbeck’s expertise todevelop part-time, evening,undergraduate degrees offeredlocally in east London, meetingthe needs of employers andindividuals. To find out moreabout the courses offered atBirkbeck Stratford, visitwww.birkbeckstratford.ac.uk.For more details about the BAPhilosophy at the Bloomsburycampus, visit www.bbk.ac.uk/phil

at Birkbeck is helping her in herwork: “At Birkbeck you learn tomanage your time better. I have abusy schedule and sometimesCouncil engagements clash so I domiss the odd lecture, but lecturesare backed up with discussiongroups so you can always catch upthere. I feel more confident andfocused when joining debates. Ithink I ask better questions.”

She adds: “I’m a politician so mydegree is giving me more insightinto how political ideologies areformed and why we have thesystems we have today. I’m also ahumanitarian and I do really wantto help people to have a betterunderstanding of each other andto be more tolerant.”

16 Alumni news

Przemek Tomalski came to Birkbeckfrom Poland in 2005 to commencehis full-time PhD Psychologyresearch into cognitive and braindevelopment. He was lucky enoughto receive a Marie Curie Early StageTraining Fellowship from theEuropean Union.“Birkbeck was definitely top of my

list,” he says. “I was attracted to theCollege because of its excellence inresearch. The team at the Centre forBrain and Cognitive Development(aka the Babylab), where I’m based,is famous for its work.”“My research is aimed at

investigating the brainmechanisms involved inprocessing visual informationabout faces. I look at neuralpathways that are active in thehuman brain from birth through toadulthood that allow the rapiddetection of faces. Apart from thestimulating atmosphere, I benefitfrom impressive research facilitiesand equipment, all located incentral London.”

He continues: “Birkbeck is notjust a place where you can doworld-class research. It is also aplace where you can discover thatworking towards your PhD is notjust three years of hard work, butalso three years of fun and sharingyour passion with others.”When Przemek completes his

PhD he plans to continue as aresearcher of cognitiveneuroscience. “The next step is tofind a suitable laboratory to gainmore experience as a post-doctoralfellow. Eventually, I might be ableto get a position as a group leaderand start my own laboratory.”For those thinking about

following in his footsteps, Przemeksays it’s vital to identify an area ofinvestigation that you find excitingand important to explore. “Thenyou can look around and find arelevant supervisor that youwould be happy to work with.”

Przemek Tomalski on life in a world-class lab

PhD on the brain

Graduation must have seemed likea distant dream when Genet Amarewent into labour during her finalLaw exam last year. However, sixmonths after the birth of herdaughter, Eldana Michael, Genetwas able to enjoy her graduationceremony in November.“Graduation day was a day filled

with pride. Pride in being part ofsuch a memorable ceremony,” shesays. “I felt proud of all myachievements as an employee,student and mother. This is whatBirkbeck does best. It facilitatesand enables you to realise your fullcapacity without having to makeany compromises.”

“Everybody at Birkbeck has beenreally supportive. Had it not beenfor the staff in the Law School, Iwould not have been able to sit myexam, let alone graduate with a 2:1.”Genet (31) enrolled on a degree

shortly after leaving school, butfound it wasn’t right for her. But10 years later, when she decided tobecome a solicitor, she came toBirkbeck because she needed theflexibility offered by its part-time,evening teaching. “I’m going to be afamily law solicitor. Not only hasmy experience at Birkbeck mademe more confident, but it hasadded another dimension both tome and my family.”

Labour of love

Above: Genet Amare with daughterEldana at her graduation ceremony

in November (Jon Wilson)

Above: Przemek Tomalski(Birkbeck Photo Unit)

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In person 19

History will almost certainly judgeRowan Williams, the Archbishop ofCanterbury, more kindly than manyof his recent critics have done. Likemany other societies across theworld, one of the key challengesfacing Britain in the twenty-firstcentury is a re-negotiation of theplace of religion in public life. Onepossibility, encouraged by the risingvoices of the new atheism, is tomove towards a more thoroughlysecularist state, in which the Churchof England is disestablished,religious groups have little or norecognised role in public structures,and religion is firmly confined to theprivate faith and conscience of theindividual believer. Anotheralternative, arguably more inkeeping with the British tradition oftoleratance, is to recognise a placefor religion in public life within thewider context of legal and politicalstructures that promote the commongood for people of every or no faith.Williams’ original speech at the

Royal Courts of Justice offered asophisticated vision of that latterapproach, arguing for a legal systemwhich recognises that people maybe members of liberal, democraticsociety whilst also being membersof faith communities with their ownmoral traditions.Such recognition of people’s

‘multiple affiliations’ offers amodel of society which respectssocial identifications other thanthe state, but which does not allowthese identifications to over-ridebasic principles of human freedomand dignity enshrined in theprinciples of liberal democracy.Williams’ vision represents anevolution of the British traditionof toleration, framed by a commoncommitment to notions of humandignity, which both have theirorigins in religious traditions, andshould also be used to critique theway in which religious traditions

operate in the modern world.Whether secularism or Williams’

vision of toleration wins the day issomething that we will discover inthe coming decades, but we shouldwelcome his courageous attempt tooffer a constructive vision ofBritish society that goes beyond aspecial pleading for his own faithcommunity to a more generous andinclusive vision for society.One lesson from the furore is that

we need to have a higher regard forthe power of human agency toeffect positive cultural change. Toomuch of the debate around RowanWilliams’ comments seems toassume that we live in a world ofimmutable, unchangeable realities.Some people believe that British

identity is fixed and can’t adapt –and that anyone who can’t fit intothis should ‘go back to where theycame from’. Others believe thatsharia law, and Islamic thinkinggenerally, are fixed and incapableof adapting to core modern valuesof equality and human rights.Yet

others seem to believe that the wayin which the news media works isan inevitable given, over whichmedia professionals have littlepower or moral responsibility, andthat public debate has to bedetermined by media forms ratherthan the other way around. Butall of these things are capable ofchange.We know that nationalidentities, religious traditions andmedia usage can all shift and adaptin the face of new cultural contextsand challenges. Our capacity foradaptation will determine the kindof society our children will inherit.Our challenge is to think about

what responsibility we have inshaping the political, religious andmedia landscape that we inhabit,and as Rowan Williams wouldexhort us, to find a way of buildinga fair and peaceful society.

Critics should welcome Rowan Williams’ courageous attempt tooffer a constructive vision of British society, writes Gordon Lynch

A law unto themselves

Above: Rowan Williams,who defended hisremarks, but tookresponsibility for any“misleading choice ofwords” (Reuters)

Gordon Lynch is Professor in Sociologyof Religion in the Faculty of LifelongLearning, exploring interactions betweenreligion, media and popular culture.

20 Features

Dr Jane Nicklin jumped at the chance ofbeing a consultant microbiologist on HowClean is Your House? Just don’t expecther to do any cleaning

Mould expert Dr Jane Nicklin has madesuch a name for herself that Channel Fourthought she was the natural choice to helpthem produce their hit show, How Clean isYour House? She answered their call andbecame their consultant microbiologist forthe popular TV series. Based in the Schoolof Biological and Chemical Sciences, shespecialises in mycology, the science ofmoulds, and her lab is one of the few inthe UK with expertise in this area.How Clean is Your House?, hosted by

cleaning professionals Kim Woodburn andAggie Mackenzie, recently screened itsfifth series. The production team broughtin Jane on the latest series to analyseswabs taken from kitchen sinks, choppingboards and dish cloths from houses in direneed of tender loving care. The programmeaims to ‘revolutionise the dull world ofhousework’ by providing tips that used tobe passed down through the generations,as well as labour-saving, cost-cuttingtrade secrets of professional cleaners.Jane studied the samples at her Birkbeck

laboratory and told the production teamwhat she’d discovered. “People in this fieldhave got a saying that ‘everything iseverywhere’. So if you look for a particularbug, you will find it. Usually though, wefind that the toilet is the cleanest part ofthe house because everyone flails bleacharound the place. In almost all the houseson the show we routinely picked up humanpathogens such as Salmonella and E-coli.You could find them if you looked for them,which I think shocked the householdersquite badly, but for us it wasn’t a surprise.”Once Jane had completed her lab work

she was asked to go on location during

filming asconsultant.“While Aggie wasspeaking to cameraI’d be hiding on the setbehind a dirty sofa orunderneath an old car. Myjob was to eavesdrop to makesure that what she said was soundscience based on our lab results.”“I also made sure that they were getting

the overall message right to the householder.We didn’t want to terrify people. It’s notcar crash television. It’s a sensible riskevaluation of the way some people live theirlives.We were telling the householder, ‘thisis a very hazardous way of living your life.Here are some simple ways to clean up.’”“When Aggie revealed the lab results on

set I’d make sure the householder didn’tget panicked, and to answer questions, soit’s fairly responsible.”Was there a particular house that stuck

in her mind from the series? “No, theywere all beyond belief,” she laughs. Doesshe ever get stuck into any cleaningherself? “No no no.”The College received a fee for Jane's

consultancy work on the programme,which helps to finance her School’sstudent project fund for MSc and PhDstudents to spend on their microbiologyresearch projects.Jane’s TV work took off 10 years ago

when she was commissioned by adocumentary about cot death to see ifmould on mattresses could be a riskfactor. Her work helped inform the currentguidelines that recommend parents usenew mattresses to reduce the risk.

A LIFE OFGRIME

She also formed a long-runningcollaboration, ‘Mapping the Air’, with

artist Rachel Chapman.This involvesextracting airborne spores trapped on

people's clothing and cultivating them togenerate ecological 'maps'.The pair also produced ‘Breathe’, a

series of works exhibited in 2001 by theWellcome Trust, the world’s largestresearch funding organisation. To producethe exhibits, airborne spores werecaptured on dishes of nutrient-rich agarjelly by leaving the dishes exposed to theatmosphere for a short time. The sporessoon colonised the dishes, generating aself-contained biological world thatdeveloped like a Poloroid photograph.“Rachel came to me through the personal

recommendation of a hospital technicianwho had done my MSc in Microbiology,”she says. “We have been working togetherfor pretty much 10 years and have hadexhibits all around the world.”Jane has established several research

contracts to sample airborne fungal sporesand provide risk assessments and remedialstrategies based on the data she generates.Past clients have included DEFRA andLondon Underground, and she was alsocontracted to analyse a private collectionof works on magic that was rumoured tobe haunted. The collection of Harry Priceat Senate House Library comprisespublications on witchcraft, the history ofpsychical research and hypnotism, andincludes the the first account of a séance.Luckily, Jane doesn’t spook easily, and

she went to investigate: “There was aconservator cataloging this collection andhe developed a bad reaction with chest,

throat and eye problems. A secondconservator suffered similar problems. Iwent in to prove that there were noairborne miasmas of biological origin! Youcan draw your own conclusions aboutwhat, or who, was to blame…”Ongoing work includes analyses for a

number of National Trust properties.“Since we had all that flooding lastsummer I’ve been working with theNational Trust at lots of properties wheremoulds have become a problem – forinstance Kensington Palace, CoughtonCourt and Throckmorton Estate. I’ve beenanalysing anything from silk wallpaperand horsehair plaster to books, clocks, allsorts of artefacts and materials. I’ve alsoconducted risk assessments for healthpurposes for people working in theseproperties.”She’s also been involved in lab work for

Channel Four’s Big Brother house, againwith Kim and Aggie, after the most recenthousemates had been living there forseveral weeks. “We took samples from thecommunal bath and the kitchen. Areas ofgreat concern included the dish cloth, thekitchen sink and the chopping boards. Kimand Aggie then appeared on a Big Brotherspin-off programme to comment on whatwe’d found. If they ask me again I’ll sayyes because I enjoy it, it’s good for the laband it helps the students. I really believein supporting the public understanding ofscience and this kind of work helps getscience out into public domain.”

Features 21

In almost all the houseswe routinely picked uphuman pathogens such assalmonella and e-coli.

“ „

For information about biological and chemicalsciences courses at Birkbeck, visitwww.bbk.ac.uk/prospective

22 Features

The discovery of thousandsof sharks’ teeth reveals howMoroccan farmland was oncea rich sea teeming with life.Palaeontologist CharlieUnderwood sets the scene

Below the dusty scrub and parchedfarmland of northern Morocco lie thelargest known reserves of mineralphosphate rock. Vast complexes of opencastmines, one stretching for nearly 30kilometres, cut into these deposits, with anetwork of conveyor belts transporting thephosphate sand and rock to the processingfactories turning the rock into fertiliser.These great phosphate deposits were laid

down in a sea saturated with nutrients andteeming with life. As a result, the rocks arecrammed with the fossilised phosphaticbones and teeth of fish, sharks and a hostof other extinct vertebrates. As thephosphate rock is dug up, fossils areexposed in their millions. Many of thebetter ones are collected by the mineworkers, and sold on to wholesalers. Goodfossils sell for good money, to the extentthat the badly broken fossils are often‘improved’ with skilled use of plaster.Indeed, some fossils may be little morethan a mosaic of assorted bone pieces andplaster, carved to resemble a crocodile ormosasaur – an extinct marine reptile.Away from the industrial landscapes of

spoil heaps and fertiliser factories of thenorth of the country, fossils of similar agecan be found in the more spectacularbackdrop of the Atlas Mountains. Unlikethe offshore and probably stagnant seasof mining areas, rocks here were deposited

OCEAN’SDELVE

Features 23

in shallow coastal waters, scoured bystorm waves.Sixty eight million years ago Morocco

lay on the southern margin of the greattropical ocean of Tethys, part of whichwould in future become the MediterraneanSea. For millions of years this had beengetting narrower as Africa and Indiamoved northwards, changing oceancurrents to force nutrient-rich waters upfrom the ocean floor and onto the floodednorthern edge of the African continent.Within these warm and productive seas,great blooms of plankton formed the basisof a food chain, at the top of which livedthe mosasaurs, monstrous sea-goingmonitor lizards – some species reachingover 15 metres in length. But whilst theocean conditions that created thisenvironment persisted for 18 millionyears, the mosasaurs and theircontemporaries did not. The tumultuousevents that occurred at the end of theCretaceous period wiped out many of theinhabitants of these rich seas, from theplankton to the giant reptiles.After the demise of so many of the

inhabitants of the world’s oceans, newanimals evolved to take their place, withnew groups of fish, sharks and reptilesreplacing the animals of the Cretaceous.Even now, as survivors of the greatCretaceous extinction evolved into newforms during the Palaeocene period, anotherglobal upheaval was to occur.The end-Palaeocene saw one of the most dramaticrises known in global temperatures, asmethane, a powerful greenhouse gas,previously trapped in the deep ocean wasreleased into the atmosphere. During all thistime, the phosphates, with their abundanceof fossils, continued to be deposited, leavingan unrivalled record of the changes inmarine vertebrate faunas across thesetwo events.Despite all of the large and spectacular

fossils recovered from the phosphates, themajority of vertebrate fossils are too smallto interest the dealers. Particularlyabundant are the isolated teeth of sharksand their flattened relatives, the rays.Despite having a skeleton of mineralisedcartilage that rarely makes it into thefossil record, sharks and rays produce andshed thousands of teeth during their life,and so leave many potential fossilsbehind. A bucket full of soft phosphatesediment may yield a kilo of phosphate

sand and grit when passed through a finesieve to get rid of the finer grains. Whensorted under the microscope, this couldcontain anything up to one thousand teeth,with maybe 20 or more species of sharksand rays present. The sheer quantity ofmaterial enables vast samples of fossilvertebrates to be collected.When sorting through the samples, the

most striking observation is how moderneverything looks. Even in the Cretaceous,when the sharks shared the seas with thegreat marine reptiles, and pterosaurssoared overhead, many of the sharks andrays would be familiar today. The shallowswere dominated by stingrays of manydifferent types, along with medium-sizedpredatory sharks, members of an extinctgroup of sawfishes and small bamboosharks. In more offshore waters, thesewere joined by a greater diversity ofsharks, especially the large midwaterhunters, whilst the deep and muddy seascontained additional catsharks and sixgilled sharks; groups today whichdominate many deep seas.The end-Cretaceous saw the demise of

several families and most shark and rayspecies, although a few seemed to comethrough the event unharmed. As gaps inecosystems do not last for long, newgroups of stingrays, sand tiger sharks,houndsharks and true sawfish allappeared very shortly after; indeed thisreplacement was so rapid that the newlyappeared groups are often presentalongside teeth of Cretaceous species,mixed together by storms and burrowinganimals disturbing the sea floor. The end-Palaeocene warming seems to havechanged the faunas in an unexpected way.Not only did very few species becomeextinct, but several saw dramatic sizeincreases at that time. During this warmperiod, some teeth of the genus Otodusreached eight centimetres long, larger thanthose of a modern great white, making itprobably the greatest predator of the time.With the coming of spring, and the

warmer weather making working in thegarden more pleasant, spare a thought forthe fossils revealed in order to make thefertiliser you are using, and the teemingseas where these nutrients were buried.

Left: A tray of fossils in the warehouse of a localdealer in Morocco containing reptile and fishremains from phosphates of various ages. Theseinclude (from the top) tooth plates of rays andshark vertebrae, shark and fish teeth andcrocodile plates and teeth of mosasaurs andother Cretaceous reptiles (Charlie Underwood)

Dr Charlie Underwood is based at the School ofEarth Sciences. For more information about theSchool, visit www.bbk.ac.uk/es

Dr Charlie Underwood is apalaeontologist at the School of EarthSciences. He started working on fossilsharks almost by accident when acolleague showed him a few teeth he hadcollected whilst sampling for other fossils.“I have since carried out extensive studiesof fossil sharks in the UK, and I startedworking in Morocco in order to obtainlarger samples. This initial work has beenin part-funded by a Birkbeck Faculty ofScience Grant. I’m now finalising plans foran official collaboration between Birkbeckand researchers in Morocco."

24 Features

Free trade nation

Far from being what is seen as the cold economic doctrine of today,Free Trade was once a passionately held ideal that stood fordemocracy, justice, and peace, writes Frank Trentmann

First came the banana, then there wascoffee. Fair Trade goods, bags, and meetingshave become part of our everyday life.Entire towns, like Bristol, are now ‘FairTrade cities’. Fair Trade is cool, even sexy,the pet cause of film and rock stars.Free Trade, by contrast, is viewed as a

conspiracy of rich multinationals andinternational organisations like the WorldTrade Organisation, even as the modernsuccessor to the slave trade. At the violentanti-globalisation battles in Seattle andGenoa it was in the first line of attack.A century ago, the battle over

globalisation looked very different. Then,it was Free Trade which was popular andgood. Britons rallied to its defence, inmass meetings, dramatic stage shows, andeven at the seaside. In High Wycombe,Free Traders were even read the Riot Actin 1910 after smashing their opponents’offices, setting their exhibits on fire, andfighting street battles with the police.My new book, Free Trade Nation, tells

the story of how Free Trade became adefining part of British identity andpolitics – and how it lost its moralhighground after the First World War. Itoffers a fresh look at a critical chapter inBritish and world history. At the sametime, it provides a historical perspectiveon today’s debate about globalisation,challenging the ways we have come tothink about trade, justice, and democracy.In writing the book I have been

especially keen to put my hand on thepulse of Free Trade culture and to captureits heartbeat for readers. Liberal writers

make much of the superiority of Free Tradeas an economic theory. But for people inlate Victorian and Edwardian Britain itwas much more than that. Free Tradestood for peace, civil society, anddemocracy. It was Britain’s civilisingmission. Bertrand Russell, in 1904, saidhe felt ‘inclined to cut my throat’ ifprotectionism won. What nationalismand socialism were on the continent, FreeTrade was in Britain: a national ideologyand mass movement.Before the First World War, Free Trade

mobilised millions of people across allclasses and parts of the country, fromworking-class housewives to millionaires,from Winston Churchill to the anarchistprince Peter Kropotkin. One of the delightsof the research was to find tucked away inChurchill’s voluminous papers detailedreports of what one of the many FreeTrade groups was up to. In 1910 alone,it organised over 5,000 mass meetings,masterminded by Churchill withcharacteristic military zeal. It even invadedsea-side resorts, pulling tourists away fromice-cream vendors and minstrel shows todebate political economy on the beaches.This political circus drove home one key

message: Free Trade meant civilisationand democracy as well as cheap goods.Supporters held up the cheap white loaf toshow that Free Trade guaranteed freedomfrom hunger and oppression while incountries like Germany, they claimed,tariffs reduced people to eating blackbread, horsemeat, and even dogs. Childrenand grown men paraded the streets

dressed up as the big loaf.The book also sheds new light on the

general relationship between citizenshipand consumption. We tend to take itfor granted that consumer cultureundermines civic spirit. As Andrew Marrhas recently put it in his engaging historyof contemporary Britain: Britons startedshopping and stopped voting.Free Trade Nation offers an alternative

story.The defence of Free Trade came aftera generation of unprecedented affluence.Britain was the richest place in Europe atthe time. Music halls and department storeswere multiplying.The people flocked toseaside resorts, early cinemas, and the racecourse.Yet politics was not crowded out byshopping and entertainment. Far from it.Turnout shot up to 87% at the January 1910election. Free Traders and Tariff Reformersfeverishly adapted modern advertising,entertainment, and new technologies likefilm for their own use. In the process, theytransformed politics, making it trendier,even sensationalist, but also enabling it tocommunicate big questions of politics andeconomy to a mass electorate. Free Traderswere the first to target ‘the consumer’ as apublic interest.During and after the First World War,

Free Trade culture disintegrated. It hasbeen fashionable to blame its defeat on theworld depression of 1929–1931. This killedit off, but as I show, Free Trade wasalready fading. Consumers felt it left themhelpless against big multinationals andeconomic cycles. ‘Shopping for the Empire’became the mantra of Conservative

Features 25

housewives. Free Trade increasinglybecame the preserve of libertarians andeconomists, and even here it suffered ahuge loss when John Maynard Keynesturned towards trade regulation.This story has interesting lessons for

the present. Free Trade was not juststeamrolled by bad economic times andforeign nationalism. A new world view wasemerging that would shape the rest of thetwentieth century. Economic globalisation,former Free Traders now argued, hadoutpaced political globalisation. Marketshad become more integrated, while politicswas lagging behind, stuck in a model ofthe nation-state. What was needed insteadwere international organisations, like theLeague of Nations, and later the UnitedNations. These could defuse explosivetrade rivalries, especially over oil andfood. They would also give a politicalexpression to the global concerns of thepeople, rather than just leaving things tomerchants and markets. Here are theprecursors of an idea that has recentlyreceived international attention throughthe best-selling writings of Joseph Stiglitz,the Noble prize winning economist.In the book I spell out the implications

for today’s debate over globalisation.Political and economic writers are wrongto presume that, given the choice, peoplenaturally flock to Free Trade. Historyshows the opposite. Britain was a uniquecase – other democracies, like the UnitedStates, were deeply protectionist. FreeTrade won in the past because it went outto win the hearts and minds of the people.And here entertainment and ethics were asimportant as sound economics. But it alsohas a lesson for the majority of peoplewho today instinctively look to Fair Tradeas a solution to global problems. FairTrade does not have a monopoly onmorals. Nor are consumers just passivevictims of globalisation. In an earlier eraof globalisation, it was consumers whoempowered Free Trade, laying some of thefoundations of the world we still live in.

Free traders transformedpolitics,making it trendier,even sensationalist.“ „

Professor Frank Trentmann is based at the Schoolof History, Classics and Archaeology. He gave hisinaugural lecture, Free Trade Nation, on 11 March.His book, of the same name, was published inFebruary. The BBC’s former Economics Editor,Evan Davis, says of the work: “This is terrifichistory that will inspire economists to remembertheir subject really can arouse passion.''

MatthewWeait asks why, after more than 20 years,the criminal law is now being used against thosealleged to have infected their sexual partners

Features 27

I joined the Faculty of Lifelong Learning asSenior Lecturer in Law and Legal Studiesfrom Keele University in July 2007. Myparticular research interest is the impactof law on people living with HIV and AIDS.I have spent many years working withlocal, regional, national and internationalorganisations, including the World HealthOrganisation and UNAIDS – the JointUnited Nations programme on HIV andAIDS – to support their efforts to eliminatediscrimination and the stigma againstthose who live with the virus.In my book, Intimacy and Responsibility:

the Criminalisation of HIV Transmission(Routledge-Cavendish, 2007) I explore thereasons why – after more than 20 years ofthe epidemic in the UK – the criminal lawstarted to be used against those alleged tohave infected their sexual partners. Thebook seeks to synthesise a diverse range ofsources and literature, from trialtranscripts and appeal court decisionsthrough to risk theory and virology. This isa brief extract from the final chapter ofthe book where I set out three reasons whyit is reasonable to question the use of thecriminal law in this context:“First … those who accept the legitimacy

of [the criminalisation of reckless HIVtransmission] need to recognise that it isbased on an individualised model of faultand conduct that ignores the fact that HIVexists in populations and that itstransmission occurs between people. Eachperson who transmits HIV to another issomeone who was him- or herself infected.If HIV is understood as a social fact rather

than merely as a quality or characteristicof individuals it becomes legitimate todevelop responses to transmission thatcentre on the social consequences andbenefits of any intervention (such ashuman-rights-sensitive public healthprovisions) rather than on the censure ofparticular people.Second, the approach that the criminal

law has adopted towards responsibilityfor transmission is one that will denythe relevance of particular individuals’attempts to behave responsibly (bypractising safer sex rather than disclosingstatus for example). To the extent that itdoes so, it undermines those attempts andignores the very real impediments andbarriers to behaving as the law demands.Third, criminal law (unlike tort law) is

not concerned with fault allocation. If adefendant meets the conditions forliability he will be held responsible; if not,he will be absolved. And yet there arestrong, public health centred, argumentsthat emphasise the importance of joint andshared responsibility for sexual health ...To the extent that the criminalisationof reckless transmission establishes aperpetrator/victim dyad – even in caseswhere the ‘victim’ was aware of the risksshe was taking when she engaged inunprotected sex despite the lack of [apartner’s] disclosure – the law is servingto undermine this important public healthmessage ... What I am arguing is that,where the negative social impact ofcriminalisation in a particular contexthas the potential to outweigh any social

benefits it might achieve (as I believe isthe case here), it is legitimate to questionwhether criminalisation is, as a matter ofprinciple, always and in every casedefensible and justifiable.HIV affects everyone, whether they are

positive or negative, and whether they knowthis or not. It affects them in differentways, in different contexts and for differentreasons. Those who are HIV negative may,unless they take precautions againsttransmission in situations where that is arisk, become infected; those who are HIVpositive may, unless they take precautions,infect others. There is, therefore, for thosein each category a responsibility, both tothemselves and to others, to minimise therisk of onward transmission. This simpletruth of prevention, central to safer sex andhealth promotion initiatives in the field ofHIV and AIDS, nevertheless fails to capture… what being responsible means andentails, both for people living withHIV/AIDS and those at risk of infection. Nordoes it give any indication of how people,individually or in their relations withothers, are able to put, or are preventedfrom putting, their understanding of whatbeing responsible means into practice. Putmore simply, being responsible in the timeof AIDS is both critically important anddeeply problematic; and it is somethingthat the criminalisation of recklesstransmission fails abjectly to address.

HIV affects everyone,whether they are positive ornegative,and whether theyknow this or not.

“ „

Intimacy & responsibility

For details about studying Law at Birkbeck, visitwww.bbk.ac.uk/prospective

Left: Topographic relief of couple kissing(Ann Monn/Jupiter Images)

28 Letters

John Crace’s interview with Eric Hobsbawm provokedstrident views amongst some readers

Letters

I can quite understand that it wasdifficult to be truthful about EricHobsbawm and his work in anarticle celebrating his 90thbirthday and fifth anniversary asBirkbeck's President. Nevertheless,it is a historian's duty to tell thetruth about an academic who hasstill not recanted of his slavishsupport for the Soviet Terror, norhis commitment to the GermanDemocratic Republic, which in theview of most commentators wasthe most evil of all the Communistregimes – though North Korea andCambodia run it close. Hobsbawmhas learned nothing and forgottennothing – only an apologia pro vitasua could begin to compensate forall the misjudgements and

misalliances in his academic andpolitical life. Is he teasing us withhis coy self criticism about hisfailure to adequately understandthe importance of the USA? I wouldsuggest he was so wrapped up inhis Marxist dreams that the USAwas only seen through the prism ofSoviet fear and loathing.I regard Hobsbawm as the most

baleful influence upon Englishcultural and intellectual life. In aless forgiving nation, such as hisadmired Soviet Union, he wouldhave been ‘purged’, stripped of allhonours and condemned to theGulag. In England he is allowed tobecome the Grand Old Man of theLeft who yearn for the good olddays when the Stasi was the rolemodel for all police states and aTrabant car the aspiration of everyworker. John Crace was right onone thing. Hobsbawm has beenconsistently wrong abouteverything. Yet Birkbeck revere himas a sage. Funny old world, innit?WR Savage

I was surprised at how lightlyJohn Crace treated Hobsbawm’scontinued support for theCommunist Party after Hungary1956. It would have been interestingto hear how the Great Manjustified Stalinism to himself atthat period and of course earlier.The truth about the purges wasknown to those like Hobsbawmwho took their politics seriously.Imagine if Hobsbawm had opted

for the National Socialists insteadof the Communists in the 1930s.No doubt such a position, had hetaken it, would attract the kind ofclose interrogation that Socialistrevisionists of the Left never seemto face from the fearless reportersof today’s media or in academiagenerally.Stephen MarksBA English, 2002

Eric Hobsbawm replies:John Crace must speak for himself.So far as I am concerned, myanswer to Stephen Marks’questions may be found in myautobiography, Interesting Times.Whether it will convince him, Icannot judge. As for WR Savage, Iam sorry he thinks I am ‘the mostbaleful influence upon Englishcultural and intellectual life’,though I am naturally flattered atbeing assigned so powerful a role.On the other hand, I find it

difficult to understand what thestatement means, other than asan expression of passionateopposition to the views I amsupposed to represent, fromsomeone who also seemsunfamiliar with my writings, orindeed with the late GermanDemocratic Republic – which,oddly, he considers worse thanNorth Korea and Pol Pot’sCambodia. What is my ‘balefuleffect’? How exactly has it beenexercised, except by peoplechoosing to read my writingsand, presumably, failing to bepersuaded by impassioneddenunciations like those of yourcorrespondents? Still, everyhistorian and writer should beready for disagreement, and Iwelcome its publication inBBK magazine.Professor Eric Hobsbawm

Above: ProfessorEric Hobsbawm(Eamonn McCabe)

Please send all correspondence to:BBK Editor,External Relations,Birkbeck, University of LondonMalet Street,London WC1E 7HXAlternatively, email c.stevens@bbk.ac.uk

Books and eventsCurrent publications, and dates for your diary

Spring 2008 29

Diary dates

Tuesday 8 April, 7pmThe uniqueness ofNazism's racial warBirkbeck-WienerLibrary Lecture SeriesSpeaker: Professor Ian KershawMalet Street, B33� Free entry; first come,first seated

Tuesday 8 April, 7–8.30pmIs the Renaissancescholar dead?A Rethink debate presentedby Agora and The Guardian.Prof AC Grayling and StephenBayley v Prof Adrian Monckand Simon WoodroffeGuardian Newsroom,Farringdon. Tickets £5.� To book, visit www.agora-education.org/events

Tuesday 15 April, 4–7.30pmBirkbeck PostgraduateOpen Evening – BloomsburyRoyal National HotelTo book, visitwww.bbk.ac.uk/openeve

Tuesday 22 April, 6.30–8.30pmAndrew McKinnon (ResearchFellow, Birkbeck Institutefor the Humanities) inconversation with writerFrank DeasyMalet Street, Council Room� Free entry; first come,first seated; Emailj.eisner@bbk.ac.uk

Wednesday 30 April, 6.30–9pmBook launch: JensAndermann: The Optic of theState: Visuality and Powerin Argentina and Brazilwith Claudio Canaparo, JoãoCezar de Castro Rocha andAnnie CoombesMalet Street, Council Room

� Free entry; first come,first seated; Emailj.eisner@bbk.ac.uk

Wednesday 7 May, 4-7.30pmBirkbeck Open Evening– BloomsburyRoyal National Hotel� To book, visitwww.bbk.ac.uk/openeve

Saturday 10 May, 2pmBook launch: RaymondWilliams: a Warriors’ Taleby Dai SmithDai Smith (Chair, Arts Councilof Wales) in conversation withProfessor Eric HobsbawmMalet Street, Room 532Followed by book signing andbuffet in the George Birkbeckbar, fourth floor� For more information, emailparmod.w@ntlworld.com

Thursday 29 May, 12.30-5pmWomen in Lifelong LearningNetwork Seminar: Identity,power and learningBirkbeck Institute forLifelong LearningSpeakers: Professors AlisonFuller and Jocey Quinn� Registration required,email c.seagrave@bbk.ac.uk

Friday 30 May, 9.30am–5pmConference: Lifelong learning,power and social changeBirkbeck Institute forLifelong LearningSpeakers: Professors ClaireCallender, Alison Fuller andBill Jones� Payment and bookingrequired, emailc.seagrave@bbk.ac.uk

Thursday 19 June, 10am–5pmSocial research after thecultural turn: will it survive?With Professor Stephen Frosh,

Gordon Lynch, Les Moran,Sasha Roseneil, Lynne Segaland Karen WellsInaugural symposium,Birkbeck Institute forSocial ResearchClore Management Centre, B01£25 standard/£15 Birkbeckstaff and students. Lunch andrefreshments provided.� Register atwww.bbk.ac.uk/bisr oremail j.eisner@bbk.ac.uk

Thursday 26 June, 4–7.30pmBirkbeck Open Evening– BloomsburyRoyal National HotelTo book, visitwww.bbk.ac.uk/openeve

The SAS needs you!

The Student AmbassadorSociety (SAS) would like to hearfrom Birkbeck graduates whowould be willing to share theirexperiences of Birkbeck and alittle of their time. The SAS ison the look-out for additionalmembers to offer new Birkbeckstudents in Bloomsbury adviceand assistance.At the beginning of term andparticularly at the start of theacademic year, as well asthroughout each term, the SASaims to act as a point ofreference for new students,especially those who are newto London and/or the UK, andoffer meet-up sessions andcampus tours.The SAS recently receivedsignificant funding from theBirkbeck College Students’Union, but desperately needsmore members to turn theirplans into action. For details,email Jenny Quamina atfquam02@students.bbk.ac.uk

Books

What is Medieval History?John ArnoldPolity Press (February 2008)

Death Rites and RightsEdited by Belinda Brooks-Gordon et alHart Publishing (November 2007)

Conceiving Life:Reproductive Politics and theLaw in Contemporary ItalyPatrick HanafinAshgate (December 2007)

Free Trade Nation: Commerce,Consumption, and CivilSociety in Modern BritainFrank TrentmannOxford University Press(February 2008)

Intimacy and Responsibility:the Criminalization of HIVTransmissionMatthew WeaitRoutledge Cavendish(December 2007)

ViolenceSlavoj ZizekProfile Books (January 2008)

Thank youto all donors and volunteers who

have helped Birkbeck in the last year

Donors have

supported over 300 students who have received bursaries

… contributed to research developments at the London

Knowledge Lab … enabled library hours to be extended …

contributed towards a series of public lunchtime lectures …

helped establish an English and Humanities web journal

Volunteers have

offered advice to many students at the last four

Open Evenings … featured in a variety of publications and

marketing campaigns … offered support, advice and

influence in the Equivalent or Lower Qualifications (ELQ)

funding cut debate