Academic Promotions - October 2011

The UK’s European university

ACADEMICPROMOTIONSOctober 2011

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NEWPROFESSORS

Iain Fraser (School of Economics)

My research interests span agricultural, environmentaland resource economics. I have conducted extensiveresearch on agri-environmental policy, household wastemanagement, estimation andmeasurement of economicefficiency and, most recently, non-market valuation. Ihave just completed three years as anAssociate Editorof the Australian Journal of Agricultural and ResourceEconomics and, from September 2012, will become aneditor of the European Review of Agricultural Economics.In addition, as Director of Learning and Teaching, I willhelp steer the School of Economics through its PeriodicProgram Review in 2012.

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NEWPROFESSORS (CONT)

David Herd (School of English)

The past year has been a busy one for the Centre ofModern Poetry, which I direct. In November 2010, wehosted the Charles Olson Centenary Conference, an eventthat drew international scholars and poets to Canterburyto mark Olson’s achievement as poet, theorist andeducator. In May 2011, working in collaboration withthe Centre for CreativeWriting and the Sounds NewContemporary music festival, we staged the inauguralSounds New Poetry festival; a week-long event featuringaward-winning poets from Britain and the USA. My ownwork continues to have a double focus on contemporarypoetry and the politics of movement. In the past year,I have given lectures and talks at universities inVancouver, Paris, Boston, Melbourne and Sydney aswell as in the UK. I have also given readings frommyforthcoming collection of poetry, All Just, to be publishedby Carcanet in July 2012. Looking at key challengesahead, it is crucial to ensure that, in the new fundingclimate, educational values are not overridden by ideasof consumerism.

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NEWPROFESSORS (CONT)

Bernard Ryan (Kent Law School)

My academic work explores the challenges for law andpublic policy posed by migration. I have published acrossthe field of migration law, including the legal aspects ofimmigration control, labour migration and nationality. In2010, I co-edited a work on ‘extraterritorial’ immigrationcontrol, which addressed the legal framework when astate controls migration prior to arrival on the territory.I have also recently conducted research on the impact ofthe ‘life in the UK test’, taken by applicants for long-termresidence or for British citizenship. My teaching at Kentcovers all aspects of migration law, with modules onBritish, European Union and international law. I am alsothe joint chair of the Migration and LawNetwork, whichpromotes the study of migration law within Britishuniversities.

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NEWPROFESSORS (CONT)

Miri Song (School of Social Policy, Sociology andSocial Research)

Since my appointment to a lectureship at Kent in October1995, I have undertaken significant research acrossmigration, race and ethnicity, and ‘mixed race’. Inparticular, I have contributed to and shaped thescholarship on second-generation migrants in Britain.This has related especially to issues of belonging and theassertion of public ethnicities and, more recently, theemergence of ‘mixed race’ young people in Britain andWestern Europe. The social and political implicationsof this growing ‘mixture’ cannot be exaggerated; wewill have to think critically about the meanings andenumeration of who is and isn’t a ‘minority’, the socialdistance betweenWhite and non-White people, andcontinuing salience of racial and ethnic difference.Akeychallenge for the future of sociology at Kent is to establishand publicise the varied sub-fields of sociology in whichour staff have expertise at national and internationallevels.

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NEWPROFESSORS (CONT)

Tim Strangleman (School of Social Policy,Sociology and Social Research)

I have been drawing onmy previous researchprojects focusing on work identity andmeaning,deindustrialisation and nostalgia. I have also helped tosuccessfully launch a network – Reworking Kent – forstaff researching work across the three faculties. Themain focus of my work over the next year or so will bewriting a book frommy research into the GuinnessCompany and its Park Royal Brewery inWest London.This innovative book, ImaginingWork in the TwentiethCentury, draws on extensive visual material and aims totell the story of work in the 20th century. The state of theglobal and national economymake work and employmentone of the most important areas for contemporaryresearch and I want to make sure that Kent is at theforefront of this activity.

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NEWREADERS

Jennie Batchelor (School of English)Over the past year, I have enjoyed working with colleagues to expand ourgrowing community of graduate students. As Co-Director of the Centre forStudies in the Long Eighteenth Century (CSLEC), I helped to design theinterdisciplinary MA in Eighteenth-Century Studies. The programme, whichruns with modules from English, History & Philosophy of Art and the Schoolof European Culture and Languages (SECL), launched in 2010-11 with asuccessful day-conference on ‘The Visual and the Verbal in the EighteenthCentury’. Graduate students are, of course, vital members of our teachingand research culture. Ensuring that we continue to recruit excellent studentsat MA and PhD level through innovative, interdisciplinary programmes andspecialised training for their work within and beyond the University is, I think,one of the biggest challenges we face post-2012.

Julie Beadle-Brown (Tizard Centre)In 2010/11, we have strengthened collaborative work in the fields of autismand intellectual disabilities – work spanning both academia and appliedconsultancy work. Within the UK, new collaborations with colleagues in theSchools of Arts and Psychology have resulted in AHRC funding for a projecton ‘Imagining Autism’. New training materials in autism and guidance fortrainers and those commissioning training has emerged from collaborationwith the National Autistic Society. Working as part of QORU (Quality andOutcomes in person-centred care for people with long-term conditionsResearch Unit) as well as in other projects, I have focused on ensuring thatpeople with intellectual disabilities and autism are included in research aswell as in society. I am also working to understand what determines goodoutcomes for people with intellectual disabilities and complex needs.

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NEWREADERS (CONT)

Jenny Billings (Centre for Health Services Studies)My primary focus has been on grant applications, project managingsuccessful bids, and publishing and disseminating research via conferenceattendance. This year, I have been focusing mainly on my European projectsconcerned with improving health and social care for frail older people andhope to make an impact on policy and practice. There are many challengesnow with research funding so, in the coming year, I will be making sure thatthe Centre for Health Services Studies (CHSS) is well positioned to takeadvantage of the funding streams in health, and working with colleagues inKent and across Europe to develop innovative ideas to improve the healthand well-being of vulnerable groups.

Adam Burgess (School of Social Policy, Sociology andSocial Research)The focus of my research is risk and society; how the modern worldunderstands and manages uncertainty. My work is concerned, firstly, withsocial practices of risk. A recent example is research on the ‘risk ritual’ of flumask wearing in Japan, now curiously worn to protect against radiation.Secondly, I’m interested in changing languages of risk and their differingimpacts. An example is representation of last year’s volcanic ash cloud, andhow framing it as an ‘act of God’ limited the usual search for blame. I’m alsointerested in institutions of risk, most recently by examining the evolution ofmajor public inquiries, a mechanism that routinises how we think aboutexceptional experiences. My work has always included a strong comparativecomponent – trying to understand the very different responses to similar riskin different societies – and I hope to develop this aspect in the future.

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Helen Carr (Kent Law School)In 2010, I became Director of Learning and Teaching for the Law School,stepping into Alan Thomson’s not inconsiderable shoes. With 2012approaching fast, my focus has been on working with academics,administrators and students to ensure that our undergraduate provision isrigorous and meets student expectations. We made a successful bid to theHigher Education Authority Change Academy on promoting change inteaching within the Social Sciences faculty. As a result, we spent four days atSunningdale working on ideas to promote student engagement which wehope will lead to new initiatives. At the same time, my research interests inhousing and social welfare law have become increasingly acute as a resultof coalition policies and public spending cuts. This year, I intend to focus onthe consequences of housing benefit cuts and the problems of the singlehomeless. My academic work is complemented by professional legal work– I chair a Residential Property Tribunal, considering rents, service chargesand the legal regulation of housing conditions.

Karen Douglas (School of Psychology)My research over the past year has focused primarily on the socialpsychology of conspiracy theories. In particular, I am interested in why somany people are drawn to conspiracy theories and what features make themconvincing and popular. Over the past year, I have also been busy teaching,co-authoring a social psychology undergraduate text, co-editing a book onthe psychology of feedback and acting as associate editor for two socialpsychology journals. I think that one key challenge for the future will be tomaintain and build upon our high-quality teaching and research withsignificant cuts to higher education and decreasing funds available from theresearch councils.

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NEWREADERS (CONT)

Maria Drakopoulou (Kent Law School)Over the past 12 months, I have focussed my intellectual efforts primarilyon research. I have progressed personal projects on legal theory – mostnotably, the development of a genealogy of feminist legal thought – andcontinued to nurture KLS’s graduate researchers in my role as Director ofPostgraduate Research. My own work led to visits and collaborative projectswith the University of Umea, Sweden and Melbourne Law School, Australia.My support for our postgraduate research community continued the KLStradition of treating our students as ‘scholars in the making’ and integratingthem as part of our vibrant, high-quality research community. To me, theimportant challenge ahead is to strengthen research that critically engageswith knowledge and ideas – which defines the School – in the context of anincreasingly difficult economic climate.

Michael Forrester (School of Psychology)The primary focus of my research is understanding the emergence of youngchildren’s skills and abilities. I am interested in examining, documenting andexplaining children’s conversational skills, as well as understanding earlyexpressions of their musicality. An example is my collaboration in a large-scale cross-cultural study establishing and documenting young children’ssinging skills across countries such as Japan, Canada, Brazil, France, Kenya,Estonia (see http://www.airsplace.ca/). My research is inflected with, andinformed by, the discursive and critical orientation found in social psychology,developmental psychology and childhood studies. In the coming years, thedifficulty of securing research funding for basic research in these areas islikely to increase. At the same time, internet-oriented technologicalinnovations, and an increased awareness of diverse methodologicalapproaches, will open up new prospects.

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Mark Howard (School of Biosciences)My research concentrates on the applications of nuclear magneticresonance (NMR) spectroscopy in biology. NMR spectroscopy is ideal forexamining the molecular make-up of biological molecules and has a key rolein determining their three-dimensional structure. NMR’s real strength lies inthe studies of metabolite composition, biomolecular interactions andmolecular motions that influence cellular function and disease. My groupuses these strengths to study biological systems with a widespread interestfrom cellular biochemistry to enzymology, molecular processing and cancertumour imaging and therapy. Challenges are found in the continualdevelopment of novel NMR methodologies to answer biological questions.However, the future is very promising following our recent acquisition of astate-of-the-art Bruker Avance III NMR spectrometer with QCI cryoprobe thatwill allow us to push the boundaries of detection or shorten experimentaltime. This spectrometer, installed in the School of Biosciences in June 2011,was funded with a £460,000 grant from the Wellcome Trust.

Ben Hutchinson (School of European Culture andLanguages)My main challenge over the past year has been to combine a busy scheduleof research activities and administrative roles with the small matter ofbecoming a parent. Research leave in the autumn enabled me to completemy most recent book, Modernism and Style, as well to finish co-editing twovolumes of essays (on the ‘Archive’ and on W.G. Sebald). I returned in thenew year to take over as Head of German, as well as to continue as Directorof the Kent Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities (KIASH) andCo-Director of the Centre for Modern European Literature. Maintaining thebalance between the three areas of research, teaching and administrationwill undoubtedly remain the key challenge ahead: whilst my own workbecomes ever broader, the pool of languages students in the UK threatens

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NEWREADERS (CONT)

to become ever smaller. Championing German and European literature, aswell as the Humanities more generally, is thus of vital importance. We mayhave to look beyond the UK: in 2012, I will be co-organising the first ever‘summer school’ for British postgraduates at the German Literature Archivein Marbach.

Csaba La’da (School of European Culture andLanguages)My main focus at Kent has been research into Greek and Egyptian papyrifrom Graeco-Roman Egypt (332 BC–AD 641) and the social and culturalhistory of the period. Over the last year, I have made a number of researchvisits to the Vienna papyrus collection where I have ongoing projects.Perhaps the most fascinating of these is publishing, together with ProfA Papathomas of Athens University, the earliest known administrative text inany European language to use the method of alphabetisation for dataprocessing and arrangement. In addition to research and teaching, I haveassumed increasingly senior administrative roles such as SECL Directorof Graduate Studies for Research Programmes and acting Head ofDepartment of Classical and Archaeological Studies. I have been focusingon postgraduate recruitment and conversion, as well as contributing todesigning new programmes, in order to place the Department and Schoolin a strong position for the challenges that lie ahead. I am pleased to reportthat the Department’s postgraduate recruitment has increased significantlythis year.

Ellie Lee (School of Social Policy, Sociology and SocialResearch)2011 saw the launch of a new research centre in SSPSSR, The Centre forParenting Culture Studies (http://blogs.kent.ac.uk/parentingculturestudies/).CPCS, which I direct, started life in 2007 with a conference, ‘Childrearing in

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the age of ‘intensive parenting’. The aim was to see if it was possible toinitiate genuinely interdisciplinary collaborations with colleagues here andother universities in the UK and internationally. Happily, experience hasshown that it is; I have led an ESRC-funded seminar series; publication oftwo special issues of journals about parenting culture; and successfulapplications for new research on the moralisation of breastfeeding, riskconsciousness and pregnancy, and welfare of child assessments in assistedconception clinics. As increasing claims are made about brain science’simpact on how we should raise our children, our main event of 2011 was‘Science, evidence, experts and the new parenting culture’. Over the nextyear, CPCS will continue to focus on this topic. I will also be disseminatingfindings from our ‘welfare of the child’ study, as well as encouraging newPhD students to work with us on this exciting, important social research.

Ana de Medeiros (School of European Culture andLanguages)If I wanted to express in one word what the primary focus has been over thepast 12 months I would say ‘excellence’. Whether as lecturer, researcher,supervisor or acting Head of SECL, I always strive for excellent results– however apparently small or great the task at hand might be. I am proud ofworking at Kent and want to ensure that the students and colleagues I workwith feel equally proud to share this wonderful opportunity. It is impossible toput a price on education and, although the discussion of tuition fees hasrightly dominated the headlines in the past two years, I believe the focus inthe next 12-24 months will return to the overall enrichment which educationprovides in ways which cannot be quantified. Recent studies show that theoverall benefits of education far outweigh the increased earning potentialassociated with a good degree.

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NEWREADERS (CONT)

Stewart Motha (Kent Law School)Throughout my time at Kent, I have focused on drawing on my research toinform my teaching. One aspect of my research looks at post-apartheidconstitutionalism and politics in South Africa. I draw on conventional legalmaterials such as case law, but also aesthetic forms such as the novel andfilm. Recently, we drew on Peter Harris’s book Just Defiance to help studentsthink about political violence – not only in South Africa, but also the violenceused by the state when policing demonstrations and protests in London andelsewhere in the UK. The key challenge in the years ahead is to ensure thatwe are in a position to tackle the new funding regime in an innovative andcreative way that does not compromise the pedagogical values we havefostered over many years. I believe Kent Law School and the University ofKent are in a very strong position to meet these challenges, providing weprioritise innovation over nostalgia for an idyllic past that never was.

Catherine Richardson (School of English)I am interested in how people lived in early modern England, particularlynon-elite men and women who had little contact with the written word. Thatis why I work on the material culture which surrounded them and throughwhich they understood their lives – for instance, possessions, clothes andhouses. I have spent the last year researching and teaching one aspect ofthis experience – the way Shakespeare made objects work on the stage andin his audience’s imagination. I am looking forward to taking this research ina different direction with the aid of an AHRC Network Grant. I will be workingwith scientists, conservators, museum curators, heritage professionals andmy students to explore how people experienced household interiors in earlymodern England. New technologies will allow us to construct digitalenvironments to help with this work, and the results will feed into how we alllook at historic properties in the present.

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Ebrahim Soltani (Kent Business School)My research interests include operations improvement, human resourcesissues that are relevant to quality management, and management attitudetoward quality. In 2010, I was awarded a two-year ESRC-funded researchproject to explore the cause-effect relationships between contextual forcesand conditions, management’s orientation and support, and the bottom-lineimpact of quality management practices. This research project is a responseto the lack of informative research on the main barriers to ‘sustainedimprovement’ via quality management practices. This research is both timelyand important given the current ‘credit crunch’ and the need to strengthenperformance and capability in central and local government organisations,as well as privately-owned firms, through embracing quality and productivity-focused management interventions.

Robbie Sutton (School of Psychology)Over the last year, I have been working hard with PhD students to identifyhow social psychology can cast light on social problems. Much of our workhas focused on gender. We have obtained results showing that women areliked more if they are afraid of crime, that sexism plays a role in the ‘bossy’societal stance toward pregnant women, and that boys as young as six orseven years old fall prey to the (self-defeating) belief that they, compared togirls, are not only less well behaved and lower achieving, but also lessintelligent. Through this work and the opening of cross-disciplinary centresin the University, I have enjoyed much greater dialogue with people fromother fields such as law, sociology and geography. Looking ahead, theunfortunate increases in university fees and reductions in research fundingat national level raise many uncertainties and pose challenges for everybody.

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NEWREADERS (CONT)

Scarlett Thomas (School of English)As Director of Creative Writing, my main priorities over the last year havebeen recruiting new MA students, teaching on the MA and making sure theprogramme runs smoothly. I also supervise six research students. Our MA inCreative Writing is growing very well. This year, we will have over 30 students.A key challenge for me now is to make the MA as international as possible.We attract a good number of overseas students, but we would like more.I am also planning to create a new MA in Travel Writing. I’m currently alsoworking on two book-length projects: one novel and one book about writing.

Yu Zhu (School of Economics)I have been developing work in the field of labour economics, particularlythe economics of education, since joining the University almost a decadeago. More recently, my primary focus, aided by a Nuffield Foundation grant,has been the differential returns by different degree subjects and on returnsto independent education in the UK. One of the key challenges for my futureresearch will be developing a better understanding of how different tiersof HE institutions in the UK adopt different strategies when facing theburgeoning global demand. I will also be looking at how the large inflow offoreign students to HE institutions in the UK affects the learning and labourmarket outcomes of native students.

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NEWSENIOR LECTURERS

Donatella Alessandrini (Kent Law School)Maria Alfredsson (School of Physical Sciences)Albena Azmanova (Brussels School of International Studies)Thomas Baldwin (School of European Culture and Languages)Ruth Blakeley (School of Politics and International Relations)Ania Bobrowicz (School of Engineering and Digital Arts)David Byers Brown (School of Engineering and Digital Arts)Frank Camilleri (School of Arts)Pratik Chakrabarti (School of History)James Fowler (School of European Culture and Languages)Dirk Froebrich (School of Physical Sciences)Emily Grabham (Kent Law School)Frances Guerin (School of Arts)Elaine Heslop (Kent Law School)Peter Kenny (School of Computing)Anne Logan (School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research)Stephen Lowry (School of Physical Sciences)Vincent Miller (School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research)David Morelli (Kent Business School)Daniela Peluso (School of Anthropology and Conservation)Georgina Randsley de Moura (School of Psychology)Balihar Sanghera (School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research)Natalia Sobrevilla Perea (School of European Culture and Languages)David Stirrup (School of English)Melissa Trimingham (School of Arts)Loba Van der Bijl (School of Mathematics, Statistics and Actuarial Science)David Wilkinson (School of Psychology)John Wills (School of History)Jane Wood (School of Psychology)

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University of Kent, The Registry,Canterbury, Kent CT2 7NZ

T: +44 (0)1227 764000E: [email protected]

INTERNALPROMOTIONS– FINDOUTMOREInternal promotions are an important way ofrecognising the outstanding, ongoing performanceof individual staff in support of the University.Through these promotions, the University aims toencourage staff to improve their own performancewhile meeting nationally and internationally-recognised standards of excellence. Details ofhow to apply, and when, for both academic andnon-academic promotions, are available on theHR webpages www.kent.ac.uk/hr-staffinformation/promotion-salary-review/index.html