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University to award nine honorary degrees

Posted on 18 June 1998

The honorary degree of Doctor of the University will be conferred on nine distinguished people by the University of York's Chancellor, Dame Janet Baker CH DBE, at degree ceremonies on 9 and 10 July.

Sir Michael Carlisle, a Pro-Chancellor of the University of York since 1996, is former Chairman and Managing Director of Diesel Marine International Ltd, and a non-executive director of many other companies including York Science Park Ltd and the Centre for Biomedical Accelerator Mass Spectrometry - a University of York initiative. He has been closely involved with health and education bodies in Sheffield and is currently Chairman of the Community Health Sheffield NHS Trust.

Sir Neil Cossons is Director of the National Museum of Science and Industry, a group which comprises the Science Museum in London, the National Museum of Film, Photography and Television in Bradford, and the National Railway Museum in York. He has worked in museums in Bristol, Liverpool and London, including as Director of the Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust and Director of the National Maritime Museum. He was instrumental in establishing the Institute of Railway Studies, a joint venture between the University of York and the National Railway Museum, in 1994.

Dame Rennie Fritchie has had a long career in training, equal opportunities, and leadership development. Her work with the Manpower Services Commission led to appointments as chair of the Gloucestershire Health Authority, chair of the South Western Regional Health Authority and regional chair of the South and West Region. She became a Dame of the British Empire in recognition of her services to the NHS, and is now an honorary visiting professor at the University, with a particular role in the Centre for Leadership Development in the Department of Health Studies.

Professor Richard Gregory FRS is Emeritus Professor of Neuropsychology and former Director of the Brain and Perception Laboratory at the University of Bristol. An expert on visual perception, he is a member of the Royal Society Committee on the Public Understanding of Science and was on the BBC Science Consultative Group from 1988 to 1993. He has been the recipient of many awards, including the Michael Faraday Medal of the Royal Society in 1993. His publications include the Oxford Companion to the Mind (editor), The Artful Eye and Mirrors in Mind.

Professor Sheila Kamerman and Emeritus Professor Alfred Kahn work at the Columbia University School of Social Work in New York, where they teach social policy and planning and co-direct the Cross-National Studies Research Program. They have made a distinctive contribution to comparative social policy, especially in the field of child and family policy. Their links with European social policy developments are strong and they have been valued contributors to international comparative studies at York.

Professor William Labov is Professor of Linguistics and Philosophy and Director of the Linguistics Laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania. His work in sociolinguistics led to important new understanding of the links between language and society. The central feature of his work is that language is a dynamic social system which is continuously in flux. His work and ideas have shaped the research and thinking of many generations of linguists, including those in York's Department of Language and Linguistic Science. Professor Labov will receive his degree in absentia.

Genista McIntosh is Executive Director of the Royal National Theatre and a graduate of the University of York. Her first job was as press secretary to the York Festival of Arts. She enjoyed a successful career at the Royal Shakespeare Company, rising from Casting Director, to Planning Controller, Senior Administrator and Associate Producer. She joined the Royal National Theatre in 1990. After eight months as Chief Executive of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in 1997, she returned to the National Theatre.

The writer Graham Swift, who studied English literature as a postgraduate at York in the early 1970s, is best-known for his prize-winning books Waterland and Last Orders. Waterland, published in 1983, won the Winifred Holtby Award of the Royal Society of Literature, the Guardian Fiction Prize and the Premio Grinzane Cavour. Last Orders won the Booker Prize in 1996. Described as a modern-day Canterbury Tale, it was praised by the Booker prizes for its 'beautiful' construction and for being both 'funny and wise'.