Professor Jane Macnaughton writes: Durham’s Centre for Medical Humanities is proud to announce that Professor Felicity Callard has today taken up her new post as Director of Birkbeck’s Institute for Social Research.
Felicity joined the Durham Geography Department in 2012 in a post created through a Wellcome Trust Strategic Award to the Centre for Medical Humanities. She has placed a key role in building the critical capacities of medical humanities research through publications, collaborations and by co-convening the first workshop on Critical Medical Humanities in 2013.
One of Felicity’s crowning achievements during her time at Durham was her leadership of Hubbub, an international collective of social scientists, artists, humanities researchers, scientists, broadcasters, public engagement professionals and mental health experts. Hubbub were awarded the first residency of The Hub at Wellcome Collection in 2014 to explore the dynamics of rest, noise, tumult, activity and work, as they operate in mental health, the neurosciences, the arts and the everyday.
We would also particularly like to acknowledge the crucial role Felicity played in ensuring the CMH team’s success in achieving a further Wellcome Development Grant of £1m this year. Felicity will be sorely missed by all at the Centre, but our ongoing collaborations through this Award mean she will not be a stranger to the Centre or the field of critical medical humanities more broadly.
We look forward to working with her and our friends at Birkbeck in the future, and wish her all the very best.