The University of Essex Podcast

The third of our 50th Anniversary podcasts considers founding Vice-Chancellor Sir Albert Sloman, with some of those who worked with him discussing his “formidable skill” and “excellent eye for people of exceptional ability” – as well as his shyness.

Sir Albert Sloman was a former wartime RAF fighter pilot who became the founding and longest serving Vice-Chancellor of the University of Essex. The interviewees in this podcast tell of a man who was “scrupulously fair-minded” and “insisted on hiring the best”.

Sir Albert Sloman died in July 2012. You can read former Vice-Chancellor Professor Sir Ivor Crewe’s assessment of his life and work on our website.

Interviewees

- Sheila Cardy, former Secretary to the Registrar

- Sir Ivor Crewe, Vice-Chancellor, 1995-2007, and Lecturer and Professor in Government at Essex for more than 35 years

- Robin Dixon, former Secretary to the School of Comparative Studies

- Sir Denis Forman, former executive in the British film and television industry and honorary graduate of the University of Essex

- Anthony King, appointed Senior Lecturer in Government in 1966, now Essex County Council Millennium Professor of British Government

- Margaret Law, former Secretary to the Vice-Chancellor

- Gabriel Pearson, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studies for over 30 years

- Peter Townsend, (died 2009), founding Professor of Sociology

David Javier Thompson, known as Javier, is part of the US-UK Fulbright Awards Programme and is studying for a Masters in Refugee Care in the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies at the University of Essex. Here he chats about the opportunities offered by his Fulbright Scholarship, why he chose to study at the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies at Essex and his experiences so far.

For more information see: https://www.essex.ac.uk/news/event.aspx?e_id=4672

This podcast examines founding Vice-Chancellor Sir Albert Sloman’s vision for the University and how others saw it at the time.

Sir Albert Sloman saw a University which would be interdisciplinary, where subjects would inter-relate, often with an international focus that looked beyond the West, and be taught by leaders in their fields. Class and social barriers would be broken down by attracting not just some of the best and brightest students from around the world, but also many of the older men and women in the area who had never had the chance to go into higher education.

Some of the early staff attracted by Sir Albert’s vision talk about the “bright, imaginative, adventurous” undergraduates who might otherwise have gone to Oxford and Cambridge – and academics who were upset at the idea of not having a Senior Common Room where they could escape from the students.

Interviewees

- Dawn Ades, Professor of Art History

- Martin Atkinson, Emeritus Professor of Language and Linguistics, first came to Essex in 1974

- Joanna Bornat, PhD student, now Emeritus Professor, Faculty of Health and Social Care, Open University

- Peter Frank, former Professor of Russian Politics in the Department of Government

- Maurice Kimmit, former Professor of Physics, now Visiting Professor at the University’s Physics Centre

- Anthony King, appointed Senior Lecturer in Government in 1966, now Essex County Council Millennium Professor of British Government

- Alastair McAuley, Reader in the Department of Economics

- Gabriel Pearson, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studiesfor over 30 years

- Paul Thompson, Research Professor in the Department of Sociology, first came to Essex in 1964

- Peter Townsend (died 2009), founding Professor of Sociology

This introductory podcast features an interview with the man behind the podcast project, Paul Thompson. A Research Professor in the Department of Sociology, Paul Thompson talks of Essex as “one of the places where oral history in Britain originated”.

When he moved to Wivenhoe in the 1990s, Professor Thompson initiated an oral history project based in the town, which grew to involve many enthusiastic local residents. There are now over 60 interviews with Wivenhoe residents in the archive, many of whom worked at the University. The oral history archive is held at the Colchester Museum Resources Centre, as well as at our Albert Sloman Library.

The interview was carried out by Chris Garrington, herself a former University employee, who edited together this series of podcasts based on the archive interviews.

In this interview, Rachael Glendinning, from our Faculty of Social Sciences, speaks to Natalie, a recent Essex graduate, about her job role at ICM Research. Natalie was working at our 2012 Options Fair and gave us lots of great advice on applying for graduate jobs and the support she was given by University of Essex