Graduation Ceremonies 12, 25, 26, 27 and 28 July 2018 The Honorary Graduands
The Honorary Graduands
Every year the University of Professor Dame Anne M Johnson MD, FMedSci, FFPH, FRCP, FRCGP York confers the honorary Dame Anne Johnson is Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology at University College London (UCL). After degree of Doctor of the training in medicine at the Universities of Cambridge and University honoris causa Newcastle, she specialised in Epidemiology and Public on distinguished people. Health. For over 30 years, she has worked in research on the epidemiology and prevention of HIV and sexually The recipients come from transmitted infections as well as other infectious diseases many walks of life and all such as influenza, Ebola, and antimicrobial resistance. have made a significant She co-directed the Medical Research Council UK Centre for Co-ordinating Epidemiological Studies of HIV and contribution to society. AIDS from 1985 until 1999 and was principal investigator on the National Survey Honorary graduands are of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles (Natsal), through which she maps the extent of selected from nominations the HIV epidemic and tracks changes in behaviour over time. She co-founded UCL’s Institute for Global Health and has advised many by members of the University national and international science organisations. She is currently Vice- and very often have links with President International of the Academy of Medical Sciences and a Governor of departments or alumni. the Wellcome Trust.
Professor Monica McWilliams Monica McWilliams was a delegate to the multi-party peace negotiations leading to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. She co-founded the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition and was elected to the Northern Ireland Legislative Assembly from 1998 to 2003. Monica chaired the sub-committee on human rights and was subsequently appointed as Chief Commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission and helped to draft the advice on a Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland. She is currently appointed to the four-person Independent Reporting Commission on the disbandment of paramilitary organisations set up by the British and Irish governments and the Northern Ireland Executive. Monica is Emeritus Professor at Ulster University and has recently completed a large-scale research project on the impact of conflict on women’s lives spanning the past 25 years.
Left: York’s medieval Minster in the heart of the city is a stunning backdrop for major performances by the University Choir and Symphony Orchestra Graduation Ceremonies 12, 25, 26, 27 and 28 July 2018 The Honorary Graduands
Dr Stephen Cleobury CBE Professor Dame Athene Donald DBE FRS Stephen Cleobury has been Director Dame Athene Donald is Professor of of Music at King’s College, Cambridge, Experimental Physics at the University since 1982. His work there has brought of Cambridge and Master of Churchill him into fruitful relationships with College, Cambridge. leading orchestras and soloists. Her research is in the field of soft At King’s he has sought to enhance matter and physics at the interface of the reputation of the world-famous Paul Grover biology and she has published over Choir, broadening its repertoire, 250 papers in these fields. She is a commissioning new music and member of the Scientific Council of developing its activities in broadcasting, the European Research Council and a recording and touring. He nurtured generations of young former Trustee of the Science Museum. musicians throughout the University of Cambridge during his She was Director of the University of Cambridge’s Women many years as Conductor of the Cambridge Music Society. in Science, Engineering and Technology Initiative, and the Beyond Cambridge he is in demand as a conductor. From 1995 University’s first Gender Equality Champion. She also chaired to 2007 he was Chief Conductor of the BBC Singers and is now the Athena Forum, an organisation which provides oversight of Conductor Laureate. developments that seek to advance the career progression and He is an active organ recitalist. A past President of the Royal representation of women in science, technology, mathematics College of Organists and of the Incorporated Association of and medicine in UK higher education. Organists, he is currently President of the Friends of Cathedral As well as various prizes from the Institute of Physics and the Music and of the Herbert Howells Society. He was appointed Royal Society, she won the 2009 L’Oréal/Unesco Laureate for CBE in 2009. Europe award.
Professor Alastair J Minnis Professor Helen M Blau Professor Alastair Minnis is one of University of York graduate Professor the leading professors of medieval Helen Blau is Director of the Baxter literature in the world. Since 2008 Laboratory for Stem Cell Biology at he has been Douglas Tracy Smith Stanford University. Her research Professor of English at Yale University, focuses on regenerative medicine. and has achieved international She is world-renowned for her work recognition for his work on literary on nuclear reprogramming and the criticism and the history of ideas, and demonstration of the plasticity of the on medieval philosophy and theology. differentiated state using cell fusion. He is the author of seven books and Her revolutionary studies provided over 70 articles, and the editor of 17 collections of essays. He the scientific underpinnings for the has been elected a Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America, modern era of stem cell biology. as well as President of the New Chaucer Society. She is also internationally recognised for her discovery of Alastair was a professor in the Department of English at the regulators that rejuvenate muscle stem cell function and University of York from 1987 to 2000. During his time at York, identification of strategies for the treatment of muscle atrophy he was Director of the Centre for Medieval Studies and helped due to disease, injury or aging. to found the York Medieval Press which enjoys an international Helen served as President of the American Society for reputation as the publisher of outstanding monographs and Developmental Biology and President of the International books on medieval studies. Society of Differentiation, and as a member of the Harvard Board of Overseers. Her awards and honours include an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Nijmegen, Holland, and election to the National Academy of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences. Graduation Ceremonies 12, 25, 26, 27 and 28 July 2018 The Honorary Graduands
Dr David Lawrence Sacks Gregory Doran Dr David Lawrence Sacks is one of the Gregory Doran is Artistic Director of world’s foremost experts in the field the Royal Shakespeare Company. He of leishmaniasis, a poverty-related joined the RSC in 1987 and directed parasitic disease. his first production in 1992, Derek Dr Sacks is Head of the Intracellular Walcott’s adaptation of Homer’s Parasite Biology Section at the Odyssey for The Other Place in
Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases, part Stratford-upon-Avon. He has directed Kurttz Ellie of the National Institute of Allergy and over two thirds of the canon, including Infectious Diseases, USA. His research All’s Well That Ends Well with Judi focuses on the vector biology and Dench, Macbeth with Antony Sher, immunology of leishmaniasis, including vaccine development. Hamlet with David Tennant and Patrick Stewart, and Julius Caesar set in contemporary Africa. He is one of the most influential figures in helping to develop the research base in leishmaniasis disease-endemics, notably To mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death in 2016, in India. He was a founding investigator for a tropical medicine his productions of Richard II, Henry IV Parts I & II and Henry V research centre in India and leads a project funded by the undertook the RSC’s first major tour to China and Hong Kong. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to establish sandfly colonies He also directed Shakespeare Live! From the RSC which was in India. This will facilitate critical research on disease broadcast worldwide and received a BAFTA nomination for Best transmission in support of the national visceral leishmaniasis Live Event. elimination campaign. His work as an expert advisor for the Awards include the 2002 Olivier Award for Outstanding World Health Organisation Tropical Disease Research led to an Achievement of the Year and the 2012 Sam Wanamaker Award, influential vaccine development programme in Iran. recognising his work in increasing the understanding and enjoyment of Shakespeare. Gavin Esler Simon Stephens Gavin Esler, currently Chancellor of the University of Kent, is known for University of York graduate Simon his journalistic work on the wrongful Stephens is a playwright. For 20 years convictions of the so-called ‘Guildford his work has been widely translated and Four’ and ‘Maguire Seven’. Their stories produced throughout the world. eventually became the basis of the film, He has won several awards including
In the Name of the Father. Olivier and Tony Awards for new Kevin Cummins Jeff Overs Jeff Esler became the BBC’s Chief North plays. His work ranges from the deeply America Correspondent, based in political, considering subjects such as Washington and covering the Bush and the 7/7 London bombings (Pornography) Clinton White House. Over the past two decades Gavin Esler or the possibility of school shootings has interviewed world leaders including Margaret Thatcher, in the UK (Punk Rock) to the more accessible. His most famous King Abdullah of Jordan and President Carter. play is his adaptation of Mark Haddon’s best-selling novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. In the arts and culture programmes he anchors for BBC World Service he has also interviewed writers and artists such He has written new English-language versions of masterpieces as Seamus Heaney, Angelina Jolie and Penelope Cruz, plus by Chekhov, Ibsen and Brecht, collaborated with the world’s numerous film-makers. leading theatre practitioners and produced original work throughout Europe and the US. He is a writer of fiction and non-fiction books. His book Lessons from the Top led to a separate career lecturing to He has been Artistic Associate at the Lyric Hammersmith and audiences including business groups, university business Associate Playwright at the Royal Court Theatre. schools and the military. Simon has led workshops with the University of York’s Theatre, Film and Television students. Greg’s Place on Campus West provides an innovative outdoor community space for numerous student-led events Graduation Ceremonies 12, 25, 26, 27 and 28 July 2018 The Honorary Graduands
Bridget Kendall MBE Dr Penelope Curtis A long-standing BBC Correspondent, Since 2015 Dr Penelope Curtis has Bridget Kendall was appointed the been Director of the Gulbenkian first female Master of Peterhouse, Museum in Lisbon, responsible both the University of Cambridge’s oldest for the Founder’s Collection and the College, in 2016. Modern Collection. Educated at Oxford and Harvard, Having studied at Oxford and the she joined the BBC World Service Courtauld Institute, Dr Curtis joined as a trainee in 1983 and became the the then new Tate Gallery in Liverpool. BBC’s Moscow Correspondent in 1989, She later moved to Leeds and was covering the collapse of the Soviet instrumental in creating what became Union as well as Boris Yeltsin’s rise to power. the Henry Moore Institute, a centre for the study of sculpture. She was then appointed Washington Correspondent before In 2010 she took up the role of Director at Tate Britain, where moving to the senior role of BBC Diplomatic Correspondent, she oversaw the £47m ‘Millbank project’ renovation and was reporting on major conflicts such as those in Kosovo, Iraq, responsible for the complete rehang of the collection, which Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and Ukraine. opened in 2013. Her interviews with global leaders include Margaret Thatcher, Dr Curtis has written widely on 20th-century British sculpture, Hillary Clinton, Mikhail Gorbachev and Vladimir Putin. on European art and architecture of the inter-war years, and on She is host of BBC Radio’s weekly discussion programme, The many contemporary European sculptors. Her monographs have Forum. Her book The Cold War: a New Oral History has just been published by Oxford (1999), Ridinghouse/Getty (2007), come out in paperback. Her awards include the James Cameron and Yale (2017), this last being the published version of the 2015 Award for distinguished journalism, as well as an MBE. Mellon Lectures.
Professor Narendra Ahuja Professor Narendra Ahuja is a Research Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Beckman Institute, and Coordinated Science Laboratory at University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign, and the Founding Director of Information Technology Research Academy in New Delhi. He was the Founding Director of International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad, the first of now over 20 such Indian institutions (IIITs). His current research is on extraction and representation of spatial structure in images and video; use of multiple sources and machine learning for scene representation and recognition; computational cameras; and applications of computer vision to challenging societal problems with focus on developing societies. He has supervised thesis research by about 50 PhD students and 80 other research and postdoc students. He is the Founding President of Vision Technology, a computer vision technology company. His algorithms/prototypes have been used in a number of industrial systems including at General Electric, Westinghouse, Lockheed and Honeywell.