In Conversation: Ann Oakley

As part of the Conference on Women, Crime and Criminal Justice Practice 10–12 January 2012 - In Conversation: Ann Oakley

Author of A Critical Woman: Barbara Wootton, Social Science and Public Policy in the Twentieth Century.

Ann Oakley has worked in university research for many years and has written both fiction and nonfiction. She is best known for her work on sex and gender, housework, childbirth and feminist social science, and more recently for her work on evidencebased public policy and methodologies of research and evaluation. She is Professor of Sociology and Social Policy at the Institute of Education, University of London, and until January 2005 was Director of the Social Science Research Unit (SSRU) at the Institute, where she also headed the Evidence for Policy and Practice Information and Coordinating (EPPI) Centre. She also holds honorary appointments as a Professor in Social Sciences at the Institute of Child Health in London and as a Fellow at Somerville College in Oxford.

(Extracted from www.annoakley.co.uk)

Barbara Frances Wootton née Adam (1897-1988) was a pioneer in many fields relating to the most challenging social issues of modern times. For over sixty years, beginning in the 1920s, she was at the forefront of debates about social inequality; the origins and treatment of antisocial behaviour; the importance of internationalism, human rights and world peace; how to combine democracy with state planning; the environment and the preservation of the countryside; and the (ir)relevance of economics as a way of understanding social systems. As a woman, her remarkable life spanned enormous changes in women’s position. Her achievements cut a broad swathe across sex discrimination and entrenched prejudice, making, as one commentator put it, modern feminists ‘look like a bunch of schoolchildren’.Barbara Wootton published many books (including a novel and a book of short stories). She also wrote autobiographical reflections, In a World I Never Made (1967).

(Adapted from www.barbarawootton.co.uk)

Chair: Dr Anthea Hucklesby, University of Leeds

Discussants: Professor Loraine Gelsthorpe University of Cambridge; Fellow of Pembroke College, Professor Anne Worrall Professor Emerita, Keele University

ALL WELCOME

4.30 pm, Wednesday 11th January 2012, LG18, Law Faculty, Sidgwick Site, Cambridge