Contact
Biography
Please note that from September 2024-September 2025 I will be leading two large grants and I will be only engaged in minimal teaching duties.
I am interested in the social and cultural histories of health and medicine post 1850, but mainly in the twentieth century. In the past my research focused upon the operation of western medicine in the British Empire (particularly in British East Africa), these days, however, I consider myself principally a historian of health in modern Britain. I am particularly interested in health consumerism: whether thinking about how British health & hygiene products were sold, to how unhealthy 'addictive' industries have come to sponsor elite sports.
Before I joined Nottingham in 2014, I worked for four years as an Associate Professor at the University of Nottingham, Ningbo, China (2010-14). In China I served as Acting Head of Department, Deputy Head of Department and Director of Teaching in the School of International Studies. Prior to that, I held Assistant Professorial positions at the University of Exeter (2009-10) and the University of Strathclyde (2005-9). I also have held part time teaching and research positions at University College London, where I took my PhD, funded by the Wellcome Trust. My post graduate degrees are from UCL and the University of Cambridge.
I have written several books and articles on elements of modern health history: Practising Colonial Medicine (I.B. Tauris, 2007) looked at European Doctors working in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania; Indian Doctors in Kenya: The Forgotten Story, 1895-1940 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, paperback 2017) with Harshad Topiwala moved my focus to the careers of private and governmental Indian doctors in Kenya. My co-authored book Florence Nightingale at Home (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020) won the National People's Book Prize, 'Best Achievement', 2021-22. In 2023 I published a health humanities guide on how to use history for better health outcomes: Arts for Health: History (Emerald Books, 2023).
Currently I am Principal Investigator (PI) on two large grants. An AHRC Standard Grant: 'Chemists to the Nation, Pharmacy to the World': Exploring the Global Dimensions of British Healthcare and Beauty with Boots the Chemists, 1919-1980' (2021-2026). I am also PI on a £1.7m Wellcome Trust Discovery Award: 'Kicking the Habit: Kicking the Habit: Historicising 'Addictive' Sport Sponsorship in Britain, 1965-2025' (1 September 2024-31 August 2030).
I work closely in the Health Humanities, particularly promoting the role of history in health and well being. I am a fellow of the Royal Historical Society and A Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.
Expertise Summary
My current interest is in health consumerism, I am leading a large research project on the 'unhealthy' sponsorship of sports by alcohol, tobacco, and betting companies. The tobacco research strand will be located at University of Nottingham. However, I am interested in a variety of aspects of the history of modern medicine. I am also keenly interested in the history of drugs and pharmaceuticals, the history of smoking, modern sports history, the history marketing and retailing health, particularly the history of Boots the Chemists.
I am very happy to accept research students in any of these fields or in any aspect of the history of modern medicine post 1850, or within the Medical Humanities or Health Humanities broadly defined.
Teaching Summary
I have won awards for my teaching. I have taught a third year Special Subject, Disease and Domination: The History of Medicine and the Colonial Encounter and a third year option, The Agony and the… read more
Research Summary
My current research Projects:
(1 October 2021-31 March 2026)
AHRC Standard Research Grant (AH/T008741/1) Principal Investigator [Dr Richard Hornsey, CI] 'Chemists to the Nation, Pharmacy to the World': Exploring the Global Dimensions of British Healthcare and Beauty with Boots the Chemists, 1919-1980'.
https://www.overtheglobalcounter.com/
X account: @OTglobalcounter.com
(1 September 2024-31 August 2030).
Wellcome Trust Discovery Award (227393/Z/23/Z), £1.7 million, Principal Investigator [Prof Alex Mold, LSHTM, CI, Prof Heather Wardle, University of Glasgow, CI] 'Kicking the Habit: Historicising 'Addictive' Sport Sponsorship in Britain, 1965-2025'
Selected Publications
I have won awards for my teaching. I have taught a third year Special Subject, Disease and Domination: The History of Medicine and the Colonial Encounter and a third year option, The Agony and the Ecstasy: Drugs for Pleasure and Pain in the History of Medicine. Additionally, I regularly teach at MA level. I also give guest lectures and seminars on the year one module, Learning History. I additionally contribute to Roads to Modernity and the Contemporary World.
In the past I have taught many diverse modules, from the history of medicine in the media, to medicine and literature, the history of capitalism and the history of narcotics. I also have convened several broad survey modules in the history of the British Empire and the history of medicine.
Past Research
Previously I have written about the history of British and Indian doctors in colonial East Africa, medical theories of tropical life, and the theoretical uses of history in other social science disciplines (particularly within Organisational Studies).
I have experience on a number of funded research projects. For example:
1 August 2020-31 July 2021)
Wellcome Prime ISSF Principal Investigator, 'Tobacco, Public Health and Sponsorship: An Exploratory Case Study of John Player and Son and Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club'.
(10 November 2019-10 August 2021)
AHRC GCRF Cultures, Behaviours and Histories of Agriculture, Food, and Nutrition call (AH/T00410X/1) Co-investigator [Professor Murray Lark, PI and Dr Alison Mohr, CI) 'Towards Transdisciplinary Understanding of Inherited Soil Surveys: an Exploratory Case Study in Zambia'.
(January 2018-September 2021)
AHRC Standard Research Grant (AH/R00014X/1), Co-investigator [Professor Paul Crawford, PI], 'Florence Nightingale Comes Home for 2020: an Historico-Literary Analysis of her Family Life'.