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Peter Lansley Professor Emeritus of Construction Management, University of Reading
“ There is one development that I think has had an adverse impact on ageing research and that is the desire of the Research Councils to bundle research monies into very big grants. This makes it difficult for new people coming into the
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field, younger researchers in particular, to find their feet. They’ re always bag carriers for very senior, prestigious academics who are leading the research programmes. It’ s important that young researchers get their own money, run their own research, find out about managing research and the issues that they face in project management, as early as possible in their careers.” |
Leonie Kellaher Professor Emeritus, London Metropolitan University
“ Latterly, the label that I would have attached to what I’ ve been doing all along was an examination of material culture – which had been a term much more prevalent in anthropology than in gerontology. That’ s what I was always interested in … looking at buildings and their interiors,
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and domestic objects and practices, and the relationship to the way life is lived within them. In many ways, in cemeteries, it’ s the same: we look at the landscape and we look at the artefacts … And of course I’ ve encountered quite a lot of older people in the cemeteries when I’ ve been interviewing: widows, widowers. So that often felt familiar territory in a sense.” |
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jonathan barker Research Director, Far-sight Research / Director, Musique Cordiale International Festival & Academy
“ At the time [ 1972 ] that I was doing the masters – which required a dissertation – my grandfather had been not very well treated in the discharge from hospital process. So my dissertation was then about older people being discharged from hospital … I remember
Julia Johnson Retired; former Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Health & Social Care, The Open University
“ The main thing that’ s driven my research interest has been ageism in its very broadest sense. And I feel rather depressed about gerontology in a way, because I think we live in a more ageist society now than we did 20 or 30 years ago.”
Bob Woods
Professor of Clinical Psychology of Older People, Bangor University
“ You could see that once you began to see people as individuals, just what a difference it made to them, and to their day-to-day quality of life. I
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meeting David Hobman [ then Director of Age Concern ]. He asked me to come and talk about this piece of research and … they were looking for a whole collection of people who would write a little manifesto series of papers. I wrote one on this – called Home from Hospital – which attracted a lot of attention and a Today programme interview and a Jimmy Young Show interview which was very improbable … That launched me.”
“ I’ d like there to be more emphasis on ageing in general and not too much of a specific focus on older people, which is how gerontology has tended to focus. I’ m not saying it does entirely. But, if we’ re really to become a rather less ageist society, we do have to look at age in its entirety.”
suppose it’ s that that’ s driven me on really, wanting to do something about that. It’ s a bit of bloodymindedness, as well, I guess. As soon as people said,‘ Oh, you’ re stupid to or crazy to work with older people’, then I wanted to do it all the more and to prove them wrong; that there is stuff that you can do.”
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JOHN BOND Emeritus Professor of Health Services Research & Social Gerontology, Newcastle University
“ The failure of gerontology academically is the same for the UK as it was in America. There isn’ t something at the end of it which says you can use this to do A or B. We can get away with it with sociology, we can get away with it with psychology,
GILLY CROSBY Chief Executive Officer, Centre for Policy on Ageing
“ It’ s the marrying of my work, my interest in later life issues … the life course perspective, but always being an information professional. Does that make me a gerontologist? I think so. I think
AnnE Jamieson Reader Emerita in Education & Life Course Studies, Birkbeck, University of London
“ The department I was in – Extramural Studies – had quite a lot of older students over 60, even over 70. And I became interested in why do older people get involved in education … I was interested in education, educational gerontology, not just about older learners, but also about teaching about
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we can get away with it with languages... with the other social sciences. But gerontology, because it’ s interdisciplinary, you’ ve got this tension – and have had all the time – between being a psychologist on the one hand, or a sociologist and, on the other hand, being gerontologists. And so that’ s been, I think, the fundamental problem for gerontology over the years.”
a gerontologist is more than an academic working within a specific discipline. From my understanding of the word, I think so.”
“ I am lucky … I have worked, in my professional life, with people who have been, by and large, optimistic, vibrant, hugely vibrant, and passionate about their work, and that’ s certainly rubbed off on me.”
gerontology.”
“ I think the problem about gerontology is that although everybody agrees that we’ re interested in, not just old people – it’ s ageing as a process – most people associate it with old people. That’ s what I’ ve always felt was a negative aspect of the image of gerontology. That’ s why I prefer life course studies, actually.”
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