Catz researchers recognised by the British Academy

The St Catharine’s community is celebrating the leading international humanities and social sciences researchers among our alumni and former Fellows who have been elected by the British Academy to its Fellowship:

• Professor Philippe Sands KC, FRSL, Hon FBA (Fellow Commoner 1984–86*; Research Fellow 1986–88)
• Professor Nicholas Harrison FBA (Research Fellow 1992–95)
• Professor Dafydd Johnston FBA FLSW (1974, ASNC)
• Professor Daniel Wakelin FBA (Junior Research Fellow 2002–04)

Professor Julia Black, President of the British Academy, welcomed the news:

“It is with great pleasure that we welcome yet another outstanding cohort to the Academy’s Fellowship. The scope of research and expertise on display across our newly elected UK, Corresponding and Honorary Fellows shows the breadth and depth of knowledge and insight held by the British Academy. It is our role to harness this to understand and help shape a better world... I wholeheartedly congratulate each of our new Fellows on this achievement and look forward to working together.”

The newly elected Fellows of the British Academy become part of the UK’s national academy for the humanities and social sciences, currently totalling over 1,600 distinguished intellectuals. There are currently only 31 Honorary Fellows of the British Academy, who are expected to have contributed signally to the promotion of the purposes for which the Academy was founded.

Professor Philippe Sands

Professor Sands was elected an Honorary Fellow by the British Academy this year. He is currently Professor of the Public Understanding of Law at University College London, where his work focuses on the place and purpose of international law in the modern world, with an emphasis on rights and responsibilities in relation to people and the environment. His engagement in this work is by a combination of scholarship, litigation and writing for the general public.

He commented, “I got my academic start at St Catharine’s, back in 1984, with the support of Eli Lauterpacht at the fledgling Lauterpacht Centre for International Law. I am still in close contact with many colleagues from that time, including Barry Supple (Master 1984–93; Honorary Fellow 1993) and Sir John Baker (1971; Honorary Fellow 2012), who I regularly cite for the astute proposition that any legal development is necessarily a long game! I have always been intensely grateful for the collegiality and intellectual inspiration that was provided in those years, stood me in decent stead, it seems. St Catharine’s remains a very special place, for me.”

Professor Nicholas Harrison 

Professor Harrison has been elected to the Fellowship of the British Academy for his contributions to modern languages, literatures and other media from 1830. He is Professor of French and Postcolonial Studies at King’s College London, where his research interests include French, postcolonial and comparative studies.

He recalled, "Getting a research fellowship at St Catharine’s was a turning point in my academic career, and a wonderful piece of good fortune. It gave me the time and space to launch into a new field, around colonial histories and French-language literatures of the Maghreb, in which I have now worked for thirty years. And I had outstanding colleagues around me, with Chris Clark (1990) in the neighbouring office, and three exceptional Fellows in Modern Languages: Andrew Webber, Geoffrey Kantaris (1990) and Simon Gaunt (1988), who was to become a close friend and colleague, in Cambridge then London, and whom I miss greatly. I look back on those years with great affection and gratitude."

Professor Dafydd Johnston 

Professor Johnston has been elected to the Fellowship of the British Academy for his contributions to medieval studies. Now Emeritus Professor at University of Wales Trinity St David, he was Director of the Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies at the University of Wales for twelve years from 2008 until his retirement at the end of 2020. Among his publications is an introductory guide, The Literature of Wales (University of Wales Press, 2017).

He said, “Election to the Fellowship of the British Academy came as an unexpected honour, working as I do in a marginal field and publishing mainly through the medium of Welsh. My journey into Celtic Studies began at Catz, where I read Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic in Part II, and was fortunate to receive funding from the College to attend two summer schools in modern Welsh at Aberystwyth – where I eventually returned to end my career as Director of the University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies.”

Professor Daniel Wakelin 

Professor Wakelin has also been elected to the Fellowship of the British Academy for his contributions to medieval studies. He is Jeremy Griffiths Professor of Medieval English Palaeography at the University of Oxford and Fellow in English at St Hilda’s College, Oxford. His research focuses on manuscript and early printed copies of English literature, primarily from the 1100s to the 1500s.

He added, “It was during my Junior Research Fellowship at St Catharine's that I had time to work out the approach I would take in my research. Supervisions with brilliant students in College and conversations with the Fellows in English – then Dr Paul Hartle (1971, English; Fellow 1979–2019; Emeritus Fellow 2019), Dr Caroline Gonda (1996) and The Rev’d Dr Glen Cavaliero (1965) – forced me to think about how my rather narrow doctoral research fitted into the wider subject. I remember a particularly challenging question from Paul about one throwaway remark of mine that goaded me into developing my second book.

“And Catz remains an inspiration. The day that my British Academy Fellowship was announced I was on a research trip and opened one document in the Huntington Library only to find that – of course! – Sir John Baker had read it first, in July 1983, and left a note in the file identifying it. All research in the humanities builds on those who went before; I feel a dwarf on the shoulders of Catz giants.”

* At the time of his election, this was a research post.