New appointments to Arts and Humanities Research Council

Greg Clark, Minister for Universities and Science, has appointed four new members, to the AHRC’s governing body, the Council. Professor Svenja Adolphs, Mr Robert Dufton, Professor Tom Inns, and Professor Fiona Macpherson have been appointed for four years. The Minister has also reappointed Council members Professor Andrew Thompson and Mr Trevor Spires until 2018. Council members are appointed by the Minister for Universities and Science and are responsible for the overall strategic direction of the AHRC including its key objectives and targets, and key decisions about the research direction of the AHRC.

Chairman of the AHRC Professor Sir Drummond Bone welcomed the appointments: “It is my great pleasure to welcome these four enterprising and influential individuals to the AHRC Council. They will bring new perspectives from their extensive experience in their respective fields to complement our current membership. I look forward to working with them to support the AHRC in driving forward the aims of our strategy throughout our tenth anniversary year and beyond.”

Professor Svenja Adolphs is Professor of English Language and Linguistics at the University of Nottingham, where she is also currently Director of Research and Knowledge Exchange for the Faculty of Arts and Associate Director of the Centre for Advanced Studies. Her main research interests include multimodal corpus linguistics and discourse analysis, and interdisciplinary approaches to the understanding of language use in dynamic contexts. At the AHRC she has previously served as strategic and peer reviewer, as well as on the Knowledge Transfer Fellowship and Catalyst Panel.

Mr Robert Dufton is Director of Campaigns (Designate) at the University of Sheffield. Previously he was the CEO of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, one of the largest grant-making organisations in the UK, operating in the arts, education, social justice for disadvantaged young people. He is a member of the London Council of Arts Council England, appointed by the Mayor of London. He is a trustee of Fruitvox, an arts charity raising LGBT voice internationally. He is Deputy Chairman of the Alumni Association of the University of Bristol, Chair of its London Branch and was previously on the University’s Council. He was a Governor of the Museum of London (2004-13). He studied law at the University of Bristol, and trained and worked as a solicitor in London and New York.

Professor Tom Inns is the Director of the Glasgow School of Art, Scotland’s Specialist Institution for Art, Design & Architecture. In 1990 he co-founded the Design Research Centre at Brunel University, becoming Director in 1996. In 2000 he moved to the University of Dundee becoming Head of Design at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design, and was later Dean. Between 2005-2010 he was Programme Director for the AHRC/EPSRC funded Designing for the 21st Century Initiative. Tom has an active interest in how strategic design can apply principles of traditional design to society’s systemic challenges. He studied Engineering at the University of Bristol and Design at the Royal College of Art, and his PhD explored the impact of design on innovation in small companies.

Professor Fiona Macpherson is Head of Philosophy and Director of Research in Philosophy at the University of Glasgow, where she is also Director of the Centre for the Study of Perceptual Experience. She was a Visiting Fellow at Harvard University as a Kennedy Scholar, a Teaching Fellow at the University of St Andrews, and a Research Fellow at Girton College, Cambridge. She has spent time as a Research Fellow at the Australian National University, and as a Visiting Professor at Umea University, Sweden, and at the Institute of Philosophy, University of London. She is Co-Director of the Centre for the Study of the Senses at the Institute of Philosophy, School of Advanced Study, University of London, and is also a Trustee of the Kennedy Memorial Trust. She holds a MA from the University of Glasgow, a MLitt from the University of St Andrews, and a PhD from the University of Stirling.

For further information, please go on to the AHRC website.