My story is one of grim determination and stubbornness in the face of recurring hurdles. I tell it here as a cautionary tale, in part. I am sure I made mistakes, maybe also there was a certain inevitability to my path, but perhaps this story, my story, will resonate with others or will even act as an encouragement. I have been told that the students in my Department at UCL regarded me as an example of ‘how a person can do it their own way’. Other early career academics have said they regard me as an example of how to preserve a degree of autonomy. Although all this happened more by accident than design, it is a source of pleasure that my chequered history might be helping some people to follow their own dreams.

My relationship to academic medical sociology has been like a bad affair with an unfaithful lover. I have never been able to get over the fascination of the subject, with its enormous potential for discovery and the improvement of human welfare. As a result, I have clung grimly to the precipice of job insecurity. The amount of work I have had to do just to keep myself from being expelled from academic life has taken over almost my entire existence (if my life’s partner were not in the same business I doubt he could tolerate it).

Early influences: discovering medical sociology, 1968–74

The year 1965 was a great one in which to go to university, just in time to graduate into the political upheavals of 1968. I had never heard of sociology, but was advised to change from philosophy and politics by my tutor. She had decided I was destined for academic work and knew that a degree from Reading University might have some chance to open doors in this newer discipline. This change of major subject gave me access to the inspirational teaching of Viola Klein and Salvador Giner (among others) and at their further urging I began to look for ways to remain a sociologist.

As an American citizen I was not eligible for a grant to study further, so I applied for various research assistantships, and somehow managed to land one of these, despite having nothing more to offer than a 2.1 from an obscure university.