Professor Ken Mayhew Retirement Dinner

After 39 years at Pembroke, Professor Ken Mayhew retired from his post as Fellow in Economics at the end of last academic year. On 23rd January the Fellowship gathered at a special dinner in his honour to mark his outstanding contribution to the College.

In her speech the Master, Dame Lynne Brindley, paid tribute to Professor Mayhew, noting in particular his unique tutorial sytle: "Generations of Pembrokians have benefitted from his consummate teaching skills, ineffable supply of irreverent anecdotes and acerbically witty reflections, humanising economics in the most memorable ways".

Professor Ewart Keep (Oxford University Department of Education) spoke warmly of his research colleague, pointing out that "Ken’s academic interests have always been broad-ranging. In a world where many social scientists really do devote their careers to knowing more and more about less and less, this is a hearteningly different approach."

Professor Stephen Whitefield (Pembroke Fellow in Politics) added: "Ken has always thought that the life of an academic was about balancing various public commitments: research – certainly, but that should be connected to real and important problems; teaching – no doubt, but that was broad and not just technical, especially at the undergraduate level, and in which economics was an education not just in mathematics and models but in the moral and political choices that economics should engage; and in service to the academic community and beyond as a public intellectual."