Honorary Research Fellow

Contact Details

• Email: dw149@le.ac.uk  

Research

My specialist research area and publications concern both historical anthrozoology and the history of comparative psychology and other studies of animal behaviour (pure and applied) especially in Britain, including interdisciplinary, institutional, professional, ethical, recreational, literary and military aspects.

• Publications 

External Contributions

I currently serve as a member of the Peer Review College of the Arts and Humanities Research Council, assessing and advising on the quality of research grant applications.

I serve on the Editorial Board of Anthrozoös, a multidisciplinary academic journal of the interactions of people and animals, published by Berg for the International Society for Anthrozoology.

My historical research has been the basis for scriptwriting, picture research and media production for a 40-minute television documentary which is currently in preparation.

Research material has been used for the BBC Coast series (1 July 2007).

In addition to appearances on the BBC, I was asked to advise the BBC Natural History Unit about the thematic content and structure of a radio programme. From Vicars to Clones would investigate how the historic development of animal behaviour theory responded to and threw light on contemporary human interests, activities or preoccupations, in areas such as altruism, group loyalty, processes of learning, sexual morality, industrial efficiency, co-operation, and motivation.

Most Recent Publications

1. (2010) ‘Animal performance: interdisciplinary features of a special area of performing arts history’, Journal of the Scottish Society for Art History, vol. 15, pp. 7-16.
2. (2009) ‘Racial prejudice and the performing animals controversy in early twentieth-century Britain’, Society and Animals. Journal of Human-Animal Studies, vol. 17 (2), pp. 149-165.
3. (2009) ‘“Crank legislators”, “faddists” and professionals’ defence of animal performance in 1920s Britain’, Early Popular Visual Culture, vol. 7 (1), pp. 83-101.