This symposium honours the life and work of Catherine Will, Professor of Science and Technology Studies, University of Sussex. Catherine died in 2024 and left a legacy of academic work across a number of social science areas, including science and technology studies (STS), sociology of health, medicine and illness, politics and economics of health, social practices, research methods, social theory and social justice.

The symposium will be in-person only. It will be recorded and the recording will be made available after the event. Contributions marked * are pre-recorded.

This event has been organised by: Ben Fincham; Bobbie Farsides; Flis Henwood; Jo Moran-Ellis; Karen Lowton; Kate O’Riordan; Mark Erickson and Rachel Thomson

Programme

1030 – Refreshments

1100 – Welcome from Sasha Roseneil, Vice Chancellor University of Sussex, and Jo Moran-Ellis, Head of the School of Law, Politics and Sociology

1115 – 1230 Panel discussion on Catherine Will’s life, work and legacy

Alison Phipps*, Gillian Bendelow, Ulla McKnight, Kate Weiner

Kate Spiegelhalter*, Eleanor Kashouris, Shadreck Mwale

Chairs: Bobbie Farsides and Rachel Thomson

1230 – 1315 Lunch

Video presentation of Catherine’s play Scenes from the many lives of Escherichia coli

1315 – 1445 Presentations session 1. Theme: Medical devices, health technologies and health regimes

Henriette Langstrup Digital health citizenship – a spectrum of participation in healthcare*

Dorthe Kristensen Tracking towards care: Relational affordances of self-tracking in gym culture

Linsey McGoey The Alchemy of Clinical Trials revisited

Kate O’Riordan Attention, relation and trace

Cécile Chevalier and S. L. Nelson Bodies in Flux: Human Augmentation, Biopolitics, and the Ethics of Self-Optimisation

Chair: Flis Henwood

1500 – 1630 Presentations session 2. Theme: AMR and microbiology

Tiago Moreira Whatever happened to EBM *

Andrea Butcher and Salla Sariola TBC

David Armstrong An unfinished conversation

Sarah Nettleton and Nik Brown Beyond behaviour? And breathe…? Some reflections on sociological contributions to understanding responses to AMR

Jessica Omija Korpela Socioeconomic Differences in Antibiotic Prescriptions: A Population-based Study in Finland

Chair: Mark Erickson

1630 – Coffee

1700 – 1830 Presentations session 3. Health, society, STS and sociology

Ros Williams Interdisciplinarity, infrastructures, inequity*

Helen Eborall Preventative medicine as a risk to ordinariness revisited

Ewen Speed Reflections on the Cost of Living blog

Sarah Dry Knowledge, Science and Taste in the Age of Protein: Lessons from an Obsolete Global Emergency

Mark Erickson Laboratory protocols as paratactic poetry

Chair: Karen Lowton

1830 Closing remarks from Ben Fincham, Head of Sociology and Criminology

Catherine Will Symposium