Laurie Taylor

Laurie Taylor is perhaps best known as presenter of BBC Radio 4's Thinking Allowed, a programme that explores new research on how society works. He has made numerous television and radio programmes, is an accomplished public speaker, and for over 30 years has written a satirical column on university life for the Times Higher Education.

He began his career as a librarian, later becoming an actor, before joining the University of York, where he went on to become Professor of Sociology.

He was awarded an honorary doctorate by Goldsmiths in 2013.

"British social science is admired around the world for its originality and theoretical sophistication but Goldsmiths has always been one of the very best centres of sociological thought and research," explained Laurie during the awards ceremony.

"Let me read out a list of people who have at one time featured on Thinking Allowed - all of these Goldsmiths academics are major social scientists. I'm listing them to give the list, but the length of the list is what really says a lot about Goldsmiths: Les Back, Angela McRobbie, Bev Skeggs, Caroline Knowles, Alberto Toscano, Mike Featherstone, Nirmal Puwar, Rebecca Cassidy,Alex Rhys-Taylor, Dhiraj Murthy, Kate Nash, David Oswell, Roger Burrows and Vikki Bell. It's a tremendous list and an indication of what an important place Goldsmiths is."