Laureation address: Professor Dame Elizabeth N Anionwu
Honorary Degree of Doctor of Science
Laureation by Professor Katherine Hawley, School of Philosophical, Anthropological and Film Studies
Wednesday 26 June 2019
Vice-Chancellor, it is my privilege to present for the degree of Doctor of Science, honoris causa, Professor Dame Elizabeth Nneka Anionwu.
Dame Elizabeth is now Emeritus Professor of Nursing at the University of West London, following a very distinguished career as nurse, health visitor, researcher, teacher and activist.
As a health visitor in 1970s London, Dame Elizabeth realised that ethnic minority families were not getting the healthcare they deserved. During the same period, she discovered her extended family in Nigeria, and she encountered anti-racism campaigners both in the US and in Britain. This combination of professional, personal, and political factors prompted Dame Elizabeth to focus her energies on sickle cell disease, an inheritable blood disorder which can cause severe pain, anaemia and other major problems if it is not properly treated. The disease is especially common in people of Nigerian descent, but it received scandalously little attention at the time; sufferers, including young children, often did not even receive proper pain relief.
In 1979, Dame Elizabeth set up the first ever UK sickle cell/thalassaemia nurse counselling service, and she later did ground-breaking research in this area, with an emphasis on community support and care for patients and their families. In 1988 she earned a PhD from the Institute of Education in London; a PhD is always an impressive achievement (as some of you now know from personal experience) but especially so for someone who had left school at 16.
During the 1990s Dame Elizabeth was at the forefront in teaching and researching nursing, ethical, and policy issues around genetic disorders, first at the Institute of Child Health, then as Dean of the School of Adult Nursing and Professor of Nursing at the University of West London, where she was one of only a handful of black female professors in the whole country, in any discipline.
With Professor Karl Atkin she co-authored an important book, The Politics of Sickle Cell and Thalassemia, and in 1999 she founded the Mary Seacole Centre for Nursing Practice, integrating a multi-ethnic philosophy into nursing and midwifery.
Mary Seacole was a nineteenth-century nurse of Jamaican-Scottish heritage who worked in both Central America and the Crimea. For decades she remained an obscure historical figure, but in recent years she has been increasingly recognised, thanks not least to Elizabeth Anionwu and her campaigning and fundraising work. A memorial statue of Mary Seacole was finally unveiled at St Thomas’ hospital in London in June 2016, and Dame Elizabeth is now Life Patron of the Mary Seacole Trust.
In 2017, Professor Anionwu became Dame Elizabeth when she was awarded a DBE in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours list for services to nursing and to the Mary Seacole Statue Appeal. This is just a highlight amongst many awards and recognition. In 2018, she was named as one of the 70 most influential nurses in the history of the NHS; she has received the UK Chief Nursing Officer’s Lifetime Achievement Award, is a Fellow of the Queen’s Nursing Institute and a Fellow of the Royal College of Nursing, and is now just moments away from becoming an honorary graduate of the University of St Andrews.
Over her long career, Dame Elizabeth has had immeasurable impact on patients, families, and communities, on generations of nursing students and the communities they have gone on to serve, on academic and public recognition of cultural and ethnic issues in healthcare, and on, of course, awareness of Mary Seacole’s historical significance. Now retired, she is not taking things easy: her fascinating memoir, Mixed Blessings from a Cambridge Union, was published in 2016, and she has a full schedule of public talks. We know from personal experience here at St Andrews that she is an inspiring, generous speaker, reflecting on both her professional and her personal experiences.
Vice-Chancellor, in recognition of her major contribution to nursing, research and campaigning, I invite you to confer the degree of Doctor of Science, honoris causa, on Professor Dame Elizabeth Nneka Anionwu.
Professor Dame Elizabeth Nneka Anionwu's response
Vice-Chancellor, wow. I’m really overwhelmed by this honour. But firstly I really would like to congratulate all of the graduands today. I mean, what a glorious day to be celebrating your achievements with your family, friends and all those that have supported you through your studies, so well done.
I’ve discovered a few rituals, I don’t know how traditional they are. Some have really surprised me. So for example, this morning when my friend Nina and I were walking around St Andrews and we went down obviously to look at the sea I couldn’t believe my eyes to see some students, now graduands, jumping into the water. And I would really like to do a shout out to those two male graduands whose photo I took, I’ll be tweeting that photo at some point over the next 24 hours. Congratulations, I don’t know how you do it but anyway.
I’d also like to particularly thank Thomason, a second year philosophy student for inviting me last November - my very first visit to the University to give a lecture to students and staff. It was an incredible visit, the sun was also shining so I think you should bring me a long a little bit more. But it was the hospitality, the welcome, the very stimulating discussion after the lecture, the wonderful dinner overlooking the sea. It was a tremendous visit for me.
However, never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I would be back at your wonderful, fantastic university. Before I finish I have to congratulate the University itself. I have a sort of link, you know this 'six degrees of separation’, so I’m really stretching it. As you heard, my memoirs are called ‘Mixed Blessings from a Cambridge Union’. I did not go to Cambridge University and so I was really delighted to see that somebody has managed to create a split, a division, between Oxbridge.
You must be so proud, and you know I’ve kept it a secret that I’m getting this award, I’m waiting for the University to tweet it and then I’ll retweet it. And you did receive so much publicity, quite rightly for the achievement of coming second above a certain university called ‘O’ - we will just leave it at that, so really you need to be hugely proud of yourselves.
So, in conclusion I just want to once again congratulate the graduands, because this is, as you well know, your day. So, enjoy it. Don’t jump into the sea this afternoon please.
Thank you very much.