Glasgow University to continue posthumous review of Jason Arday appointment
Professor Jason Arday was employed by Glasgow University for a year and a review into the appointment is to continue
Glasgow University is to continue a review of its appointment of Jason Arday despite the professor’s recent death.
Prof Arday became embroiled in a plagiarism row that led to wider questions about the veracity of other claims he had made.
The 41-year-old was found unresponsive at his London home last week in what is understood to have been a suicide.
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The university confirmed a posthumous investigation will be carried out but a spokesman gave no further detail.
Prof Arday, who was Cambridge University’s youngest youngest ever black professor at the age of 37, had worked at Glasgow University in 2022 and 2023.
He quit his high-profile role after Cambridge launched a probe into his academic qualifications and honorary appointments.
Reports alleged he had plagiarised his PhD thesis at Liverpool John Moores University and other research.
Prof Arday had defended himself and his work, saying his autism meant he used mimicry to make sense of information.
The Jesus College fellow was professor of sociology of education at Glasgow from January 2022 to March.
A Glasgow spokesman previously said its principal had commissioned a review of the appointment in order to understand all the facts and "learn lessons”.
Meanwhile, a professor at Edinburgh University has told staff the events leading to Prof Arday’s death have been “profoundly troubling”.
Professor Emily Sena, Personal Chair of Meta-science and Translational Medicine, is head of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) at the university.
In a communication to staff, she said that as a black professor, “aspects of this national news story have resonated with me and given me pause to reflect, as I imagine they have for many in our community”.
She added: “Scrutiny of one black, autistic academic became something much larger: about merit, belonging, and the legitimacy of efforts to address racial inequality in universities.
“The intensity and increasingly personal nature of that scrutiny, including of his life and disability, should concern all of us.”
Prof Sena went on to say that no one black academic should be required to be a test case for the “legitimacy, merit or belonging” of all black academics.
She added: “I hope we can use this moment to reflect honestly on the culture we create in our own school.
“Our responsibility is not simply to reaffirm our commitment to EDI, but to recognise and challenge the structures and assumptions through which racism continues to shape academic life.
“We should work towards a culture where everyone can expect to belong, where that belonging is not conditional on being exceptional or infallible, and where no one is expected to carry the burden of representing an entire group.”
Prof Senna said the university’s Race Equality and Anti-Racism Subgroup (REAR), would now revisit its action plan to tackle racism and inequality.
Cambridge said claims of plagiarism regarding Prof Arday's thesis and some journal publications had been investigated by LJMU, as had the journals in question.
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LJMU - which awarded Arday his PhD in 2015 - concluded that he had not plagiarised work.
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