Michael Thomson - Keele University

Professor Michael Thomson

Title: Professor of Law, Culture and Society
Phone: +44(0)1782 734359
Email:
Location: Chancellor's Building, room CBC 1.017
Role: CLES Committee Member, Member of Senate
Contacting me: During office hours without an appointment, or email to make an appointment.

Michael did his first degree at the School of Law, University of Southampton. He undertook his doctoral studies at the University of Birmingham. He joined Keele University in 1995. He has been a Visiting Fellow at the University of Sydney, Cornell University, and Emory University. He is a Visiting Professor at Université Paris Ouest Nanterre.

Michael was Head of the School of Law from 1st September 2004 until 31st January 2011.

Michael’s research interests include Health Care Law, Law and Gender, and Law and Literature/Popular Culture.  His particular focus has been the regulation of reproduction and the relationship between law and gender. The focus of his most recent work has been masculinity and the legal regulation of the male sexed body. He is the author of Reproducing Narrative: Gender, Reproduction and Law (Dartmouth, 1998) and Endowed: Regulating the Male Sexed Body (Routledge, 2007). His current research projects explore male genital cutting (with Marie Fox), masculinity and feminist legal theory (with Martha Fineman), the art of Matthew Barney, and conscientious objection in the provision of health services (with Sheelagh McGuinness).

He has worked with doctoral students who have explored the legal regulation of same-sex relationships, the regulatory interplay of gender and reproductive technologies, the regulation of adolescent sexuality, minority faiths and health services, and science fiction and legal personhood. He is very interested in supervising research students in the areas of health care law, law and literature/popular culture, legal humanities, law and gender, legal embodiment, and conscientious objection.

Since coming to Keele Michael has taught on undergraduate modules in  Criminal Law, Health Care Law, Law and Literature, Family Law, and Law and Ethics. At postgraduate level he has contributed to Medical Law and Ethics, Child Care Law and Practice, and Gender, Sexuality and Law. He has also taught Tort Law and Equity and Trusts.

He is a member of the Society of Legal Scholars and the Socio-Legal Studies Association. He has been an ethics advisor for the European Commission and is a trustee of the charity Genital Autonomy.