A bookshop event and a conference speech featuring the former Cambridge University professor have been called off
Jason Arday has cancelled a series of events promoting his forthcoming memoir after his resignation over a high-profile plagiarism row.
A bookshop event in Edinburgh and a conference speech featuring the former Cambridge University professor have been called off “on the request of the speaker”.
Prof Arday stepped down from his high-profile position on Wednesday after the prestigious institution launched a probe into his “academic qualifications and honorary appointments”.
The resignation follows a series of media reports alleging that Prof Arday, who became Cambridge’s youngest black professor in 2023, plagiarised his PhD thesis, completed at Liverpool John Moores University, and other research.
In his open resignation letter, published on the Good Law Project’s website, Prof Arday said that the “only way to bring this chapter to an end is to step away”.
“This decision should not be interpreted as a loss of faith in scholarship or in the values that first brought me to Cambridge,” he said.
“Nor should it be mistaken for an acceptance of the narratives that have surrounded me. It is simply the decision of someone who has reached the limits of what any person should reasonably be expected to endure.”
His memoir, Great And Unfortunate Things, is to be published in the UK on August 27.
Further questions were asked in the press about the truth of other claims he made, including saying he ran 600 miles in six days and that he had raised £5.5 million for charity.
At the start of the week, publishers Simon & Schuster said that Prof Arday’s memoir was to go ahead as planned.
Prof Arday was due to attend Topping and Company Booksellers in Edinburgh on September 18, but the event has now been cancelled.
He was also booked for a “fireside chat” at the Royal Geographical Society.
On their webpage, it says the conversation has been cancelled “on the request of the speaker”.
In a statement released on Friday, Cambridge confirmed: “As has been widely reported, Jason Arday has resigned from his post at the university with immediate effect. Regardless of this, and for clarification, the university will continue to investigate the circumstances around Jason Arday’s appointment and tenure.
“The findings will feed into a review of the process for the appointment of senior academic roles. In addition, and as previously stated, the university’s Research Policy Committee will review the misconduct in research policy.”