The We Society S8 Ep7: The Social Life of Pain with Tom Shakespeare
Jul 2, 2025
28:14
In the UK alone, around one in four adults are experiencing chronic pain. And nearly a quarter of the population live with some form of disability. Yet despite these numbers, pain and disability are still too often talked about in hushed tones, misunderstood, or entirely overlooked in public life.
How do we talk about pain that doesn’t go away? How do people live in bodies that society isn’t built for? And how can we shift the narrative from individual burden to collective responsibility?
Professor Tom Shakespeare helps us answer these questions in this episode of the We Society. His work challenges the assumptions we make about ability, autonomy, and what it means to live a fulfilling life.
As Professor of Disability Research in the medical faculty at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Tom is a leading sociologist, bioethicist and one of the UK’s most influential voices in disability studies.
Join acclaimed journalist and Academy president Will Hutton, as he invites guests from the world of social science to explore the stories behind the news and hear their solutions to society’s most pressing problems.
How do we talk about pain that doesn’t go away? How do people live in bodies that society isn’t built for? And how can we shift the narrative from individual burden to collective responsibility?
Professor Tom Shakespeare helps us answer these questions in this episode of the We Society. His work challenges the assumptions we make about ability, autonomy, and what it means to live a fulfilling life.
As Professor of Disability Research in the medical faculty at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Tom is a leading sociologist, bioethicist and one of the UK’s most influential voices in disability studies.
Join acclaimed journalist and Academy president Will Hutton, as he invites guests from the world of social science to explore the stories behind the news and hear their solutions to society’s most pressing problems.
Don’t want to miss an episode? Follow the show on your favourite podcast platform and you can email us on wesociety@acss.org.uk and tell us who we should be speaking to.
The We Society podcast is brought to you by the Academy of Social Sciences in association with the Nuffield Foundation and the Leverhulme Trust.
Producer: Emily Uchida Finch
Assistant Producer: Emily Gilbert
A Whistledown Production
Producer: Emily Uchida Finch
Assistant Producer: Emily Gilbert
A Whistledown Production