Alastair Heron (1915 – 17 March 2009) was a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

psychologist A psychologist is a professional who practices psychology and studies mental states, perceptual, cognitive, emotional, and social processes and behavior. Their work often involves the experimentation, observation, and interpretation of how indi ...

and writer. A member of the

Religious Society of Friends Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abili ...

, or

Quakers Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abil ...

, he wrote a number of books and pamphlets on Quakers in Britain.

Quaker works

Heron was a member of

Balby Balby is a civil parish and suburb of Doncaster in the City of Doncaster district in South Yorkshire, England. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Balby is within the Doncaster Central constituency and contains the electoral wards ...

Monthly Meeting In the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), a monthly meeting or area meeting is the basic governing body, a congregation which holds regular meetings for business for Quakers in a given area. The monthly meeting is responsible for the administr ...

, and attended

Sheffield Sheffield is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is Historic counties o ...

Central Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. In 1986 he spent nine weeks traveling in the ministry in Australia, and three years later did the same coast-to-coast in Canada. His first Quaker book, ''Caring, Conviction, Commitment'', was published in 1992. It resulted from the survey he carried out in

Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a Historic counties of England, historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other Eng ...

to learn at first hand of the experiences of attenders from the time of their first entry into a Quaker meeting. In 1994, he published a small

dictionary A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies ...

, ''Quaker Speak'', as one of his responses to the needs discovered in the Yorkshire survey. In 1996 his major work, ''Quakers in Britain; a century of change'', was the only book to mark the centenary of the Manchester Conference that had opened the way for what later became known as the 'liberal stage' in British

Quaker history The Religious Society of Friends began as a proto-evangelical Christian movement in England in the mid-17th century in Lancashire. Members are informally known as ''Quakers'', as they were said "to tremble in the way of the Lord". The movement in ...

. Abstracted from it came ''The British Quakers: 1647 to 1997'', a (first modern) introduction to inform newcomers. His autobiography, ''Only One Life: A Quaker's Voyage'' was published in 1998.

List of books and pamphlets by year

*''Towards a Quaker View of Sex: An Essay by a Group of Friends'', ed.; Friends Home Service Committee, 1963 *''Gifts and Ministries: A Discussion Paper on Eldership''; Unknown, 1987 (pamphlet) *''Charity, Liberty, Unity: A Quaker Search for Essentials''; The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Australia Inc.; 1988 (pamphlet) *''Speaking to Our Condition: A Ministry to Friends''; 1989 (pamphlet) *''Caring, Conviction, Commitment: Dilemmas of Quaker Membership Today; Quaker Home Service'', 1992 *''To Join or Not: A Guide to Quaker Membership'', ed.; 1993 *''Quaker Speak: First Aid for Newcomers''; Quaker Outreach Yorkshire, 1994 *''Now We are Quakers: The Experience and Views of New Members''; 1994 *''Quakers in Britain: A Century of Change 1895-1995''; Curlew Graphics, 1995 *''The British Quakers, 1647-1997: Highlights of Their History''; Curlew Productions, 1997 *''Only One Life: A Quaker's Voyage''; Curlew Productions, Scotland, 1998 (autobiography) *''Our Quaker Identity: Religious society – or friendly society?''; Curlew Productions, Scotland, 1999 *''On Being a Quaker: Membership – Past – Present – Future''; Curlew Productions, 2000 *''Searching the Depths: Essays on Being a Quaker Today''; ed. Harvey Gillman and Alastair Heron; Quaker Books, 1998 *''The Future of British Quakers – Shrinkage Addressed: Process and Commitment''; 2004.

Biography

For thirty years Heron was research psychologist working mainly in the field of

human development Human development may refer to: * Development of the human body * Developmental psychology * Human development (economics) * Human Development Index, an index used to rank countries by level of human development * Human evolution, the prehistoric ...

through the life span, and in cross-cultural studies. In the early 1970s, he was professor and head of department of psychology in the

University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb nor ...

, Australia. He and his wife Margaret reached their sixtieth wedding anniversary in November 2000, less than a year before her death at 88. His son and daughter live in England and the US respectively, and Alastair was a great-grandfather.

References

External links

Biography

Obituary

The Alastair Heron prize in psychology
{{DEFAULTSORT:Heron, Alastair 1915 births 2009 deaths Quaker ministers Quaker writers Scottish Quakers Scottish psychologists 20th-century British psychologists