The character arc of Kay Redfield Jamison
A life drawn by Character Arc from the public record
Born on 22 June 1946. Between then and now sit undergraduate zoology and neurophysiology at St Andrews in Scotland, degrees at UCLA in 1971, a doctorate in 1975, a faculty post at the same university, the founding and direction of its Affective Disorders Clinic, a tenured professorship, a move to Johns Hopkins, over a hundred academic articles, an illness she has had since early adulthood and later wrote about openly, a MacArthur Fellowship in 2001, and an honorary chair back in Scotland. The line below draws the story so far, in order.
Drag along the line to move, pinch or use the buttons to look closer. Tap the line to pluck it, or any mark for its card. Drawn from the public record of her life; the sources are at the foot of the page.
Who is Kay Redfield Jamison?
She built the clinic for the illness she was living with.
She studied zoology and neurophysiology as an undergraduate at St Andrews in Scotland, then began clinical psychology at UCLA in the late 1960s, taking a bachelor's and a master's in 1971 and a doctorate in 1975. She joined the faculty of the same university, and went on to found and direct its Affective Disorders Clinic, a large teaching and research facility for outpatient treatment.
Which is the ordinary version of the story. The real one is that she has had bipolar disorder since her early adulthood, and the clinic she founded was for the illness she was living with while she ran it. She was treating the condition and having it, in the same building, on the same days.
After several years as a tenured professor at UCLA she was offered a post at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, first as an assistant professor and then as Professor of Psychiatry, where she holds a named chair in mood disorders and psychiatry. She has published more than a hundred academic articles.
And then she wrote it down, plainly, under her own name, at a time when a clinician admitting to a psychiatric illness could reasonably expect it to end her career. It did the opposite. She has been named among the best doctors in the United States, chosen by Time as a hero of medicine, made one of five subjects of a public television series on great minds of medicine, given a national award named after a writer who wrote about his own illness in 1995, a suicide prevention research award in 1996, a leadership award in 1999, and a MacArthur Fellowship in 2001. She lectured at Harvard in 2002 and Oxford in 2003, and holds an honorary chair in English at the Scottish university where she first studied.
The moments
Kay Redfield Jamison's timeline.
The 1960s
Zoology in Scotland
Milestone. She started in animals and nerves, not in people.
The 1970s
Two degrees at UCLA
Milestone, and it changed her direction. Two degrees in the same year, and a subject chosen for good reasons.
The illness begins
Setback, and it changed everything. It began while she was training to treat it.
A doctorate at twenty nine
Milestone, and it changed her direction. Doctorate finished, and straight onto the faculty.
She founds the clinic
Milestone, and it changed everything. She built the clinic for the exact illness she was living with.
The 1980s
Johns Hopkins
Milestone, and it changed everything. A chair at one of the great medical schools in the world.
The 1990s
Write it under her own name
Crossroads, decided.
The paths laid out: publish it as hers, taken, or keep the two apart. She was named a hero of medicine, one of the best doctors in the country, and a MacArthur Fellow.
She writes it down
Milestone, and it changed everything. A clinician saying in print that she has the illness she treats.
A research award
Milestone, and it changed her direction. The field answering her, with its own awards.
Hero of medicine
Milestone, and it changed her direction. Named among the best doctors in the country, illness and all.
The 2000s
The MacArthur
Milestone, and it changed everything. The award they give for being unlike anybody else.
Harvard, then Oxford
Milestone, and it changed her direction. The lecture invitations that only go to a handful of people.
The 2010s
Home to St Andrews
Milestone, and it changed her direction. An honorary chair at the university where she started in zoology.
The chair at Hopkins is still hers and the articles still come. What she set moving is permission, the kind that only counts when it costs something: a senior clinician who said in public that she had the illness she treated, and made it a little less unthinkable for everybody who came after.
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Sources
- Kay Redfield Jamison, English Wikipedia biography, filed under living people.
- UCLA and Johns Hopkins records for her posts and the Affective Disorders Clinic.
- MacArthur Foundation records for her 2001 fellowship.