OpenLearn Profile

Dan Weinbren

Dan Weinbren

Faculty of Social Sciences

Professional biography
Dr Daniel Weinbren works in Social Sciences. His most recent book is ‘The Open University. A history’ can be purchased for £12. Profits go to the student charity, the OU Students Educational Trust. www.open.ac.uk/ousa/shop-ousa Dr Daniel Weinbren is writing the history of The Open University and welcomes ideas, images and communications on the subject via http://www.open.ac.uk/blogs/History-of-the-OU/. He has published extensively about the histories of organisations and local business and has written much about fraternity, with particular reference to trust, loyalty and reciprocity. This has involved work on charities, friendly societies and the Labour Party. His teaching materials have been about the First World War, virtual heritage and the changing roles of families in the UK. He has been the recipient of 13 grants from a variety of bodies including the British Academy and the Nuffield Foundation. He is the founder and chair of the international Friendly Societies Research Group and he set up and ran the Labour Oral History Project for over a decade. His most recent book, The Oddfellows. 200 years of making friends and helping people, Carnegie, Lancaster, 2010, ‘fills an important and neglected aspect of our social and economic life ... an invaluable source of information’ (Journal of Co-operative Studies). It has been called ‘a detailed and important history’ (Journal for Research into Freemasonry and Fraternalism). His analysis of the oral testimony of Labour Party members, Generating Socialism: recollections of life in the Labour Party, Sutton, Stroud, 1997 was made ‘book of the month’ by the New Statesman and described as ‘fresh and entertaining’ (The Times Higher) ‘a tremendously important piece of work both historically and politically’ (Professor Paul Thompson) and ‘absolutely wonderful’ (Professor Jerry White). More information.

Dan Weinbren's activities

Browse 14 OpenLearn items Dan Weinbren has worked on