october 3, 2011
From "useless boy" to social epidemiology pioneer
Memoir tells how renowned professor's early years influenced academic work
S. Leonard Syme, professor emeritus of epidemiology and community health at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health, has recently published a memoir. The book, titled Memoir of a Useless Boy, describes how his difficult early years shaped an interest in social forces that eventually led to pioneering work in developing the new field of social epidemiology. He also tells of the way in which his commitment to this radical way of thinking about health helped him to train a whole new generation of young scholars to further develop these ideas.
Syme was born and raised in Manitoba, Canada, in a stifling and discouraging environment with no role models or encouragement from his family. He tells the story of a skinny 12-year-old boy whose father challenged him to squish the caps of soda pop bottles. He regularly failed. He clearly remembers feeling bruised every time his father walked away muttering about his "useless boy." Looking back, he realized that he devoted his life to proving his father wrong. The lessons he learned in successfully dealing with his father's rejections and disapprovals helped him to better mentor and encourage his students to achieve their potential. In spite of these early hardships, his memoir is an optimistic one: It describes his humorous and revealing journey from squeezing bottle caps to changing the way we as a society understand health and well-being. The message of the book is that the obstacles we face in our lives can actually be a motivating force for good.
It was Syme's daughter who urged him to write the book. After some initial hesitation, he decided to take on the project for two reasons. "One reason," he writes, "is that, as a public health researcher, I have for years been interested in understanding how children from disadvantaged backgrounds were able to survive to lead healthy and fulfilling lives. In my research field, this is one of the most compelling issues we must think about. What allows some to escape and thrive? I thought that my story might be useful in shedding some light on this important question.
"The second reason is more personal. I am curious to know how a useless kid became useful, and I hope that my story may be of interest to my grandchildren as they attempt to understand their family origins."
Syme joined the Berkeley faculty in 1968. His major research interest has been the study of such psychosocial risk factors as job stress, social support and poverty. In conducting this research, he has studied San Francisco bus drivers; Japanese living in Japan, Hawaii and California; British civil servants; and people living in Alameda County, California. He has written two books and 170 published papers. He has been a visiting professor at universities in England and Japan. Syme was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and has received several honors related to his teaching and research, among them the Lilienfeld Award for Excellence in Teaching; the J.D. Bruce Award from the American College of Physicians for Distinguished Contributions in Preventive Medicine; the University of California Distinguished Emeritus Professor Award; and the most prestigious honor given in public health, the Wade Hampton Frost Lectureship Award. Along with Linda Neuhauser, Syme is principal investigator of Health Research for Action (HRA) at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health. HRA is focused on research and interventions that empower people to take more control over their health.
Syme's book can be purchased at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or at his website. As he notes in his memoir, the local library in his poor community was a powerful inspiration and because of this, a major portion of any money realized from the sale of his book will be donated to libraries in similarly underprivileged communities.
Photo by Peg Skorpinski