Alan Earle O’Day received his AB from the University of Michigan (1962) and his MA from Roosevelt University (1965). After two years of doctoral study at Northwestern University, he went to London, where he completed his PhD at King’s College, University of London (1971). After holding a succession of short-term academic appointments at the universities of Newcastle, Salford, and East Anglia, and two years at Universität Giessen in Germany, he took a position at North London Polytechnic (now London Metropolitan University) in 1976, where he remained until his retirement in 2001.