Jason Arday, a sociology professor at Cambridge University who is accused of plagiarism and embellishment of his academic career, resigned from the British university on Wednesday.
In 2023, Cambridge had touted Arday, then 37, as the youngest Black professor in its history.
After accusations of plagiarism in his Ph.D. thesis, and questions about Arday’s claims that he held a string of prestigious visiting fellowships and professorships at other universities, the professor resigned, according to The Guardian.
“I no longer wish to feel as though I am living under a constant spotlight, where every aspect of my life is subject to public examination and judgment,” Arday wrote in a statement, The New York Times reported.
His resignation came hours after Cambridge announced an investigation into Arday, and six days before the scheduled release of his memoir “Great and Unfortunate Things” according to the newspaper.
Jason Arday, the University of Cambridge professor, is leaving the school after plagiarism claims and questions about his life and career exploded into public view. https://t.co/GqDRi2xxv8
— The New York Times (@nytimes) August 5, 2026
Cambridge’s probe follows new information the university said it had obtained about Arday’s “academic qualifications and honorary appointments,” the BBC reported.
Arday has admitted errors in his work, but said he had faced “an unrelenting level of public scrutiny and personal attack” and was not a “liar,” the news outlet reported.
According to the BBC, Arday said his resignation should not “be interpreted as a loss of faith in scholarship or in the values that first brought me to Cambridge.”
“Nor should it be mistaken for an acceptance of the narratives that have surrounded me,” he added.
Arday came under scrutiny last year. He was originally accused of plagiarism in parts of his doctoral thesis in 2015, but has denied the claims, The Guardian reported.
An investigation by Liverpool John Moores University did not uphold the charges of plagiarism but said they were probably caused by “honest and reasonable error.”
Before it was taken down on Wednesday, Arday’s faculty page at Jesus College, Cambridge, where he was a fellow, listed past appointments that included visiting professorships in the Office of Diversity and Inclusion at the Ohio State University, the Times reported.
But a spokesperson for Ohio State told the newspaper via an email that it had no record of employment for a person with Arday’s name.
Arday’s faculty page has since been taken down.
Arday’s University of Cambridge page claimed he is a visiting professor at Nelson Mandela University in South Africa. But a spokesman for Nelson Mandela University told the Times by email that while Arday had served as an adjunct professor “on a fixed-term association that concluded in November 2025,” he has no current formal affiliation.
Biographies linked to Arday have also claimed he had visiting professorships at Durham, Glasgow, Coventry and London Metropolitan universities, The Guardian reported.
Other claims Arday has made on his résumé include running 30 marathons in 35 days while raising as much as 5.5 million pounds for charity, according to the Times.
In his full resignation letter, published by The Guardian, Arday said his departure did not mark the end of his work, but was “simply the end of this chapter.”
“I need time to heal. I need time to simply be myself again,” he wrote. “And when that time comes, I will return.
“I will return stronger, wiser and with the same determination that has always defined my journey. There is still so much work to do, and I look forward to doing it alongside so many of you in the years ahead,” Arday continued. “For now, however, I ask only for understanding, for compassion, and for the space to begin again.”
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