Peter Gordon (historian)

Peter Eli Gordon (born 1966) is an American intellectual historian. The Amabel B. James Professor of History at Harvard University, Gordon focuses on continental philosophy and modern German and French thought,[2] with particular emphasis on the philosopher Martin Heidegger, continental philosophy during the interwar crisis, and most recently, secularization and social thought in the twentieth century.[3]

Peter Gordon
Born
Peter Eli Gordon

1966 (age 5455)
Other namesPeter E. Gordon
Years active1998–present
Academic background
Alma mater
ThesisUnder One Tradewind[1] (1997)
Doctoral advisorMartin Jay
Academic work
DisciplineHistory
Sub-disciplineIntellectual history
InstitutionsHarvard University
Main interests
Notable worksContinental Divide (2010)
Websitescholar.harvard.edu/pgordon

Early life

Born in Seattle, Washington,[4] in 1966, Peter Gordon was the son of Sunnie and Milton Gordon. Milton Gordon (1930-2005) was a biochemist who attended University of Minnesota and the University of Illinois,[5] earning his Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree at 23 and joining the faculty at the University of Washington in 1959, focusing on plant genetics.[6][7] Peter Gordon received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Reed College (1988) after a stint at the University of Chicago. He studied with Martin Jay at University of California, Berkeley, from which he received his PhD degree (1997).[4]

Career

Gordon spent two years (1998–2000) at the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts at Princeton University before joining the faculty at Harvard in 2000.[2] In 2006 he became a member of Harvard's permanent faculty, and in 2005 he received the Phi Beta Kappa Award for Excellence in Teaching.[8]

Gordon's first book, Rosenzweig and Heidegger: Between Judaism and German Philosophy (University of California Press, 2003), about Martin Heidegger and the German-Jewish philosopher Franz Rosenzweig,[9][10][11] won the Salo W. Baron Prize from the Academy for Jewish Research for Best First Book, the Goldstein-Goren Prize for Best Book in Jewish Philosophy, and the Morris D. Forkosch Prize from the Journal of the History of Ideas for Best Book in Intellectual History.[2]

In Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos (Harvard University Press, 2010), Gordon reconstructs the famous 1929 debate between Heidegger and Ernst Cassirer at Davos, Switzerland, demonstrating its significance as a point of rupture in Continental thought that implicated all the major philosophical movements of the day.[12][13][14][15] Continental Divide was awarded the Jacques Barzun Prize from the American Philosophical Society in 2010.[16]

Gordon's most recent monograph, Adorno and Existence (Harvard University Press, 2016), reinterprets Theodor W. Adorno's philosophy by looking at the critical theorist's encounters with existentialism and phenomenology. The main claim of the book is that Adorno was inspired by the unfulfilled promise of these schools to combat traditional metaphysical thinking, which led to the development of his "negative dialectics".[17][18][19]

Gordon sits on the editorial boards of Modern Intellectual History, The Journal of the History of Ideas, and New German Critique. He is co-founder and co-chair of the Harvard Colloquium for Intellectual History.[20] Gordon regularly teaches two survey courses on continental philosophy: German Social Thought and French Social Thought.

Selected publications

References

  1. Gordon, Peter Eli (1997). Under One Tradewind: Philosophical Expressionism from Rosenzweig to Heidegger (PhD thesis). Berkeley, California: University of California, Berkeley. OCLC 39670935.
  2. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-04-14. Retrieved 2012-04-23.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  3. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-05-11. Retrieved 2012-04-23.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  4. "A Brief Biography". Harvard University. Retrieved 2018-10-04.
  5. Skolnik, Sam (2005-08-22). "Milton P. Gordon: UW professor was a pioneer in plant genetics". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved 2018-10-04.
  6. "UW Biochemistry - Faculty - Milton Gordon". depts.washington.edu. Retrieved 2018-10-04.
  7. Gordon, Peter E. (2018-10-01). "Lenny Boy". Boston Review. Retrieved 2018-10-04.
  8. Evan H. Jacobs (May 9, 2005). "History's Gordon Tenured".
  9. Leventhal, Robert S. (June 2005). "Rosenzweig and Heidegger: Between Judaism and German Philosophy.(Weimar and Now: German Cultural Criticism, number 33.)". The American Historical Review. 110 (3): 886–887. doi:10.1086/ahr.110.3.886. ISSN 0002-8762.
  10. Sheppard, Eugene R. (2006-07-13). "Three Questions for Peter Eli Gordon on his book: Introduction". Jewish Quarterly Review. 96 (3): 385–386. doi:10.1353/jqr.2006.0034. ISSN 1553-0604.
  11. Braiterman, Zachary (November 2005). "Peter Eli Gordon. Rosenzweig and Heidegger: Between Judaism and German Philosophy. Berkeley, University of California Press, 2003. 357 pp". AJS Review. 29 (2): 405–407. doi:10.1017/S0364009405440179. ISSN 1475-4541.
  12. Isaacs, Alick (2013-05-11). "Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos by Peter E. Gordon (review)". Common Knowledge. 19 (2): 393–394. doi:10.1215/0961754X-2073649. ISSN 1538-4578.
  13. McGrath, Larry (2011). "Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos (review)". MLN. 126 (5): 1140–1144. doi:10.1353/mln.2011.0085. ISSN 1080-6598.
  14. Wolin, Richard (2012-04-01). "Peter E. Gordon. Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 2010. Pp. xiv, 426. $39.95". The American Historical Review. 117 (2): 598–600. doi:10.1086/ahr.117.2.598-a. ISSN 1937-5239.
  15. Winters, David (2012). "Peter E. Gordon, Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos". Radical Philosophy. 172: 61.
  16. "Search Results | Harvard University Press".
  17. Pippin, Robert. "Robert Pippin reviews Adorno and Existence". Critical Inquiry. Retrieved October 4, 2018.
  18. Bowie, Andrew (2017-07-12). "Adorno and Existence by Peter E. Gordon (review)". Journal of the History of Philosophy. 55 (3): 550–551. doi:10.1353/hph.2017.0064. ISSN 1538-4586.
  19. Hietalahti, Jarno (2017-09-12). "Adorno and Existence". Phenomenological Reviews. Retrieved 2018-10-04.
  20. "The Harvard Colloquium".
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