James Miller (academic)
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

James Miller (born 1947) is an American writer and academic. He is known for writing about Michel Foucault, philosophy as a way of life, social movements, popular culture, intellectual history, eighteenth century to the present; radical social theory and history of political philosophy. He currently teaches at
The New School The New School is a private research university in New York City. It was founded in 1919 as The New School for Social Research with an original mission dedicated to academic freedom and intellectual inquiry and a home for progressive thinkers. ...
.


Biography

Born in 1947, James Miller was Chair of Liberal Studies at the New School for Social Research from 1992 until 2013. He is Professor of Politics and Liberal Studies at
The New School The New School is a private research university in New York City. It was founded in 1919 as The New School for Social Research with an original mission dedicated to academic freedom and intellectual inquiry and a home for progressive thinkers. ...
. His most recent book, ''Examined Lives: From
Socrates Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...
to
Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his car ...
'', was published by
Farrar, Straus and Giroux Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer ...
. He is the author of five other books: ''Flowers in the Dustbin: the Rise of Rock & Roll, 1947-1977'', winner of an ASCAP-Deems Taylor award and a Ralph Gleason BMI award for best music book of 1999; ''The Passion of Michel Foucault'' (1993), an interpretive essay on the life of the French philosopher and a
National Book Critics Circle The National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) is an American nonprofit organization (501(c)(3)) with more than 700 members. It is the professional association of American book review editors and critics, known primarily for the National Book Critics C ...
Finalist for General Nonfiction, which has been translated into nine languages; ''Democracy is in the Streets: From
Port Huron Port Huron is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of St. Clair County. The population was 30,184 at the 2010 census. The city is adjacent to Port Huron Township but is administered separately. Located along the St. Clair ...
to the Siege of Chicago'' (1987), an account of the American student movement of the 1960s, also a National Book Critics Circle Finalist for General Nonfiction; ''
Rousseau Jean-Jacques Rousseau (, ; 28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer. His political philosophy influenced the progress of the Age of Enlightenment throughout Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolu ...
: Dreamer of Democracy'' (1984), a study of the origins of modern democracy; and ''History and Human Existence - From
Marx Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...
to
Merleau-Ponty Maurice Jean Jacques Merleau-Ponty. (; 14 March 1908 – 3 May 1961) was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. The constitution of meaning in human experience was his main interest an ...
'', an analysis of Marx and the French existentialists. The original editor of ''The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock and Roll'' (1976), he has written about music since the 1960s, when one of his early record reviews appeared in the third issue of ''
Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its ...
magazine''. Subsequent pieces on music have appeared in ''
The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hu ...
'', ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' and ''
Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely ...
'', where he was a book reviewer and pop music critic between 1981 and 1990. Pieces on philosophy and history have appeared in The London Review of Books,
The New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...
. In 2000, the magazine Lingua Franca published his best-known essay, ''Is Bad Writing Necessary? George Orwell,
Theodor Adorno Theodor is a masculine given name. It is a German form of Theodore. It is also a variant of Teodor. List of people with the given name Theodor * Theodor Adorno, (1903–1969), German philosopher * Theodor Aman, Romanian painter * Theodor Blue ...
, and the Politics of Language''. Besides publishing in such peer-reviewed academic journals as History and Theory and Political Theory, he has contributed to a variety of reference works, from
Encyclopædia Britannica The (Latin for "British Encyclopædia") is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It is published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.; the company has existed since the 18th century, although it has changed ownership various t ...
and
A New Literary History of America ''A New Literary History of America'' is an anthology of essays edited by Greil Marcus and Werner Sollors. Its roughly 200 essays span a range of topics that the editors selected as a sample of the different voices and perspectives on North Amer ...
, published by Harvard in 2009, to the Dictionnaire de Philosophie Morale edited by
Monique Canto-Sperber Monique Canto-Sperber (born 1954) is a French philosopher. Her works, translated in several languages, are focused on ethics and contemporary political issues. A former Director of the École normale supérieure from 2005 to 2012, she has been Pr ...
in 1996. From 2000 to 2008, he edited
Daedalus In Greek mythology, Daedalus (, ; Greek: Δαίδαλος; Latin: ''Daedalus''; Etruscan: ''Taitale'') was a skillful architect and craftsman, seen as a symbol of wisdom, knowledge and power. He is the father of Icarus, the uncle of Perdix, a ...
, the journal of the
American Academy of Arts & Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...
. He has been a
Guggenheim Fellow Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the a ...
, an NEH Fellow twice, and in 2006-2007 he was a Fellow at the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. A native of
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...
, he was educated at
Pomona College Pomona College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Claremont, California. It was established in 1887 by a group of Congregationalists who wanted to recreate a "college of the New England type" in Southern California. In 1925, it became t ...
in
California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
, and at
Brandeis University , mottoeng = "Truth even unto its innermost parts" , established = , type = Private research university , accreditation = NECHE , president = Ronald D. Liebowitz , ...
, where he received a Ph.D. in the History of Ideas in 1976.


Works

* * ''History and Human Existence: From Marx to Merleau-Ponty'' Berkeley : University of California Press, 1979. * ''Rousseau: Dreamer of Democracy'' New Haven : Yale University Press, 1984. , * ''Democracy Is in the Streets: From Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago'' Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press, 1987. , * '' The Passion of Michel Foucault'' Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 1993. , * ''Flowers in the Dustbin: The Rise of Rock and Roll, 1947-1977'' New York, NY : Fireside, 1999. , * ''Examined Lives: From Socrates to Nietzsche'' New York, NY : Picador, 2011. , * ''Can Democracy Work?: A Short History of a Radical Idea, from Ancient Athens to Our World'' New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018. ,


Essays

*''The Abyss of Philosophy: Rousseau's Concept of Freedom'' *''El Paso'' *''In Praise of Recklessness'' *''Return of the Weathermen'' *''Is Bad Writing Necessary?: George Orwell, Theodor Adorno, and the Politics of Language''


Notes


External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Miller, James 21st-century American historians 21st-century American male writers American philologists Living people 1947 births The New School faculty Pomona College alumni Brandeis University alumni Academic journal editors Foucault scholars Historians from New York (state) Historians from California American male non-fiction writers