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Jill Lepore is an American historian and journalist. She is the David Woods Kemper '41 Professor of American History at
Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
and a staff writer at ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'', where she has contributed since 2005. She writes about American history, law, literature, and politics. Her essays and reviews have also appeared in ''
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 ...
'', ''
The Times Literary Supplement ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (''TLS'') is a weekly literary review published in London by News UK, a subsidiary of News Corp. History The ''TLS'' first appeared in 1902 as a supplement to ''The Times'' but became a separate publication ...
'', '' The Journal of American History'', '' Foreign Affairs'', the '' Yale Law Journal'', ''
The American Scholar "The American Scholar" was a speech given by Ralph Waldo Emerson on August 31, 1837, to the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard College at the First Parish in Cambridge in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was invited to speak in recognition of his gro ...
'', and the '' American Quarterly''. Three of her books derive from her ''New Yorker'' essays: ''The Mansion of Happiness: A History of Life and Death'' (2012), a finalist for the Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction; ''The Story of America: Essays on Origins'' (2012), shortlisted for the PEN Literary Award for the Art of the Essay; and ''The Whites of Their Eyes: The Tea Party's Revolution and the Battle for American History'' (2010). Lepore's ''The Secret History of Wonder Woman'' (2014) won the 2015
American History Book Prize The New-York Historical Society gives three book prizes annually. From 2005 to 2012 there was one award for American history. A second award was added in 2013 for children's history. A third award was added in 2016 for military history. Barbara a ...
.


Early life and education

Lepore was born on August 27, 1966 and grew up in West Boylston, a small town outside
Worcester, Massachusetts Worcester ( , ) is a city and county seat of Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. Named after Worcester, England, the city's population was 206,518 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the second-List of cities i ...
. Her father was a junior high school principal and her mother was an art teacher. Lepore had no early desire to become a historian but claims to have wanted to be a writer from the age of six. She participated in
Reserve Officers' Training Corps The Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC ( or )) is a group of college- and university-based officer-training programs for training commissioned officers of the United States Armed Forces. Overview While ROTC graduate officers serve in al ...
(ROTC) at
Tufts University Tufts University is a private research university on the border of Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1852 as Tufts College by Christian universalists who sought to provide a nonsectarian institution of higher learning. ...
, starting as a math major. Eventually she left ROTC and changed her major to English. She earned her B.A. in English in three years in 1987. After graduating from Tufts, Lepore had a temporary job working as a secretary at the Harvard Business School before returning to school. She received an M.A. in American Culture from the
University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
in 1990 and a Ph.D. in
American Studies American studies or American civilization is an interdisciplinary field of scholarship that examines American literature, history, society, and culture. It traditionally incorporates literary criticism, historiography and critical theory. Schol ...
from
Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...
in 1995, where she specialized in the history of early America."Jill Lepore"
Faculty, Harvard University, accessed October 12, 2010.


Career

Lepore taught at the
University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego is t ...
from 1995 to 1996 and at
Boston University Boston University (BU) is a Private university, private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with ...
beginning in 1996; she started at Harvard in 2003. In addition to her books and articles on history, in 2008 Lepore published a historical novel, ''Blindspot,'' co-written with Jane Kamensky, then a history professor at
Brandeis University , mottoeng = "Truth even unto its innermost parts" , established = , type = Private research university , accreditation = NECHE , president = Ronald D. Liebowitz , ...
and now Professor of History and Pforzheimer Foundation Director of the Schlesinger Library at Harvard University. Previously, Lepore and Kamensky had co-founded an online history journal called '' Common-place''. Lepore is now a history professor at Harvard University, where she holds an endowed chair and teaches American political history. She focuses on missing evidence in historical records and articles. Lepore gathers historical evidence that allows scholars to study and analyze political processes and behaviors. Her articles are often both historical and political. She has said, "History is the art of making an argument about the past by telling a story accountable to evidence." Lepore has been contributing to ''The New Yorker'' since 2005. In the June 23, 2014, issue she criticized the concept of
creative destruction Creative destruction (German: ''schöpferische Zerstörung'') is a concept in economics which since the 1950s is the most readily identified with the Austrian-born economist Joseph Schumpeter who derived it from the work of Karl Marx and pop ...
, associated with Austrian-born political economist
Joseph Schumpeter Joseph Alois Schumpeter (; February 8, 1883 – January 8, 1950) was an Austrian-born political economist. He served briefly as Finance Minister of German-Austria in 1919. In 1932, he emigrated to the United States to become a professor at H ...
. The response of one of those whose work she discusses, fellow Harvard professor Clayton M. Christensen, was that her article was "a criminal act of dishonesty—at Harvard, of all places". From 2011 to 2013, Lepore was a visiting scholar of the Phi Beta Kappa Society. She has delivered Theodore H. White Lecture on the Press and Politics at Harvard's
Kennedy School of Government The Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), officially the John F. Kennedy School of Government, is the school of public policy and government of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The school offers master's degrees in public policy, public ...
(2015), the John L. Hatfield Lecture at
Lafayette College Lafayette College is a private liberal arts college in Easton, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1826 by James Madison Porter and other citizens in Easton, the college first held classes in 1832. The founders voted to name the college after General Laf ...
(2015), the Lewis Walpole Library Lecture at Yale (2013), the Harry F. Camp Memorial Lecture at Stanford (2013), the
University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, and several satellite campuses, research and educational centers, medical centers, and classes across the state of Kansas. T ...
Humanities Lecture (2013), the Joanna Jackson Goldman Memorial Lectures at the New York Public Library (2012), the Kephardt Lecture at Villanova (2011), the Stafford-Little Lecture at Princeton (2010), and the Walker Horizon Lecture at DePauw (2009). She is the president of the Society of American Historians and an ''Emeritus'' Commissioner of the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery. She has been a consultant and contributor to documentary and public history projects. Her three-part story "The Search for Big Brown" was broadcast on The New Yorker Radio Hour in 2015. In February 2022, Lepore was one of 38 Harvard faculty to sign a letter to ''
The Harvard Crimson ''The Harvard Crimson'' is the student newspaper of Harvard University and was founded in 1873. Run entirely by Harvard College undergraduates, it served for many years as the only daily newspaper in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Beginning in the f ...
'' defending Professor John Comaroff, who had been found to have violated the university's sexual and professional conduct policies. The letter defended Comaroff as "an excellent colleague, advisor and committed university citizen" and expressed dismay over his being sanctioned by the university. After students filed a lawsuit with detailed allegations of Comaroff's actions and the university's failure to respond, Lepore was one of several signatories to say that she wished to retract her signature.


Selected awards and honors

* 1998 Elected member of the American Antiquarian Society * 1998 Ralph Waldo Emerson Award of the Phi Beta Kappa Society for ''The Name of War'' * 1999
Bancroft Prize The Bancroft Prize is awarded each year by the trustees of Columbia University for books about diplomacy or the history of the Americas. It was established in 1948, with a bequest from Frederic Bancroft, in his memory and that of his brother, ...
for ''The Name of War'' * 2006
Anisfield-Wolf Book Award The Anisfield-Wolf Book Award is an American literary award dedicated to honoring written works that make important contributions to the understanding of racism and the appreciation of the rich diversity of human culture. Established in 1935 by Clev ...
(nonfiction) for ''New York Burning'' * 2014 Elected fellow of the
American Academy of Arts and 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, a ...
* 2014
Mark Lynton History Prize The Mark Lynton History Prize is an annual award in the amount of $10,000 given to a book "of history, on any subject, that best combines intellectual or scholarly distinction with felicity of expression". The prize is one of three awards given as p ...
for ''Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin'' * 2014 Elected to the
American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
* 2015
American History Book Prize The New-York Historical Society gives three book prizes annually. From 2005 to 2012 there was one award for American history. A second award was added in 2013 for children's history. A third award was added in 2016 for military history. Barbara a ...
for ''The Secret History of Wonder Woman'' * 2021 Hannah Arendt Prize for Political Thought


Publications

* * * * * * * * * * * * *


See also

*
Popular history Popular history is a broad genre of historiography that takes a popular approach, aims at a wide readership, and usually emphasizes narrative, personality and vivid detail over scholarly analysis. The term is used in contradistinction to professio ...


References


External links

*
Column archive
at ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'' * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lepore, Jill 1966 births 20th-century American historians 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American historians 21st-century American women writers American women academics American women historians Bancroft Prize winners Boston University faculty Harvard University faculty Historians from Massachusetts Living people People from West Boylston, Massachusetts Place of birth missing (living people) The New Yorker people The New Yorker staff writers Tufts University School of Arts and Sciences alumni University of California, San Diego faculty University of Michigan alumni Yale University alumni