Eugene Victor Wolfenstein (July 9, 1940–December 15, 2010) was an American

social theorist Social theories are analytical frameworks, or paradigms, that are used to study and interpret social phenomena.Seidman, S., 2016. Contested knowledge: Social theory today. John Wiley & Sons. A tool used by social scientists, social theories relat ...

, practicing psychoanalyst, and a professor of

political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California S ...

Early life and education

Wolfenstein graduated with his

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...

'' magna cum laude'' from Columbia College in 1962. He was a member of

Phi Beta Kappa The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States, and the most prestigious, due in part to its long history and academic selectivity. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal ...

. Wolfenstein received his

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Th ...

in 1964 and his

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...

in political science in 1965 from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

. Wolfenstein became a professor of political science at

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...

. He also completed a Ph.D. in psychoanalysis from the Southern California Psychoanalytic Institute in 1984. He was the member of the faculty of the institute from 1988 to 2004. Moreover, he was in private practice from the time he received his degree up to the time of his death.

Work

Wolfenstein worked in the critical theory tradition, with a focus on

African American culture African-American culture refers to the contributions of African Americans to the culture of the United States, either as part of or distinct from mainstream American culture. The culture is both distinct and enormously influential on Ame ...

and social movements. In his book ''The Victims of Democracy: Malcolm X and the Black Revolution'', he used a theory of the interaction between social classes and psychological groups to analyze white racism and the black liberation struggle. He developed a more general version of this theory in ''Psychoanalytic-Marxism: Groundwork'' (1993) and refined it further through engagement with Nietzsche’s philosophy in ''Inside/Outside Nietzsche: Psychoanalytic Explorations'' (2000). These later works add a concern with gender identity to the earlier agenda. His research is in the area of African-American narrative. ''A Gift of the Spirit: Reading THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLK'' (2007) offered a sustained reconstruction of W. E. B. Du Bois’s canonical text. A further study entitled “Talking Books: Toni Morrison Among the Ancestors” was published right before his death. He was a professor at UCLA. At the

undergraduate Undergraduate education is education conducted after secondary education and before postgraduate education. It typically includes all postsecondary programs up to the level of a bachelor's degree. For example, in the United States, an entry-le ...

level, he taught the lower division Introduction to Political Theory, along with Ancient Political Theory, African-American Freedom Narratives, Malcolm X and Black Liberation, Marxist Political Theory, and an occasional seminar on Platonic Dialectic and Spiritual Liberation. At the graduate level, he focused on major works of Du Bois, Foucault, Freud, Hegel, Marx, and Nietzsche, along with the related critical literatures. His main interests were History of Political Theory, Psychoanalytic Theory and Practice, Critical Theory, Critical Race Theory and Feminist Theory.

Bibliography

*''The Revolutionary Personality''. Princeton, New Jersey:

Princeton University Press Princeton University Press is an independent publisher with close connections to Princeton University. Its mission is to disseminate scholarship within academia and society at large. The press was founded by Whitney Darrow, with the financia ...

, 1967. ortuguese edition, 1968: Paedos Press, Buenos Aires, Argentina.*''Personality and Politics''. Los Angeles: Dickenson Press, 1969. *''The Victims of Democracy: Malcolm X and the Black Revolution''. Berkeley:

University of California Press The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by facult ...

, 1981 aperback_editions:_Free_Association_Books,_1990;_Guilford_Publications,_1993.html" ;"title="Free_Association_Books.html" ;"title="aperback editions: Free Association Books">aperback editions: Free Association Books, 1990; Guilford Publications, 1993">Free_Association_Books.html" ;"title="aperback editions: Free Association Books">aperback editions: Free Association Books, 1990; Guilford Publications, 1993 *''Psychoanalytic-Marxism: Groundwork''. London & New York: Free Association Books and Guilford Publications, 1993. *''Inside/Outside Nietzsche: Psychoanalytic Explorations''. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2000. *''A Gift of the Spirit: Reading the Souls of Black Folk''. NY: Cornell University Press, 2007.

References

External links

Eugene Victor WolfensteinEugene Victor Wolfenstein, Professor of Political Science at UCLA
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wolfenstein, Eugene Victor 1940 births American political scientists Columbia College (New York) alumni Princeton University alumni University of California, Los Angeles faculty 2010 deaths Deaths from cancer in California