Jay Murray Winter (born May 28, 1945) is an American historian. He is the Charles J. Stille Professor of History at
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 ...
, where he focuses his research on
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
and its impact on the 20th century. His other interests include remembrance of war in the 20th century, such as memorial and mourning sites, European
population decline
A population decline (also sometimes called underpopulation, depopulation, or population collapse) in humans is a reduction in a human population size. Over the long term, stretching from prehistory to the present, Earth's total human population ...
, the causes and institutions of war, British popular culture in the era of the First World War and the
Armenian genocide
The Armenian genocide was the systematic destruction of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, Armenian people and identity in the Ottoman Empire during World War I. Spearheaded by the ruling Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), it was ...
of 1915. He is completing a biography of
René Cassin
René Samuel Cassin (5 October 1887 – 20 February 1976) was a French jurist known for co-authoring the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.
Born in Bayonne, Cassin served as a soldier in the First Wo ...
.
He obtained his
A.B.
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 ye ...
at
Columbia
Columbia may refer to:
* Columbia (personification), the historical female national personification of the United States, and a poetic name for America
Places North America Natural features
* Columbia Plateau, a geologic and geographic region in ...
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 a ...
at
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge beca ...
. Winter is also affiliated with the
Historial de la Grande Guerre The Museum of the Great War (french: Historial de la Grande Guerre) located near the heart of the World War I Somme battlefields, is housed within the Château de Péronne, a castle in the town of Péronne, France. Péronne was under German occup ...
in
Peronne,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan ar ...
, a research center and museum of the First World War in European cultural history.
Winter is an influential scholar in the study of the First World War and its place in twentieth-century European history and culture. His earlier work was largely that of social history, including ''The Great War and the British People'' (1986) focuses on the war's demographic impact on the British population. In more recent works he has taken the approach of a cultural historian, most notably in ''Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning'' (1995) where he advocates a more transnational focus for studying the war and European culture. In this book, he analyzes the various ways the people of Germany, France and Great Britain mourned their losses during and after the war.
[Oliver, 2020.]
He has also co-authored and co-edited books on the First World War, including a survey of the war's historiography, ''The Great War in History: Debates and Controversies, 1914 to the Present'' (with Antoine Prost, 2006) and ''The Great War and the Twentieth Century'' (with Geoffrey Parker and Mary Habeck, 2000). He is co-director of the project on ''Capital Cities at War: Paris, London, Berlin 1914-1919'', which has produced two volumes.
Jay Winter was co-producer, co-writer and chief historian for the
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of ed ...
series "
The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century
''The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century'' is a 1996 documentary series that aired on PBS. It chronicles World War I over eight episodes. It was narrated by Salome Jens. In the UK, the programme was renamed ''1914-18'' and was nar ...
," which won an
Emmy Award
The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...
, a
Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Peabody, honor the most powerful, enlightening, and invigorating stories in television, radio, and ...
and a
Producers Guild of America Award
The Producers Guild of America Awards were originally established in 1990 by the Producers Guild of America as the Golden Laurel Awards, created by PGA Treasurer Joel Freeman with the support of Guild President Leonard Stern, in order to honor ...
for best television documentary in 1997.
At Yale, he teaches a lecture course entitled "Europe in the Age of Total War, 1914-1945," in which he argues that
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
,
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
, and the inter-war period, are better understood as one "European Civil War." He also teaches a seminar entitled "The First World War."
He also worked with American demographer
Michael S. Teitelbaum on high levels of migration toward countries experiencing fairly low fertility rates (''The Fear of Population Decline'', 1986 and ''A Question of Numbers'', 1998).
Works
*''Socialism and the Challenge of War: Ideas and Politics in Britain, 1912-18'' (Routledge, 1974)
*''The Fear of Population Decline'' (with Michael S. Teitelbaum) (Academic Press, 1986)
*''The Great War and the British People'' (Harvard University Press, 1986)
*''The Experience of World War I'' (Macmillan, 1988)
*''Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning: The Great War in European Cultural History'' (Cambridge University Press, 1995)
*''1914-1918: The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century'' (1996)
*''A Question of Numbers'' (with Michael S. Teitelbaum) (1998)
*''War and Remembrance in the Twentieth Century'' (Cambridge University Press, 1999, editor)
*''
America and the Armenian Genocide of 1915'' (Cambridge University Press, 2003, editor)
* editor with Antoine Prost. ''The Great War in history: debates and controversies, 1914 to the present'' (Cambridge University Press, 2005).
*''Remembering War: The Great War between History and Memory in the 20th Century'' (Yale University Press, 2006)
*''Dreams of Peace and Freedom: Utopian Moments in the 20th Century'' (Yale University Press, 2008)
* editor. ''The Cambridge History of the First World War: Volume 1, Global War'' (Cambridge University Press, 2016)
*''War Beyond Words: Languages of Remembrance from the Great War to the Present'' (Cambridge University Press, 2017)
*''The Day the Great War Ended, 24 July 1923: The Civilianization of War'' (Oxford University Press, 2022}
References
Sources
* Oliver, Lizzie. "Jay Winter, War Beyond Words: Languages of Remembrance from the Great War to the Present." ''Journal of Contemporary History'' 55.2 (2020): 443-445.
* Winter, Jay. "Learning the Historian’s Craft" (H-Diplo 13 November 2020
online autobiographyh1>
External links
Official page at Yaleon
PBS.org
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educati ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Winter, Jay
1945 births
Living people
Yale University faculty
Columbia College (New York) alumni
European University Institute faculty
American military historians
American male non-fiction writers
Alumni of the University of Cambridge
Members of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters
Historians of World War I