Jonathan Lear is an American philosopher and psychoanalyst. He is the John U. Nef Distinguished Service Professor in the Committee on Social Thought at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

and served as the Roman Family Director of the Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society from 2014 to 2022.

Education and career

Lear earned his B.A. (cum laude) in History at

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

in 1970 and his B.A. in Philosophy at

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

in 1973. He then received his Ph.D. in philosophy at

Rockefeller University The Rockefeller University is a Private university, private Medical research, biomedical Research university, research and graduate-only university in New York City, New York. It focuses primarily on the biological and medical sciences and pro ...

with a dissertation on Aristotle's logic directed by

Saul Kripke Saul Aaron Kripke (; November 13, 1940 – September 15, 2022) was an American analytic philosophy, analytic philosopher and logician. He was Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and emer ...

. He also trained at the Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis in 1995. He subsequently won the Gradiva Award from the National Association for Psychoanalysis three times for work that advances psychoanalysis. Before moving to Chicago permanently in 1996, Lear taught philosophy at Cambridge University (1979-1985), where he was a Fellow and the Director of Studies in Philosophy of

Clare College Clare College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England. The college was founded in 1326 as University Hall, making it the second-oldest surviving college of the University after Peterhouse. It was refounded ...

. He also taught philosophy at

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...

and was Chair of the Department of Philosophy (1978–79, 1985-1996). He is a member of the International Psychoanalytical Association. In 2009, he received the Mellon Distinguished Achievement Award in the Humanities. During his time as the Roman Family Director of the Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society was able to work with the Apsáalooke Nation and the

Field Museum of Natural History The Field Museum of Natural History (FMNH), also known as The Field Museum, is a natural history museum in Chicago, Illinois, and is one of the largest such museums in the world. The museum is popular for the size and quality of its educationa ...

to sponsor the exhibit ''Apsáalooke Women and Warriors''. In 2017, he was elected a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) 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 other ...

. He was elected a Member of the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...

in 2019.

Philosophical work

Lear's early work focused on formal logic and ancient Greek philosophy. Much of his work involves the intersection of

psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek language, Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious mind, unconscious processes and their influence on conscious mind, conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on The Inte ...

and philosophy. In addition to work involving

Sigmund Freud Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies seen as originating fro ...

, he has also written widely on

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

Plato Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...

Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant (born Emanuel Kant; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German Philosophy, philosopher and one of the central Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works ...

Søren Kierkegaard Søren Aabye Kierkegaard ( , ; ; 5 May 1813 – 11 November 1855) was a Danes, Danish theologian, philosopher, poet, social critic, and religious author who is widely considered to be the first existentialist philosopher. He wrote critical tex ...

and

Ludwig Wittgenstein Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein ( ; ; 26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. From 1929 to 1947, Witt ...

, focusing on ideas of the human psyche. This most recent work explores the ethical task of managing to live with the fears and anxieties of world-catastrophe. His books include: *''Aristotle and Logical Theory'' (1980) *''Aristotle: The Desire to Understand'' (1988) *''Love and Its Place in Nature'' (1990) *''Open Minded: Working Out the Logic of the Soul'' (1998) *''Happiness, Death, and the Remainder of Life'' (2000) *''Therapeutic Action: An Earnest Plea for Irony'' (2003) *''Freud'' (2005) *''Radical Hope: Ethics in the Face of Cultural Devastation'' (2006) *''A Case for Irony'' (2011) *''Wisdom Won From Illness: Essays in Philosophy and Psychoanalysis'' (2017) *''The Idea of a Philosophical Anthropology: The Spinoza Lectures'' (2017) *''Imagining the End: Mourning and Ethical Life'' (2022)

Awards and honors

, Member (2019) * American Academy of Arts and Science, Fellow (2017) *

Andrew W. Mellon Foundation The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, commonly known as the Mellon Foundation, is a New York City-based private foundation with wealth accumulated by Andrew Mellon of the Mellon family of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It is the product of the 1969 merger ...

, Distinguished Achievement Award in the Humanities (2011-2014) * Gradiva Award, National Association for Psychoanalysis ** Best Article on the Subject of Psychoanalysis (1995), ''"''The shrink is in", ''

The New Republic ''The New Republic'' (often abbreviated as ''TNR'') is an American magazine focused on domestic politics, news, culture, and the arts from a left-wing perspective. It publishes ten print magazines a year and a daily online platform. ''The New Y ...

'' ** Best Psychoanalytic Book (1998), ''Open Minded: Working Out the Logic of the Soul'' ** Best Psychoanalytic Book (2000), ''Happiness, Death and the Remainder of Life'' * John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, (1987-88) *

National Endowment for the Humanities The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...

Fellowship for Independent Study and Research, (1984-85) * The Tanner Lectures on Human Values, **

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

(November, 2010) ** Cambridge University (November, 1999)

References

Sources

*http://chronicle.uchicago.edu/001116/lear.shtml *http://philosophy.uchicago.edu/faculty/lear.html *https://web.archive.org/web/20050829075330/http://humanities.sas.upenn.edu/04-05/event_lear.html

External links