Jonathan Strassfeld (CV) is a historian of modern intellectual and social history, focusing on the history of American higher education. His work examines the university as a site of both knowledge production and bureaucratic control to show how everyday administrative needs and institutional practices play a determinative role in the development of discourse, even in a field as seemingly detached from the quotidian as philosophy. His first book, Inventing Philosophy’s Other: Phenomenology in America (University of Chicago Press: 2022) is a community study of a geographically disparate group of twentieth century intellectuals that uses mixed methodologies to explain the schism of “analytic” and “continental” traditions in western philosophy. Jonathan Strassfeld received a PhD in History from the University of Rochester and an AB in Philosophy from Princeton University. He is currently a Research Historian at Johns Hopkins University, working on a monograph that will cover the institution’s history.
EDUCATION
University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
Ph.D. in History (2020)
Dissertation: “Phenomenology and American Philosophy”
Committee: Robert Westbrook, Ruben Flores, Jean Pedersen, John Michael
Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
A.B. in Philosophy (2009)
Certificate in African American Studies
Thesis: “Initiation in Conflict: Arendt on Little Rock”
POSITIONS
Research Historian, Johns Hopkins University, 2022 – Present
Lecturer, Cleveland State University History Department, 2021
Visiting Associate, Harvard University Philosophy Department, 2020-2021
Instructor, University of Rochester History Department, 2016
PUBLICATIONS
Inventing Philosophy’s Other: Phenomenology in America (University of Chicago Press, 2022)
“‘I am aware this letter may be offensive’: The Unapologetic Achievements of Ruth Barcan Marcus and Marjorie Glicksman Grene,” Journal of The History of Ideas 83, no. 4 (2022): 579-600.
“American Divide: The Making of ‘Continental Philosophy,’” Modern Intellectual History 17, no. 3 (2020): 833–66.
“Husserl at Harvard: The Origins of American Phenomenology,” in Michela Ferri, Ed., The Reception of Husserlian Phenomenology in North America (Springer, 2019).
Works in Preparation
“Reestablishing Phenomenology in America,” in Sander Verhaegh, ed., American Philosophy and the Intellectual Migration: Pragmatism, Logical Empiricism, Phenomenology, Critical Theory (De Gruyter, 2024).
“The Second Golden Age: Harvard Philosophy, 1945-1969.” Coauthor: Warren Goldfarb.
“Process and Pippa: History, Causation, and the Philosophy of A.N. Whitehead”
AWARDS
John Dewey Prize, Society for U.S. Intellectual History, 2024
Leo Ribuffo Dissertation Prize, Society for U.S. Intellectual History, 2020
Wilson Havelock Coates Book Award, University of Rochester, 2019
Raymond N. Ball Fellowship, University of Rochester, 2018-2019
Dean’s Dissertation Fellowship, University of Rochester, 2017-2018
Edward Peck Curtis, Award for Excellence in Teaching by a Graduate Student, University of Rochester, 2016
Meyers Graduate Teaching Prize, University of Rochester History Department, 2016
Henry F. May Award, Society for US Intellectual History, 2016
Dexter Perkins Prize, University of Rochester History Department, 2015
Robert L. and Mary L. Sproull Fellowship, University of Rochester, 2012-2015
Class of 1869 Prize in Ethics and Social Philosophy, Princeton University, 2009
TEACHING
HIS 303: Recent U.S. History, 1989-2009, Spring 2021 (Instructor of record), Cleveland State University
HIS 193: America Works: A Labor History of the United States, Summer 2016 (Instructor of record), University of Rochester
HIS 191: Vietnam: The American War, Spring 2016 (Instructor of record), University of Rochester
HIS 202: Health, Medicine, and Social Reform, Spring 2015 (Teaching Assistant), University of Rochester
HIS 160: United States History to 1865, Fall 2014 (Teaching Assistant), University of Rochester
PRESENTATIONS
“Remaking the Phenomenological Movement,” invited talk at “Exiled Empiricists: American Philosophy and the Great Intellectual Migration,” Tilburg University, August 2022
“General Education: A Philosophical Problem,” Society for US Intellectual History Annual Conference, February 2022
“Phenomenology and American Philosophy,” John Carroll University, February 2020.
“Continental Divide or American Divide? Twentieth-Century Philosophy and the American University,” History of Education Society 56th Annual Meeting. Providence, November 2016.
“Phenomenology in World War II America: Foundations to Isolation.” Society for US Intellectual History Annual Conference. Stanford University, October 2016.
“Philosophical Hegemony: Analysis in America,” Syracuse University FPP Graduate History Conference. Syracuse April 2016.
“Philosophical Circulations: The Pervasion of Analysis in American Thought,” Rochester Graduate History Conference. University of Rochester, February 2016.
“Quantitative and Computational Approaches to Intellectual History,” History Department Workshop, University of Rochester, February 2016.
CONTACT
Jonathan Strassfeld (He/Him)
jstrass6@jh.edu
University of Chicago Press Author Page
Google Scholar Profile
eBird Profile