Naomi Schor
Encyclopedia
Naomi Schor was a noted literary critic and theorist. A pioneer of feminist theory
for her generation, she is regarded as one of the foremost scholars of French literature
and critical theory
of her time. Naomi's younger sister is the artist and writer Mira Schor
.
and Resia Schor
were artists who had recently immigrated to the US as refugee
s from war-torn Europe. Ilya Schor was a painter, jeweler and artist of Judaica, and Resia Schor was a painter who later worked in silver and gold and mixed media on sculptural jewelry and Judaica. The Schors lived among a polyglot community of émigrés, among them musicians, intellectuals, and artists. Naomi Schor’s first language
was French, and she went to the Lycée Français de New York
where she received her Baccalauréat
in 1961, the same year, sadly, that her father died. Schor received her B.A.
in English Literature
from Barnard College
then received her PhD
in French Literature
from Yale
. There Schor occasionally wrote her scholarly essays in French.
and deconstructive theory
in American literary studies. She wrote about canonical authors such as Emile Zola
, Gustave Flaubert
, Marcel Proust
, Honoré de Balzac
, re-examining their work through the double lens of the male-authored theoretical discourse of Jacques Derrida
(whom she knew personally), Roland Barthes
, and Jacques Lacan
, and that of French feminist theoreticians such as Julia Kristeva
, Hélène Cixous
, and Luce Irigaray
.
Schor was the founding co-editor of differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies, in 1989, a critical forum where the problematics of difference is explored in texts ranging from the literary and the visual to the political and social.
An area of Schor’s expertise was the work of the feminist psychoanalytic theorist Luce Irigaray
. With Carolyn Burke and Margaret Whitford, she edited Engaging with Irigaray, which included essays by Rosi Braidotti
, Elizabeth Weed, and Judith Butler
. With differences co-founder and co-editor Weed, Schor edited a number of differences books, including The Essential Difference in 1994 and Queer Theory Meets Feminism in 1997.
Reading in Detail: Aesthetics and the Feminine is considered one of Schor’s most influential books. In this classic 1987 work of aesthetic and feminist theory
, available in a 2006 paperback edition, Schor provided new ways of thinking about the gendering of details and ornament in literature, art, and architecture.
In other writings she developed the concept of female fetishism, in her many writings on the work of George Sand
; she examined the question of idealism
, also in relation to Sand, and in her late writings and research revisited the concept of universalism
in an era of identity politics
and difference.
Fellowships to France, NEH Fellowships (1981 and 1990–91), a Guggenheim Fellowship
in 1990: She was also elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
in 1997. Schor taught at Columbia
, Brown
(from 1978 to 1989) where she held the Nancy Duke Lewis Chair from 1985 to 1989, Duke
where she was the William Hanes Wannamaker Professor of Romance Studies Chair, and Harvard
. At the time of her death (of a brain hemorrhage) Schor was the Benjamin F. Barge professor of French at Yale
.
Naomi Schor’s papers are part of the Pembroke Center Archive's Elizabeth Weed Feminist Theory
Papers collection, held at the John Hay Library
at Brown University
.
Feminist theory
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, or philosophical discourse, it aims to understand the nature of gender inequality...
for her generation, she is regarded as one of the foremost scholars of French literature
French literature
French literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak traditional languages of France other than French. Literature written in French language, by citizens...
and critical theory
Critical theory
Critical theory is an examination and critique of society and culture, drawing from knowledge across the social sciences and humanities. The term has two different meanings with different origins and histories: one originating in sociology and the other in literary criticism...
of her time. Naomi's younger sister is the artist and writer Mira Schor
Mira Schor
Mira Schor is an American artist, writer, editor, and educator, known for her contributions to the critical discourse on the status of painting in contemporary art and culture as well as to feminist art history and criticism.-Early life and education:Mira Schor's parents Ilya and Resia Schor were...
.
Early life and education
At the time of her birth, Naomi Schor's Polish-born parents IlyaIlya Schor
Ilya Schor was a multi-faceted artist, a painter, jeweler, engraver, sculptor, and renowned artist of Judaica.- Early life :...
and Resia Schor
Resia Schor
Resia Schor was a Polish-born artist who lived and worked in New York City from 1941 until her death in 2006.- Early life :...
were artists who had recently immigrated to the US as refugee
Refugee
A refugee is a person who outside her country of origin or habitual residence because she has suffered persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or because she is a member of a persecuted 'social group'. Such a person may be referred to as an 'asylum seeker' until...
s from war-torn Europe. Ilya Schor was a painter, jeweler and artist of Judaica, and Resia Schor was a painter who later worked in silver and gold and mixed media on sculptural jewelry and Judaica. The Schors lived among a polyglot community of émigrés, among them musicians, intellectuals, and artists. Naomi Schor’s first language
First language
A first language is the language a person has learned from birth or within the critical period, or that a person speaks the best and so is often the basis for sociolinguistic identity...
was French, and she went to the Lycée Français de New York
Lycée Français de New York
The Lycée Français de New York , literally The French High School of New York, is an exclusive French-medium school for K-12 students based in Manhattan, New York which follows the French curriculum of study and allows students to study for the French general Baccalauréat, the international option...
where she received her Baccalauréat
Baccalauréat
The baccalauréat , often known in France colloquially as le bac, is an academic qualification which French and international students take at the end of the lycée . It was introduced by Napoleon I in 1808. It is the main diploma required to pursue university studies...
in 1961, the same year, sadly, that her father died. Schor received her B.A.
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
in English Literature
English literature
English literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph Conrad was Polish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, J....
from Barnard College
Barnard College
Barnard College is a private women's liberal arts college and a member of the Seven Sisters. Founded in 1889, Barnard has been affiliated with Columbia University since 1900. The campus stretches along Broadway between 116th and 120th Streets in the Morningside Heights neighborhood in the borough...
then received her PhD
PHD
PHD may refer to:*Ph.D., a doctorate of philosophy*Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*PHD finger, a protein sequence*PHD Mountain Software, an outdoor clothing and equipment company*PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
in French Literature
French literature
French literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak traditional languages of France other than French. Literature written in French language, by citizens...
from Yale
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
. There Schor occasionally wrote her scholarly essays in French.
Scholarship
Schor was one of the early proponents of French psychoanalyticPsychoanalytic theory
Psychoanalytic theory refers to the definition and dynamics of personality development which underlie and guide psychoanalytic and psychodynamic psychotherapy. First laid out by Sigmund Freud, psychoanalytic theory has undergone many refinements since his work...
and deconstructive theory
Deconstruction
Deconstruction is a term introduced by French philosopher Jacques Derrida in his 1967 book Of Grammatology. Although he carefully avoided defining the term directly, he sought to apply Martin Heidegger's concept of Destruktion or Abbau, to textual reading...
in American literary studies. She wrote about canonical authors such as Emile Zola
Émile Zola
Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...
, Gustave Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert was a French writer who is counted among the greatest Western novelists. He is known especially for his first published novel, Madame Bovary , and for his scrupulous devotion to his art and style.-Early life and education:Flaubert was born on December 12, 1821, in Rouen,...
, Marcel Proust
Marcel Proust
Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...
, Honoré de Balzac
Honoré de Balzac
Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. His magnum opus was a sequence of short stories and novels collectively entitled La Comédie humaine, which presents a panorama of French life in the years after the 1815 fall of Napoleon....
, re-examining their work through the double lens of the male-authored theoretical discourse of Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...
(whom she knew personally), Roland Barthes
Roland Barthes
Roland Gérard Barthes was a French literary theorist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. Barthes' ideas explored a diverse range of fields and he influenced the development of schools of theory including structuralism, semiotics, existentialism, social theory, Marxism, anthropology and...
, and Jacques Lacan
Jacques Lacan
Jacques Marie Émile Lacan was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist who made prominent contributions to psychoanalysis and philosophy, and has been called "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud". Giving yearly seminars in Paris from 1953 to 1981, Lacan influenced France's...
, and that of French feminist theoreticians such as Julia Kristeva
Julia Kristeva
Julia Kristeva is a Bulgarian-French philosopher, literary critic, psychoanalyst, sociologist, feminist, and, most recently, novelist, who has lived in France since the mid-1960s. She is now a Professor at the University Paris Diderot...
, Hélène Cixous
Hélène Cixous
Hélène Cixous is a professor, French feminist writer, poet, playwright, philosopher, literary critic and rhetorician. She holds honorary degrees from Queen's University and the University of Alberta in Canada; University College Dublin in Ireland; the University of York and University College...
, and Luce Irigaray
Luce Irigaray
Luce Irigaray is a Belgian feminist, philosopher, linguist, psychoanalyst, sociologist and cultural theorist. She is best known for her works Speculum of the Other Woman and This Sex Which Is Not One .-Biography:...
.
Schor was the founding co-editor of differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies, in 1989, a critical forum where the problematics of difference is explored in texts ranging from the literary and the visual to the political and social.
An area of Schor’s expertise was the work of the feminist psychoanalytic theorist Luce Irigaray
Luce Irigaray
Luce Irigaray is a Belgian feminist, philosopher, linguist, psychoanalyst, sociologist and cultural theorist. She is best known for her works Speculum of the Other Woman and This Sex Which Is Not One .-Biography:...
. With Carolyn Burke and Margaret Whitford, she edited Engaging with Irigaray, which included essays by Rosi Braidotti
Rosi Braidotti
Rosi Braidotti is a contemporary philosopher and feminist theoretician.-Biography:Braidotti, who holds Italian and Australian citizenship, was born in Italy and grew up in Australia, where she received degrees from the Australian National University in Canberra in 1977 and was awarded the...
, Elizabeth Weed, and Judith Butler
Judith Butler
Judith Butler is an American post-structuralist philosopher, who has contributed to the fields of feminism, queer theory, political philosophy, and ethics. She is a professor in the Rhetoric and Comparative Literature departments at the University of California, Berkeley.Butler received her Ph.D...
. With differences co-founder and co-editor Weed, Schor edited a number of differences books, including The Essential Difference in 1994 and Queer Theory Meets Feminism in 1997.
Reading in Detail: Aesthetics and the Feminine is considered one of Schor’s most influential books. In this classic 1987 work of aesthetic and feminist theory
Feminist theory
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, or philosophical discourse, it aims to understand the nature of gender inequality...
, available in a 2006 paperback edition, Schor provided new ways of thinking about the gendering of details and ornament in literature, art, and architecture.
In other writings she developed the concept of female fetishism, in her many writings on the work of George Sand
George Sand
Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin, later Baroness Dudevant , best known by her pseudonym George Sand , was a French novelist and memoirist.-Life:...
; she examined the question of idealism
Idealism
In philosophy, idealism is the family of views which assert that reality, or reality as we can know it, is fundamentally mental, mentally constructed, or otherwise immaterial. Epistemologically, idealism manifests as a skepticism about the possibility of knowing any mind-independent thing...
, also in relation to Sand, and in her late writings and research revisited the concept of universalism
Universalism
Universalism in its primary meaning refers to religious, theological, and philosophical concepts with universal application or applicability...
in an era of identity politics
Identity politics
Identity politics are political arguments that focus upon the self interest and perspectives of self-identified social interest groups and ways in which people's politics may be shaped by aspects of their identity through race, class, religion, sexual orientation or traditional dominance...
and difference.
Awards and honors
Schor was the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship (1963–64), a number of Fulbright AwardFulbright Award
The Fulbright Award is a scholarship awarded as part of the Fulbright Program to foster international research and collaboration. The program also awards a fellowship to Ph.D.'s to lecture and teach in foreign universities...
Fellowships to France, NEH Fellowships (1981 and 1990–91), a Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowships are American grants that have been awarded annually since 1925 by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts." Each year, the foundation makes...
in 1990: She was also elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences is an independent policy research center that conducts multidisciplinary studies of complex and emerging problems. The Academy’s elected members are leaders in the academic disciplines, the arts, business, and public affairs.James Bowdoin, John Adams, and...
in 1997. Schor taught at Columbia
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
, Brown
Brown University
Brown University is a private, Ivy League university located in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. Founded in 1764 prior to American independence from the British Empire as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations early in the reign of King George III ,...
(from 1978 to 1989) where she held the Nancy Duke Lewis Chair from 1985 to 1989, Duke
Duke University
Duke University is a private research university located in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present day town of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco industrialist James B...
where she was the William Hanes Wannamaker Professor of Romance Studies Chair, and Harvard
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
. At the time of her death (of a brain hemorrhage) Schor was the Benjamin F. Barge professor of French at Yale
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
.
Naomi Schor’s papers are part of the Pembroke Center Archive's Elizabeth Weed Feminist Theory
Feminist theory
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, or philosophical discourse, it aims to understand the nature of gender inequality...
Papers collection, held at the John Hay Library
John Hay Library
The John Hay Library is the second oldest library on the campus of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. Located on Prospect Street, opposite the Van Wickle Gates, it replaced the outgrown former library, now Robinson Hall, as the main library on the campus...
at Brown University
Brown University
Brown University is a private, Ivy League university located in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. Founded in 1764 prior to American independence from the British Empire as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations early in the reign of King George III ,...
.
Personal life
At the time of her death she was married to R. Howard Bloch, Sterling Professor of French and Chair of the Humanities Program at Yale. A first marriage, to Breton poet Paol Keineg, ended in divorce.Books
- Bad Objects: Essays Popular and Unpopular, Duke University Press, 1995.
- George Sand and Idealism, Gender and Culture Series, Columbia University Press, 1993.
- Reading in Detail: Aesthetics and the Feminine, originally published by Methuen Press, 1987, reissued by Taylor & Francis, 2006, with introduction by Ellen Rooney.
- Breaking the Chain: Women, Theory, and French Realist Fiction, Columbia University Press, 1985.
- Zola’s Crowds, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978.
Edited volumes
- Decadent Subjects: The Idea of Decadence in Art, Literature, Philosophy and Culture of the Fin de Siècle in Europe, by Charles Bernheimer, eds. Jason Kline and Naomi Schor, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002.
- Queer Theory Meets Feminism (with Elizabeth Weed), Indiana University Press, 1997.
- Engaging with Irigaray (with Carolyn Burke and Margaret Whitford), Columbia University Press, 1994.
- The Essential Difference Naomi Schor and Elizabeth Weed, eds., Indiana University Press, 1994.
- "Another Look at Essentialism" (with Elizabeth Weed). Intro by Naomi Schor, Indiana University Press, 1994.
- Flaubert and Postmodernism Naomi Schor and Henry F. Majewski, eds., University of Nebraska Press, 1984.
Essays
- "Pensive Texts and Thinking Statues: Balzac with Rodin," Critical Inquiry 27 (2), 2001: 239–264.
- “Blindness as Metaphor,” differences 11, Number 2, Summer 1999, 76-105.
- “Anti-Semitism, Jews and the Universal,” October 87, Winter 1999, 107–111.
- "One Hundred Years of Melancholy. The Zaharoff Lecture for 1996," Romantisme (Clarendon Press, TKyear) 1–15.
- "Reading in Detail: Hegel's Aesthetics and the Feminine," reprinted in Patricia Jagentowicz Mills, ed. Feminist Interpretations of G.W.F. Hegel. (Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995), 119–147.
- "French Feminism is a Universalism", differences 7.1, 1995.
- "Cartes Postales: Representing Paris 1900." Critical Inquiry 18, Winter 1992, 188-245.
- "The Scandal of Realism," in Hollier, Denis, ed., A New History of French Literature (Harvard University Press, 1989), 656–660.
- “This Essentialism Which is Not One,” differences 2, 1989, 38-58
- "Idealism," in Hollier, A New History, 769–773.
- "Simone de Beauvoir: A Thinking Woman's Woman," L.A. Times, May 19, 1986.
- "Roland Barthes: Necrologies", Sub-Stance 48, 1986, 27-33.
- "Female Fetishism: The Case of George Sand." Poetics Today 6, 1985, 301-310. Reprinted in Suleiman, Susan. Ed. The Female Body in Western Culture: Contemporary Approaches, Harvard University Press, 1986, 363–372.
- "Female Paranoia: The Case for Psychoanalytic Feminist Criticism." Yale French Studies 62, 1981, 204-219.
- "Le Détail chez Freud", Littérature 37 (1980), 3-14.
- "Le Délire d'interprétation: naturalism et paranoia," in Le naturalisme: Colloque de Cerisy, Paris, 10/18, 1978, 237–255.
- "Dali's Freud", Dada/Surrealism 6, 1976, 10-17.
- “Le Sourire du sphinx: Zola et l'énigme de la fémininité", Romantisme 12-14, 1976, 183-195.
Colloquia and conferences
- "Romancing the Dead," Feminist Theory, Brown University September 1995; Keynote address, 21st Annual Meeting, Nineteenth-Century French Studies Colloquium, October 1995; Longest Lecture, Ole Miss, November 1995; Zaharoff Lecture, Oxford University, 1996.
- "Il et Elle: Croisset et Nohant," Colloque de Nohant, Nohant, Septembre 1991.
- "George Sand and Feminism: Lettres à Marcie," Feminist Theory: An International Debate, University of Glasgow, July 1991.
- "Triste Amérique: Atala and the Post-Revolutionary Construction of Woman," Keynote Address, "Woman and Representation," Rhode Island College. April 1989. "Woman and the French Revolution," UCLA, October 1989; Danziger Memorial Lecture. The University of Chicago, May 1990.
- "Roland Barthes: Necrologies," 2nd International Conference on Translation, Barnard College, November 1984.
- "Roland Barthes' Aesthetics," Dimensions of Narrative Conference, Brown University, November 1983.
- "Female Fetishism: The Case of George Sand," Eight Annual Nineteenth Century Colloquium in French Studies, University of Massachusetts at Amherst. October 1982; Colloquium on "Women and Signs," July, 1983, Urbino, Italy; Berkshire Conference, June 1984.
- "Details and Realism: La Curé de Tours," "Synopsis IV," the Porter Institute for Semiotics and Poetics, Tel-Aviv University, May 1982.
- "Salammbo enchainée: Femme et Ville dans Salammbo," Journé d'etudes: Flaubert, La Femme, la Ville. Centennaire de la mort de Gustave Flaubert, Célébrations Nationales, Paris, France, November 1980; Flaubert Colloquium, University of Bielefeld, West Germany, May 1981.
- "Le Statut du détail chez Freud," colloque sur le fragment, Université de Montréal, March 1978; Brown University, March 1978.
- "Le délire d'interprétation: naturalisme et paranoia", Colloquium on Naturalism, Cerisy, France, July 1976.
External links
- http://www.pembrokecenter.org/farnham_archives/exhibit/Schor/schor_start.html
- http://www.dukeupress.edu/differences/
- http://www.dukeupress.edu/cgibin/forwardsql/search.cgi?template0=nomatch.htm&template2=books/book_detail_page.htm&user_id=316223710538&Bmain.item_option=1&Bmain.item=1732
- http://www.routledge.com/books/Reading-in-Detail-isbn9780415979450
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sigmund_H._Danziger,_Jr._Memorial_Lecture_in_the_Humanities (Sigmund H Danziger Lecture 1990-1991)