Naomi Schor papers, 1950-2002

John Hay Library , Special Collections
Box A
Brown University
Providence, RI 02912
Tel: 401-863-2146
email: hay@brown.edu

Published in 2013

Collection Overview

Title:	Naomi Schor papers
Date range:	1950-2002
Creator:	Schor, Naomi
Extent:	71.5 Linear feet (71 record center boxes, 1 document box)
Abstract:	The Naomi Schor papers span the years from 1950-2002 and consist of personal and professional correspondence, literary manuscripts, research and teaching materials, and materials from her professional activities. The collection documents Schor's career as one of the foremost scholars of French literature and critical theory and a pioneer feminist theorist of her generation.
Language of materials:	English
Repository:	John Hay Library , Special Collections
Collection number:	Ms.2006.02

Scope & content

This collection of personal and professional papers is organized into ten series and covers the years from 1950 to 2002.

Series 1: Juvenilia - These materials date from 1950-1963 and are split into three sections. The first covers her years at the Lycée Français and includes school notebooks and yearbooks. The second covers her undergraduate years at Barnard College and includes notes and essays. The third comprises oversized materials, including grammar-school projects, some posters from later in Naomi Schor's career, and four prints.

Series 2: Personal Correspondence - Her personal correspondence dates from 1956-2001 and is organized in two sub-series, the first arranged alphabetically by the name of the correspondent, the second arranged chronologically and spanning the years 1950 to 2001. These materials are restricted until 2014.

Series 3: Professional Correspondence - Her professional correspondence dates from 1961-2002 and is divided into four sub-series. The first is organized by year from 1961 to 2000. The second sub-series contains correspondence related to university business organized by institution. The third sub-series is her grant proposals and fellowship applications. The fourth sub-series are letters of recommendation and evaluations she wrote for others people filed alphabetically. All of her professional correspondence is restricted until 2014. The Letters of Recommendation are restricted until 2081.

Series 4: Literary Manuscripts - These date from 1969-2001 and consist of Naomi Schor's dissertation and books, arranged chronologically and by title; articles arranged by year of publication; book reviews organized alphabetically by author; and draft manuscripts by others (not Schor) arranged alphabetically.

Series 5: Research - Her research files date from 1970-2001 and include conferences, colloquia, and symposia arranged by year from 1970 to 2001; the researhc on particular subjects and authors are both arranged alphabetically.

Series 6: Teaching - Her teaching materials date from 1986-2001 and include course packets, research articles, lecture notes, and grading sheets for an NEH course in 1986, an SCT course in 1994, and various courses arranged by year from 1969 to 2001. A second grouping of teaching materials is comprised of students' theses, masters projects, and dissertations.

Series 7: Professional Activities and Service/Recognized Accomplishments - This series contains materials from 1980-2001 and includes curriculum vitas, awards, professional service documentation (including reviews and reports), and papers related to differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies.

Series 8: Printed materials, Audiocassettes, Course Packets - This material dates from 1969-2001 and comprises offprints by Schor and by other scholars, many of which are signed, audiocassettes of lectures and from the Flaubert Symposium, and course packets.

Series 9: Miscellaneous Items of Note - These materials dating from 1970-2002 include newsletters from Yale, the Pembroke Center, and miscellaneous libraries, a photograph of Schor with Jacques Derrida at Brown University, and tenure review materials.

Series 10: Personal Notes and Papers - These personal papers date from 1978-1990 and include legal documents from the case Schor v. Doubrovsky and an inventory of a safe deposit box. These papers are restricted until 2014.

Access Points

Subject Names

• Schor, Naomi

Subject Organizations

• Christine Dunlap Farnham Archive.
• Feminist Theory Archive.
• Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women.

Subject Topics

• Feminism--History
• Feminist theory
• Language and Literature
• Race, Ethnicity and Gender

Occupations

• Professors

Document Types

• Articles
• Grant proposals
• Lecture notes
• Letters (Correspondence)
• Manuscripts for publication
• Research notes
• Syllabi

Arrangement

This collection is divided into the following series:

• Series 1. Juvenilia
• Series 2. Personal Correspondence
• Series 3. Professional Correspondence
• Series 4. Literary Manuscripts
• Series 5. Research
• Series 6. Teaching
• Series 7. Professional Activities and Service/Recognized Accomplishments
• Series 8. Printed Materials, Audiocassettes, Course Packets
• Series 9. Miscellaneous Items of Note
• Series 10. Personal Notes and Papers

Biographical note

Naomi Schor, one of the foremost scholars of French literature and critical theory and a pioneer feminist theorist of her generation, held appointments at such universities as Columbia, Brown, Duke, Harvard, and Yale. From 1985 until 1989, she held the Nancy Duke Lewis Chair at Brown University; at the time of her death at the age of 58, Schor was the Benjamin F. Barge Professor of French at Yale University, where she had also earned her doctorate.

One of the leading interpreters of the writings of such French theorists and philosophers as Luce Irigaray, Jacques Lacan, Roland Barthes, and Jacques Derrida, Schor specialized in nineteenth-century French literature, writing extensively on Zola, Balzac, Sand, and Flaubert. A founding coeditor of "differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies", Schor was committed to challenging conventional understanding and to questioning not only what we take for knowledge but how knowledges are produced.

Born in New York City on October 10, 1943, Naomi Schor was the daughter of the renowned painter, goldsmith, and artist of Judaica, Ilya Schor. Her mother, Resia Schor, was also an artist. Both parents had fled from Poland to Paris to escape the Nazis, eventually reaching New York by way of Lisbon in December 1941.

Brought up in a home filled with art, music, and literature, Schor was educated at the Lycée Français in New York City and went on to earn her bachelor's degree at Barnard College in 1963. Her family was part of a community of artists and intellectuals, and the family spoke French at home.

The author of five books and more the fifty articles, as well as the editor of several collections, her monographs include Zola's Crowds (1978), Breaking the Chain: Women, Theory, and French Realist Fiction (1985), George Sand and Idealism (1993), and Bad Objects: Essays Popular and Unpopular (1995). Schor is, however, perhaps most known for her 1987 book Reading in Detail: Aesthetics and the Feminine, which brought meticulous attention to the gendering of the detail, long associated with the ornamental, the effeminate, the decadent, and the mundane. Her analyses drew from Renaissance painting, Greta Garbo, Kafka, Freud, Lukács, Dali, Eisenstein, and Duane Hanson, among others. The book, reprinted in 2006, continues to influence scholars across disciplinary lines, from French studies to art historians and visual artists.

She died suddenly December 2, 2001 at the age of 58 in New Haven, Connecticut. At the time of her death in 2001, she was working on a book project on universalism.

Access & Use

Access to the collection:	Materials of a personal nature including personal correspondence and personal papers (Box 5-15 and Box 70) are closed until January 2014. Materials relating to the work of students in courses with Naomi are restricted until January of 2081 (Boxes 71-72). Contact Manuscripts staff for exceptions to this restriction. All other materials are open without restriction. The collection can only be seen by prior appointment. These materials are stored off-site and cannot be produced on the same day on which they are requested.
Use of the materials:	Although Brown University has physical ownership of the collection and the materials contained therein, it does not claim literary rights. Researchers should note that compliance with copyright law is their responsibility. Researchers must determine the owners of the literary rights and obtain any necessary permissions from them.
Preferred citation:	Naomi Schor papers, Ms.2006.02, Feminist Theory Archive, Brown University Library.
Contact information:	John Hay Library , Special Collections Box A Brown University Providence, RI 02912 Tel: 401-863-2146 email: hay@brown.edu

Administrative Information

ABOUT THE COLLECTION
Acquisition:	Gift of R. Howard Bloch in 2002.
Accruals:	There are no further materials anticipated for this collection.
ABOUT THE FINDING AID
Author:	Finding aid prepared by Denise Davis on behalf of the Pembroke Center for the Teaching and Research on Women and the Brown University Library.
Encoding:	This finding aid was produced using the Archivists' Toolkit 2013-07-15
Sponsor:	Curatorial work and processing provided by the Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women on behalf of the Feminist Theory Archive, Brown University Library.

Additional Information

Inventory

---