Barbara Herrnstein Smith papers (Ms.2010.039)

Biographical/Historical note

Barbara Herrnstein Smith, Braxton Craven Professor Emerita of Comparative Literature and English at Duke University, is a feminist literary critic and theorist. Her interdisciplinary research focuses on topics such a language, literature, critical theory, science and the humanities.

Smith studied biology, experimental psychology, and philosophy at the City College of New York before attending Brandeis University. She graduated from Brandeis with a BA and Ph.D. in English Literature. Smith taught at the University of Pennsylvania and Bennington College before joining the faculty of Duke University in 1987. Smith also joined the faculty at Brown University in 2003 and is a Distinguished Professor of English.

She is the Former director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies in Science and Cultural Theory at Duke university. In 1988, Smith was elected president of the Modern Language Association. She was named a Fellow of the National Humanities Center in 1992, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1999 and received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Society for Literature, Science and the Arts in October 2010.