Jane Flax papers (Ms.2019.012)

Biographical / Historical

Jane Flax was born on December 31, 1948. She received her undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley where she studied Political Theory and was known to be interested in Germanic social thought and the relationships between knowledge and power. During this time, she became involved in the Civil Rights Movement and fought against the conflict in Vietnam.

Between 1969-1974, Flax earned a PhD in Political Theory and Philosophy at Yale University at a time when the Women's Liberation Movement came to the fore. Flax became interested in psychoanalysis and organized discussion groups in the Women's Center on feminism. She also became involved in the feminist magazine, Quest.

After completing her graduate education, Flax moved to Washington DC in 1978, where she wrote her first articles on feminist theory.

In her scholarship, Flax reflects and writes on three important modes of contemporary Western thought: psychoanalysis, feminist theories and postmodern philosophies. She has developed, along with other feminist theorists, feminist psychoanalysis, arguing that psychoanalysis is vital for the feminist project and that it must, like other theoretical traditions, be criticized and transformed by women, to free it from any vestige of sexism.

Flax's books include "Thinking Fragments," "Disputed Subjects," "The American Dream in Black and White," and "Resonances of Slavery in Race/Gender Relations." She has also published more than 50 book chapters and journal articles on a wide range of subjects, including philosophy of science, mother-daughter relations, ethics, critical theory, race/gender, psychoanalysis, feminist theories, postmodernism, subjectivity, justice, American political thought and politics, epistemology, Kant, and Foucault's "care of the self."

Flax most recently served as Scholar in Residence in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at American University. Previously she taught at Howard University where she was Professor of Political Science. She also taught at Stanford University, University of Maryland (Baltimore County) and University of Massachusetts, Amherst, during different times in her academic career. Flax is also a psychotherapist in private practice in Washington, DC.

[Bio note from American University and Spanish Wikipedia: https://es.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Flax]