Elizabeth Eisenstein - Wikipedia Elizabeth Eisenstein From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to navigation Jump to search Elizabeth Eisenstein Elizabeth Eisenstein in 1979 as the first resident scholar for the Center for the Book at the Library of Congress Born (1923-10-11)October 11, 1923 Died January 31, 2016(2016-01-31) (aged 92) Nationality American Alma mater Vassar College Radcliffe College Scientific career Fields Historian Institutions University of Michigan Elizabeth Lewisohn Eisenstein (October 11, 1923[1] – January 31, 2016[2]) was an American historian of the French Revolution and early 19th-century France. She is well known for her work on the history of early printing, writing on the transition in media between the era of 'manuscript culture' and that of 'print culture', as well as the role of the printing press in effecting broad cultural change in Western civilization. Contents 1 Career 2 Family and personal life 3 The Printing Press as an Agent of Change 4 The Unacknowledged Revolution 5 Awards 6 Selected bibliography 7 Further reading 8 See also 9 References Career[edit] Eisenstein was educated at Vassar College where she received her B.A., then went on to Radcliffe College for her M.A. and Ph.D. It was there she studied under Crane Brinton. She reported that in the early 1950s she was not able to find a position in a university history department, not even part-time work. In 1957, after she had obtained her PhD, she and her husband moved to Washington, D.C. where she applied to multiple institutions for teaching positions, including Georgetown, George Washington University, Howard, and the University of Maryland. She eventually found a part-time position at American University.[3] She taught as an adjunct professor[4] at American University from 1959 to 1974, then the University of Michigan, where she was the Alice Freeman Palmer Professor of History.[5] In 1979 she was resident consultant for the Center for the Book at the Library of Congress.[6] She held positions as a fellow at the Humanities Research Center of the Australian National University and at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (Palo Alto).[3] Eisenstein was visiting professor at Wolfson College, Oxford, and published her lectures from that period as Grub Street Abroad. She was professor emerita at the University of Michigan[7] and an honorary fellow of St Cross College, Oxford. Her last work was Divine Art, Infernal Machine, the Reception of Printing in the West (Penn Press, 2011). Family and personal life[edit] Eisenstein is the third daughter of Sam A. Lewisohn, son of Adolph Lewisohn and Margaret Seligman, granddaughter of Joseph Seligman and Babet Steinhardt. From the age of 50, Eisenstein began competing in senior tennis tournaments, becoming well-known and winning three national grand slams between 2003-2005.[8] The Printing Press as an Agent of Change[edit] Play media Eisenstein describes the conditions of scarcity that characterized the book as artifact in the age of the scribe. Eisenstein's best-known work is The Printing Press as an Agent of Change, a two-volume, 750-page exploration of the effects of movable type printing on the literate elite of post-Gutenberg Western Europe. In this work she focuses on the printing press's functions of dissemination, standardization, and preservation and the way these functions aided the progress of the Protestant Reformation, the Renaissance, and the Scientific Revolution. Eisenstein's work brought historical method, rigor, and clarity to earlier ideas of Marshall McLuhan and others, about the general social effects of such media transitions.[4] This work provoked debate in the academic community from the moment it was published[9] and is still inspiring conversation and new research today.[10] Her work also influenced later thinking about the subsequent development of digital media. Her work on the transition from manuscript to print influenced thought about new transitions of print text to digital formats, including multimedia and new ideas about the definition of text.[11] Eisenstein’s book has also received sharp criticism. Paul Needham, now Librarian at Princeton University’s Scheide Library, described it as "almost impossible to comprehend" and suffering "from more general flaws of historical method: an unconcern for exact chronology; a lack of historical context; an exclusive reliance of [sic] secondary writings, not always accurately absorbed, not always particularly relevant …" [12] The Unacknowledged Revolution[edit] Eisenstein's book The Printing Press as an Agent of Change lays out her thoughts on the "Unacknowledged Revolution," her name for the revolution that occurred after the invention of print. Print media allowed the general public to have access to books and knowledge that had not been available to them before; this led to the growth of public knowledge and individual thought. The ability to formulate thought on one's own thoughts became reality with the popularity of the printing press. Print also "standardized and preserved knowledge which had been much more fluid in the age of oral manuscript circulation"[13] Eisenstein recognizes this period of time to be very important in the development of human culture; however, she feels that it is often overlooked, thus, the 'unacknowledged revolution'. Awards[edit] Eisenstein has received various awards and recognitions, including fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Rockefeller Foundation. In 2002, she received the American Historical Association's Award for Scholarly Distinction,[14] and in 2004 the University of Michigan awarded her the honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters.[15] In 1993, the National Coalition of Independent Scholars created the Eisenstein Prize, which is awarded biannually to members of the organization who have produced work with an independent focus.[16] Selected bibliography[edit] Divine Art, Infernal Machine, The Reception of Printing in the West. Philadelphia PA: University of Pennsylvania Press. 2011. ISBN 978-0-8122-4280-5. Based on the Rosenbach lectures, March 2010. The printing revolution in early modern Europe (2nd ed.). Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press. 2005. ISBN 0-521-84543-2. Includes a new afterword by the author. Grub Street abroad : aspects of the French cosmopolitan press from the age of Louis XIV to the French Revolution. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 1992. ISBN 0-19-812259-4. Series : Lyell lectures 1990-1991. Print culture and enlightenment thought. [Chapel Hill]: Hanes Foundation, Rare Book Collection/University Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 1986. Series : The Sixth Hanes lecture. The printing revolution in early modern Europe (abridged edition of The printing press as an agent of change ed.). Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press. 1983. ISBN 0-521-25858-8. The printing press as an agent of change: communications and cultural transformations in early modern Europe (2 vols. ed.). Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press. 1979. ISBN 0-521-22044-0. "Some Conjectures about the Impact of Printing on Western Society and Thought: A Preliminary Report," The Journal of Modern History Vol. 40, No. 1, March 1968 The First Professional Revolutionist : Filippo Michele Buonarroti. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 1959. ISBN 978-0-674-30400-0. Further reading[edit] Briggs, Asa and Burke, Peter(2005) A Social History of the Media: from Gutenberg to the Internet(second Edition) Polity, Cambridge. Baron, Sabrina A., Eric N. Lindquist, & Eleanor F. Shevlin (eds), "Agent of Change: Print Culture Studies after Elizabeth L. Eisenstein" (2007) See also[edit] History of the book References[edit] ^ Locher, Frances C. (1980). Contemporary Authors. Gale. p. 152. ISBN 0810300486. ^ Patkus, Ron (February 4, 2016). "Elizabeth Eisenstein". EXLIBRIS-L (Mailing list). Retrieved February 5, 2016. ^ a b Baron, Sabina Alcorn (2007). Agent of Change. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press. p. 410. ISBN 978-1-55849-593-7. ^ a b James Gleick (2011). The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood. New York: Pantheon. ISBN 978-0-375-42372-7. ^ Cherry Williams, "Analytical Intellectual Biography of Elizabeth L. Eisenstein" (student paper, UCLA, 2004), 27. Student Digital Library, IS 281. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2007-02-13. Retrieved 2007-05-03.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) ^ The Library of Congress. "Book and Library History Update (November 2001) - Library of Congress Information Bulletin." https://www.loc.gov/lov/lcib/0111/cfb.html ^ Elizabeth L. Eisenstein, "An Unacknowledged Revolution Revisited," American Historical Review 107, no. 1 (February 2002): 105. ^ https://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/news/article/13031769/the-assassin ^ Peter F. McNally, ed., The Advent of Printing: Historians of Science Respond to Elizabeth Eisenstein's "The Printing Press as an Agent of Change" (Montreal: McGill University Graduate School of Library and Information Studies, 1987). ^ Sabrina Alcorn Baron, Eric N. Lindquist, and Eleanor F. Shevlin, eds. Agent of Change: Print Culture Studies After Elizabeth L. Eisenstein (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2007). ^ James A. Dewar, The Information Age and the Printing Press: Looking Backward to See Ahead, RAND Paper 8014 (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1998), https://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/P8014 ^ Needham, Paul (January 1980). "Review: Eisenstein, Elizabeth L., The Printing Press as an Agent of Social Change". Fine Print. VI (1): 23–35. ^ Briggs, Asa; Burke, Peter (2005). A Social History of the Media: from Gutenberg to the Internet (second ed.). Cambridge: Polity. ^ American Historical Association, "2002 Book Awards and Prizes," http://www.historians.org/annual/2003/2002prizes.htm ^ University of Michigan, "U-M to bestow two honorary degrees," http://www.umich.edu/~urecord/0405/Nov22_04/06.shtml ^ Independent Scholars v t e Historians of Europe T. C. W. Blanning Fernand Braudel Norman Davies Elizabeth Eisenstein Richard J. Evans Julia P. Gelardi Eric Hobsbawm Tony Judt Ian Kershaw John Lukacs Henri-Jean Martin Mark Mazower Effie Pedaliu Henri Pirenne Walter Alison Phillips Andrew Roberts John Roberts J. Salwyn Schapiro Paul W. Schroeder Jonathan Sperber Norman Stone Adam Zamoyski Charlotte Zeepvat Belgium Henri Pirenne Sophie de Schaepdrijver Bosnia and Herzegovina İbrahim Peçevi Antun Knežević Bono Benić Hamdija Kreševljaković Smail Balić Enver Redžić Marko Vego Mustafa Imamović Salmedin Mesihović England and Britain Donald Adamson Robert C. Allen Perry Anderson Leonie Archer Karen Armstrong Gerald Aylmer Bernard Bailyn Onyeka Bede Brian Bond Asa Briggs Herbert Butterfield Angus Calder J.C.D. Clark Linda Colley Patrick Collinson Maurice Cowling John Davies Susan Doran Eamon Duffy Harold James Dyos Geoffrey Rudolph Elton Charles Harding Firth Antonia Fraser William Gibson Samuel Rawson Gardiner Andrew Gordon Geoffrey of Monmouth Edward Hasted Max Hastings J. H. Hexter Christopher Hill Gertrude Himmelfarb Eric Hobsbawm David Hume Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon John Edward Lloyd Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay John Morrill Lewis Bernstein Namier Kenneth Morgan Andrew Roberts A. L. Rowse Dominic Sandbrook John Robert Seeley Jack Simmons Paul Slack David Starkey Lawrence Stone Keith Thomas E. P. Thompson George Macaulay Trevelyan Hugh Trevor-Roper, Baron Dacre of Glanton Retha Warnicke Andy Wood Daniel Woolf Cicely Veronica Wedgwood Perez Zagorin British Empire Richard Drayton Gerald S. Graham Vincent T. Harlow Wm. Roger Louis P. J. Marshall David Quinn D. M. 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Pavlowitch Catherine Samary Stephen Schwartz Jozo Tomasevich Authority control BIBSYS: 90346404 BNF: cb120972027 (data) CANTIC: a11295910 CiNii: DA01955086 GND: 133970841 ICCU: IT\ICCU\CFIV\008241 ISNI: 0000 0000 8127 3748 LCCN: n83161404 NDL: 00466047 NKC: jx20111114011 NLI: 000219423 NLK: KAC199607954 NLP: A11476175 NSK: 000066982 NTA: 067631649 PLWABN: 9810599919405606 SNAC: w6ct0kn2 SUDOC: 02932095X VIAF: 49253667 WorldCat Identities: lccn-n83161404 Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elizabeth_Eisenstein&oldid=995172559" Categories: 1923 births 2016 deaths American historians American people of German-Jewish descent Historians of the French Revolution Historians of France Jewish American historians Theorists on Western civilization Literacy and society theorists American women historians Vassar College alumni University of Michigan faculty Historians of printing Lewisohn family Radcliffe College alumni Hidden categories: CS1 maint: archived copy as title Articles with hCards Wikipedia articles with BIBSYS identifiers Wikipedia articles with BNF identifiers Wikipedia articles with CANTIC identifiers Wikipedia articles with CINII identifiers Wikipedia articles with GND identifiers Wikipedia articles with ICCU identifiers Wikipedia articles with ISNI identifiers Wikipedia articles with LCCN identifiers Wikipedia articles with NDL identifiers Wikipedia articles with NKC identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLI identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLK identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLP identifiers Wikipedia articles with NSK identifiers Wikipedia articles with NTA identifiers Wikipedia articles with PLWABN identifiers Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers Wikipedia articles with VIAF identifiers Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers Articles containing video clips Navigation menu Personal tools Not logged in Talk Contributions Create account Log in Namespaces Article Talk Variants Views Read Edit View history More Search Navigation Main page Contents Current events Random article About Wikipedia Contact us Donate Contribute Help Learn to edit Community portal Recent changes Upload file Tools What links here Related changes Upload file Special pages Permanent link Page information Cite this page Wikidata item Print/export Download as PDF Printable version In other projects Wikimedia Commons Languages العربية Català Deutsch Français 한국어 Bahasa Indonesia Italiano Português Русский Edit links This page was last edited on 19 December 2020, at 17:03 (UTC). 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