Stanley Cavell facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Stanley Cavell
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Cavell in 2016
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Stanley Louis Goldstein
September 1, 1926 Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.
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| Died | June 19, 2018 (aged 91) Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
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| Education | University of California, Berkeley (B.A.) UCLA (no degree) Harvard University (Ph.D.) |
| School | Postanalytic philosophy |
| Institutions | Harvard University |
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Main interests
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Skepticism, tragedy, aesthetics, ethics, ordinary language philosophy, American transcendentalism, film theory, William Shakespeare, opera, religion |
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Notable ideas
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Linguistic film theory, Moral perfectionism |
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Influences
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Influenced
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Stanley Louis Cavell (born Stanley Louis Goldstein; September 1, 1926 – June 19, 2018) was an important American philosopher. He taught at Harvard University as a professor of aesthetics. Aesthetics is the study of beauty and art. He focused on topics like ethics (what is right and wrong), aesthetics, and ordinary language philosophy (how we use everyday language). He also wrote a lot about other famous thinkers like Ludwig Wittgenstein, Austin, and Emerson. His writing style was like a conversation and often included references to books and movies.
Contents
Life Story
Stanley Cavell was born in Atlanta, Georgia, into a Jewish family. His mother was a talented pianist and taught him music from a young age. During the Great Depression, his family moved several times between Atlanta and Sacramento, California. As a teenager, Stanley played the alto saxophone in a jazz band in Sacramento. Around this time, he changed his last name from Goldstein to Cavell, which was a simpler version of his family's original Polish name.
He went to the University of California, Berkeley, where he studied music. Later, he studied music composition at the Juilliard School in New York City. However, he soon realized that music was not his main passion.
Stanley then decided to study philosophy. He went to graduate school at UCLA and then transferred to Harvard University. There, he was greatly influenced by the philosopher J. L. Austin. In 1956, even before finishing his Ph.D., he became an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley. His daughter, Rachel Lee Cavell, was born in 1957.
In 1963, he returned to Harvard University, where he became a well-known professor.
In the summer of 1964, Cavell joined a group of students and teachers who went to Tougaloo College, a historically Black college in Mississippi. This was part of the Freedom Summer movement, which aimed to help African Americans register to vote. In 1967, he married Cathleen Cohen. In 1969, during student protests related to the Vietnam War, Cavell helped create a plan for Harvard to start a department for African and African-American Studies.
His first son, Benjamin, was born in 1976. In 1979, Cavell helped start the Harvard Film Archive to save and show important films. He received a special award called a MacArthur Fellowship in 1992. From 1996 to 1997, he was the president of the American Philosophical Association. His second son, David, was born in 1984. Cavell retired from Harvard in 1997 but continued to teach at other universities like Yale University and the University of Chicago.
Stanley Cavell passed away in Boston, Massachusetts, on June 19, 2018, at the age of 91.
His Ideas and Writings
Stanley Cavell was trained in a style of philosophy called the "analytic tradition," but he also explored ideas from the "continental tradition." He believed that studying film and literature was important for understanding philosophy. He wrote a lot about philosophers like Ludwig Wittgenstein, J. L. Austin, and Martin Heidegger, as well as American thinkers like Henry Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Cavell became known for his unique ideas with his book Must We Mean What We Say? (1969). In this book, he looked at how we use language, what metaphors mean, and how we understand stories. He used an approach called ordinary language philosophy, which focuses on how words are used in everyday life. Another book, The World Viewed (1971), explored photography, film, and modern art.
One of his most famous books is The Claim of Reason: Wittgenstein, Skepticism, Morality, and Tragedy (1979). This book is considered a central part of his work. In Pursuits of Happiness (1981), Cavell wrote about seven classic Hollywood comedies, including The Lady Eve and It Happened One Night. He called these films "The Comedy of Remarriage." He argued that these movies showed how true happiness isn't just getting what you want, but about growing and changing with your partner.
In Cities of Words (2004), Cavell explored the idea of "moral perfectionism." This is a way of thinking about how people can improve themselves morally. His last book, Little Did I Know: Excerpts from Memory (2010), was his autobiography. In it, he shared stories from his life to explain how his philosophical ideas developed.
Awards and Recognition
Stanley Cavell received many honors and awards throughout his life.
Honorary Degrees
- Doctor of Humane Letters, Kalamazoo College, 1980
- Doctor of Letters, Iona College, 1985
- Doctor of Humane Letters, University of Chicago, 1987
- Docteur, Honoris Causa, Université de Strasbourg, 1996
- Doctor Philosophiae Honoris Causa, Hebrew University, 1997
- Doctor of Letters, Honoris Causa, University of East Anglia, 2009
- Docteur, Honoris Causa, Ecole Normale Superieure, Lyon, 2010
- Doctor of Letters, Wesleyan University, 2010
- Doctor of Theology, Institut Protestant de Théologie de Paris, 2010
Selected Honors
- Junior Fellow, Society of Fellows, Harvard University, 1953–56
- Fellow, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey, 1962-1963
- Distinguished Teaching Award, University of California, Berkeley, 1961
- Fellow, Wesleyan University Center for the Humanities, 1970-1971
- Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1978-
- Fellow, Macarthur Foundation
- President, American Philosophical Association (Eastern Division), 1996–97
- 2000 Centennial Medalist, Harvard University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
- Romanell Phi Beta Kappa Professorship, 2004–05
- Member, American Philosophical Society, 2005-
See also
In Spanish: Stanley Cavell para niños
- List of American philosophers
