Avital ronell biography

We Welcome Avital Ronell  as one of the Advisory Board Member of the "Srishti Madurai" student genderqueer group along with Most Rev. Anjali Gopalan.

Avital Ronell is a American philosopher who contributes to the fields of continental philosophy, literary studies, psychoanalysis, feminist philosophy, political philosophy, and ethics. She is a University Professor in the Humanities and in the Departments of Germanic Languages and Literature and Comparative Literature at New York University where she co-directs the Trauma and Violence Trans-disciplinary Studies Program. She is also professor of Philosophy in The European Graduation School.  She is a great supporter of Genderqueer cause. 

Avital Ronell, Ph.D., was born in Prague. Her parents were Israeli diplomats who returned to Israel before going to New York. Avital Ronell studied at the Hermeneutics Institute in Berlin with Jacob Taubes, ultimately earned her doctorate at Princeton University, and then worked with Jacques Derrida and Hélène Cixous in Paris. She was professor of comparative literature and theory at the University of California at Berkeley for several years before eventually returning to New York, where she currently is chair of the Department of Germanic Languages and Literature and teaches German and comparative literature and theory – in addition to her yearly Fall semester seminar about Derrida – and where she continues to churn out a breathtaking range of deconstructive rereadings of everything from technology, the Gulf War, and AIDS, to opera, addiction, and stupidity.

As one of the first translators of Jacques Derrida’s work into English, she in effect introduced his work to the American academy. Avital Ronell has continued the deep reading projects of her former teachers (and friends), focusing her attention on such varied as

‘Born in Prague to Israeli diplomats, Avital Ronell’s cultural background appears quite diverse. The Jewish family moved from Prague to Tel Aviv to New York. After receiving a Bachelor or Arts from Middlebury College, Vermont, she went to Berlin to study at the Hermeneutics Institute under Jacob Taubes. She ultimately earned her Doctorate in German studies at Princeton University with a dissertation on Goethe, Kafka, and Hölderlin. She met Jacques Derrida in 1979, with whom she came to develop a friendship and later taught an annual seminar on Literature and Philosophy at New York University. In the 1980s, she translated the philosopher’s works and also worked together with Professor Hélène Cixous at Université Paris VIII. Deeply influenced by deconstructionism as both an academic and a performance artist, she was described by her editor Diane Davis as at once “a consummate scholar and an anti-scholar”. Avital Ronell subsequently taught at the University of California at Berkeley from 1984 to 1995. Since then a Professor of German, Comparative Literature and English at New York University, her areas of interest range from literature to philosophy (particularly deconstruction), psychoanalysis, feminism, technology and media, trauma and violence studies, and performance art. She retains strong ties with Europe, and famously worked with French philosophers François Noudelmann, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy. She also regularly teaches at the European Graduate School, in Saas-Fee, Switzerland, where she holds the Jacques Derrida Chair of Media and Philosophy.

‘A bold and pioneering philosopher, she is considered one of America’s leading deconstructionists. According to Diane Davis, “it’s tempting to say that she does French theory American-style within a Germanic frame and marked by a Talmudic meticulousness”, which would prove quite an accurate depiction, if it were not for her acute sense of irony towards scholarly tradition. She

PERSONAL: Born April 15, 1956, in Prague, Czechoslovakia; daughter of Paul G. and Evelyn (Garfunkel) Ronell. Education:Princeton University, Ph.D. (Germanic languages and literature), 1979. Politics: "Left of left."

ADDRESSES: Office—Department of Germanic Languages and Literature, New York University, 736 Broadway, New York, NY 10003. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:University of California, Berkeley, associate professor of comparative literature, beginning 1986; New York University, New York, NY, currently professor of German, English, and comparative literature and chair of Department of Germanic Languages and Literature. Summer seminar professor, European Graduate School, Saas-Fee, Switzerland.

AWARDS, HONORS: Fulbright-Hayes fellow; award from Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

WRITINGS:

Dictations: On Haunted Writing, Indiana University Press (Bloomington, IN), 1986, revised with new preface, University of Nebraska Press (Lincoln, NE), 1993.

The Telephone Book: Technology, Schizophrenia, Electric Speech, University of Nebraska Press (Lincoln, NE), 1989.

Crack Wars: Literature-Addiction-Mania, University of Nebraska Press (Lincoln, NE), 1992.

Finitude's Score: Essays for the End of the Millennium, University of Nebraska Press (Lincoln, NE), 1994.

Stupidity, University of Illinois Press (Urbana, IL), 2002.

Contributor of numerous articles to periodicals. Contributor of essays to Thirteen Alumni Artists, by Lisa Philips, Middlebury College Museum of Art, (Middlebury, VT), 2000.

WORK IN PROGRESS: The Test Drive.

SIDELIGHTS: A native of Czechoslovakia, professor and writer Avital Ronell plays to a global classroom. She lived in Israel and completed her education in Berlin and Paris, where Ronell studied under the groundbreaking feminist Helene Cixous. She has taught on both coasts of the United States and in many countries, most notably Switzerland, where Ronell conducts seminars at the Eur

American philosopher

Avital Ronell (AH-vit-əl roh-NEL; born 15 April 1952) is an American academic who writes about continental philosophy, literary studies, psychoanalysis, political philosophy, and ethics. She is a professor in the humanities and in the departments of Germanic languages and literature and comparative literature at New York University, where she co-directs the trauma and violence transdisciplinary studies program. As Jacques Derrida Professor of Philosophy, Ronell also teaches at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee.

She has written about such topics as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe; Alexander Graham Bell and the telephone; the structure of the test in legal, pharmaceutical, artistic, scientific, Zen, and historical domains; stupidity; the disappearance of authority; childhood; and deficiency. Ronell is a founding editor of the journal Qui Parle.

An eleven-month investigation at New York University determined that Ronell sexually harassed a male graduate student, and the university suspended her wit