American Academy of Arts and Sciences Elects National and International Scholars, Artists, Philanthropists, Business and Civic Leaders

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., April 23, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- The American Academy of Arts and Sciences today announced the election of 204 new members. They include some of the world's most accomplished scholars, scientists, writers, artists, and civic, corporate, and philanthropic leaders.

The list of the new members is located at https://www.amacad.org/members.aspx.

One of the nation's most prestigious honorary societies, the Academy is also a leading center for independent policy research. Members contribute to Academy publications and studies of science and technology policy, energy and global security, social policy and American institutions, and the humanities, arts, and education.

 "It is a privilege to honor these men and women for their extraordinary individual accomplishments," said Don Randel, Chair of the Academy's Board of Directors. "The knowledge and expertise of our members give the Academy a unique capacity – and responsibility – to provide practical policy solutions to the pressing challenges of the day. We look forward to engaging our new members in this work."

Members of the 2014 class include winners of the Nobel Prize; the Wolf Prize; the Pulitzer Prize; National Medal of the Arts; MacArthur, Guggenheim, and Fulbright Fellowships; and Grammy, Emmy, Oscar, and Tony Awards. 

Scientists in the new class include: astrophysicist Neta A. Bahcall, who combines observational data from large-scale surveys to determine the structure in the universe; theoretical computer scientist Jennifer Tour Chayes, known for her work on phase transitions; Jerry F. Franklin, leading visionary in forest ecology and conservation; author of the influential book Langlands Correspondence for Loop Groups, Edward Frenkel; Tamas F. Freund, who discovered new molecular pathways in nerve cell communication; epigenetics researcher Shiv Grewal; computer scientist Daphne Koller, cofounder of Coursera; Stephen Quake, whose research seeks to improve biological measurement techniques; Dan Shechtman, winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Chemistry; Richard Silverman, inventor of Lyrica™; epidemiologist Jaime Sepulveda; and theoretical physicist Anthony Zee, a leader in particle theory.

Social scientists in the new class include: Deborah Loewenberg Ball, a leader in teacher education development with a focus on mathematics teaching; University of California, Berkeley's former Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost George W. Breslauer, a scholar in Soviet and post-Soviet studies; Raj Chetty, among the most cited young economists in the world, who works on tax policy, social insurance, and education policy; Timothy Earle, an archaeologist who specializes in the study of chiefly societies and ancient kingdoms; Michael Greenstone, former Chief Economist for President Obama's Council of Economic Advisers; political scientist Paula D. McClain, the recognized authority on race and racism in America; Judge Lee Rosenthal, leader in civil justice reform; sociologist Sherry Turkle, who explores human relationships with technology; and Janet Werker, a psychologist who focuses on understanding the roots of language acquisition.

In the humanities and the arts, new members include: Pulitzer Prize winners Jules Feiffer and Annie Proulx; scholar of American religious history, Catherine L. Albanese; artist Chris Burden; James Chandler, a scholar of British literature; philosopher John B. Cobb; Renaissance literature scholar Margaret W. Ferguson; poet Linda Gregerson; curator Maxwell K. Hearn; novelist and screenwriter John Irving; U.S. historian and The New Yorker writer Jill Lepore; choreographer Tere O'Connor; Jeffersonian scholar Peter S. Onuf; director and actor Al Pacino; short story writer George Saunders; science historian Londa Schiebinger; musician-composer Ralph Stanley; and novelist and English and comparative literature scholar Ngugi wa Thiong'o.

Elected in public affairs and journalism are: former U.S. Ambassador to Israel and current U.S. Special Envoy for Israeli-Palestine Negotiations Martin S. Indyk; William Kling, Founder and President Emeritus of American Public Media Group; Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Ann Marie Lipinski; former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich; and Chief Judge Patti B. Saris, Chair of the U.S Sentencing Commission.

Philanthropists and business leaders in the 2014 class include: Charles F. Feeney, Founding Chair of Atlantic Philanthropies; Sherry Lansing, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Sherry Lansing Foundation; Susan Woods Paine, patron of the arts and education in the Boston area; John W. Rogers, Jr., Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer of Ariel Investments; and Jerry I. Speyer, Chairman and Co-Executive Officer of Tishman Speyer, a global real estate firm.

The new class also includes leaders of educational, cultural, and philanthropic organizations, among them: Anthony K. Cheetham, Treasurer and Vice President of the Royal Society; Nicholas B. Dirks, Chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley; Christopher L. Eisgruber, President of Princeton University; Adam Gamoran, President of the William T. Grant Foundation; Nathan O. Hatch, President of the Wake Forest University; Irene Hirano Inouye, President of the U.S.-Japan Council; Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; and Michael S. McPherson, President of the Spencer Foundation.

The Academy elected 16 Foreign Honorary Members from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Ghana, Hungary, Israel, Mexico, Spain, and the United Kingdom. They include: artist El Anatsui, economist Manuel Arellano, writer A. S. Byatt, and chemist Peter P. Edwards.

The new class will be inducted at a ceremony on October 11, 2014, at the Academy's headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Since its founding in 1780, the Academy has elected leading "thinkers and doers" from each generation, including George Washington and Benjamin Franklin in the eighteenth century, Daniel Webster and Ralph Waldo Emerson in the nineteenth, and Margaret Meade and Martin Luther King, Jr. in the twentieth. The current membership includes more than 250 Nobel laureates and more than 60 Pulitzer Prize winners.

SOURCE American Academy of Arts and Sciences