Wilfred M. McClay
Curriculum Vitae
ADDRESS
SunTrust Bank Chair of Excellence in HumanitiesUniversity of Tennessee at Chattanooga
Dept. 6256 (Fletcher 412C)
615 McCallie Avenue
Chattanooga, TN 37403-2598
Phone: 423-425-5202, 5206
Fax: 423-425-5393
E-mail: Bill-McClay@utc.edu
EDUCATION
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MarylandPh.D. in History, 1987.
St. John's College,
Annapolis, Maryland
B.A. cum laude, 1974.
UNIVERSITY APPOINTMENTS
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Chattanooga, TNSunTrust Bank Chair of Excellence in Humanities and Professor of History, 1999---.
Georgetown University,
Washington, DC
Royden B. Davis Chair in Interdisciplinary Studies, 1998-99.
Tulane University, New
Orleans, Louisiana
Associate Professor of History, 1993-99; Assistant Professor of
History, 1987-1993.
University of Dallas,
Irving, Texas
Assistant Professor of History, 1986-87.
Towson State University,
Towson, Maryland,
Instructor in History, 1985-86.
RESEARCH INTERESTS
The intellectual and cultural history of the United States, with particular attention to the social and political thought of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; the theory and practice of intellectual biography; and the history of religious thought and institutions.WORKS IN PROGRESS
An intellectual biography of the American sociologist David Riesman.PUBLICATIONS
Authored and Edited Books
Pieces of a Dream: Historical and Critical Essays (in preparation).Religion Returns to the Public Square: Faith and Policy in America (Woodrow Wilson Center/Johns Hopkins, 2003).
A Student's Guide to U.S. History (ISI Books, 2000).
General Editor, with Jean Bethke Elshtain and Ted V. McAllister, of American Intellectual Culture (Rowman and Littlefield), a book series devoted to various issues in American intellectual history which commenced publication in Spring 1998.
The Masterless: Self and Society in Modern America (North Carolina, 1994). Winner of the 1995 Merle Curti Award in Intellectual History, awarded by the Organization of American Historians.
Edition, with new editorial introduction, of John W. Burgess, The Foundations of Political Science (Transaction, 1994).
Edition, with new
editorial introduction, of Walter
Lippmann,
The
Phantom Public (Transaction, 1993).
Selected Articles, Essays, and Review Essays
“Science and Self-Government,” a contribution to a symposium on “Biotechnology and the Good Life,” in The New Atlantis: A Journal of Technology & Society, Number 4, Winter 2004, 17-22.“The Soul of a Nation,” in a special number of The Public Interest entitled “Religion in
“Ideas,” in Stephen J. Whitfield, ed., A Companion to 20th-Century
“The Mixed Nature of American Patriotism,” in Society, November/December 2003, 37-45.
“The Ph.D. Octopus, 100 Years On,” in Books & Culture, November/December 2003, 6.
“Emerson and Us,” in Weekly Standard, September 1/
“Tradition, History, and Sequoias,” in First Things, March 2003, 41-47.
“Introduction,” to Patrick Swan, ed., Alger Hiss, Whittaker Chambers, and the Schism in the American Soul (ISI Books, 2003), 1-10.
“The Shadow of Mastery,” in Touchstone, March 2002, 19-21.
“The Continuing Irony of American History,” in First Things, Number 120, February 2002, 20-25. This essay also appears in John Wilson, ed., The Best Christian Writing 2004 (Jossey-Bass, 2004), 99-116.
“Teaching Religion in
“
“History for a Democracy,” in Wilson Quarterly, Volume 25, No. 4, Autumn 2001, 99-106.
“Individualism and Its Discontents,” in Virginia Quarterly Review, Vol. 77, No. 3, Summer 2001, 391-405. A shorter version of this essay also appeared in The Responsive Community, Vol. 11, No. 4, Fall 2001, 14-25.
“The American Scholar: Kenneth Lynn, 1923-2001,” in Weekly Standard,
“Remembering Santayana,” in Wilson Quarterly, Vol. 25, No. 3, Summer 2001, 48-63. (A biographical account and analysis of the American philosopher George Santayana.)
“Individualism and the Self,” in Mary Kupiec Cayton and Peter W. Williams, eds., The Encyclopedia of American Cultural and Intellectual History (Charles Scribners Sons, 2001), 3:63-71.
“The God of Princes,” in Touchstone, March 2001, 15-18. (An analysis of the uses of public religion in the 2000 presidential campaign.)
“Clio’s Makeshift Laboratory,” in First Things, Number 111, March 2001, 23-27. This essay also appears in John Wilson, ed., The Best Christian Writing 2002 (Harper San Francisco, 2002), 114-29.
“Defining the Humanities Up,” in First Things, Number 109, January 2001, 9-11.
“Two Concepts of Secularism,” in Wilson Quarterly, Summer 2000, Vol. 24, No. 3, 54-71. This essay also appears under the same title in a longer and fully annotated form in a special number of Journal of Policy History entitled “Religion, Politics, and Policy,” Vol. 13, No. 1 (Spring 2001), 47-72, and in Religion Returns to the Public Square: Faith and Policy in Modern America (Johns Hopkins, 2002), 31-62.
"The Judeo-Christian Tradition and the Liberal Tradition in the American Republic," in Gary Quinlivan, ed., Public Morality, Civic Virtue, and the Problem of Modern Liberalism (Eerdmans, 2000), 124-37.
"Croly's Progressive America," in The Public Interest, Number 137, Fall 1999, 56-72.
"Yesterday's Philosopher of Tomorrow," in Weekly Standard, June 23, 1999, 28-33. (Reassessment of the career and influence of American philosopher John Dewey.)
"Hazards of New Fortune," in First Things, Number 88, December 1998, 14-16.
"Is America an Experiment?" in The Public Interest, Fall 1998, 3-22. This essay also appears in an extended and annotated form in Gary Gregg III, ed., Vital Remnants: America's Founding and the Western Tradition (ISI Books, 1999), 1-32.
"Fifty Years of The Lonely Crowd," in Wilson Quarterly, Vol. 22, No. 3, Summer 1998, 34-42.
"Communitarianism and the Federal Idea," in Peter Lawler, ed., Community and Political Thought Today (Praeger, 1998), 101-108.
"Mr. Emerson's Tombstone," in First Things, Number 83, May 1998, 16-22. This essay also appears in extended and annotated form in Bruce Frohnen and George Carey, eds., Community and Tradition (Rowman and Littlefield, 1998), 85-101.
"Filling the Hollow Core: Religious Faith and the Postmodern University," in Gregory Wolfe, ed., The New Religious Humanists: A Reader (Free Press, 1997), 231-40.
"The Worst Decision Since Dred Scott?" Commentary, Vol. 104, No. 4, October 1997, 52-54.
"Asking 'Our' Questions," in Intellectual History Newsletter, Vol. 18, December 1996, 12-15. (Contribution to a symposium on "Intellectual History in an Age of Cultural Studies.")
"Historical Writing in an Age of Interpretation," Academic Questions, Vol. 9, No. 5, Special Issue 1997, 55-58.
"The Mystic Chords of Memory: Acquiring Historical Consciousness," in History Matters!, Vol. 9, No. 2, October 1996, 1-5. (Published by the National Council for History Education.)
"The Soul of Man Under Federalism," First Things, Number 64, June/July 1996, 21-26. Also reprinted in The Good Society (the journal of the Committee on the Political Economy of the Good Society), Vol. 6, No. 3, Fall 1996, pp. 16-20.
"A More Perfect Union? Toward a New Federalism," Commentary, Vol. 100, No. 3, September 1995, 28-33.
"Where Have We Come Since the 1950s? Thoughts on Materialism and American Social Character," in Robert Wuthnow, ed., Rethinking Materialism: Perspectives on the Spiritual Dimension of Economic Behavior (Eerdmans, 1995), 25-71.
"The State of American Higher Education: A Conversation with David Riesman," Academic Questions, Vol. 8, No. 1, Winter 1994-95, 14-32; and Vol. 8, No. 2, Spring 1995, 32-48.
"Edward Bellamy and the Politics of Meaning," American Scholar, Vol. 64, No. 2, Spring 1995, 264-71. Also reprinted in Current, Number 375, September 1995, 31-37.
"The Socialization of Desire," Society, Vol. 32, No. 4, May/June 1995, 75-83.
"The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Freelancer," Reviews in American History, Vol. 23, No. 1, March 1995, 123-28. (Review of Daniel Horowitz, Vance Packard and American Social Criticism.)
"The Hipster and the Organization Man," First Things, Number 43, May 1994, 23-30.
"Historical Research on the Refugee Intellectuals: Problems and Prospects," International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, Vol. 7, No. 3, Spring 1994, 513-24.
"Clio in 2013: The Writing and Teaching of History in the Next Twenty Years," Academic Questions, Vol. 7, No. 1, Winter 1993-94, 20-28.
"John W. Burgess and the Search for Cohesion in American Political Thought," Polity, Vol. 26, No. 1, Fall 1993, 51-73.
"The Strange Career of The Lonely Crowd: Or, The Antinomies of Autonomy," in Thomas L. Haskell and Richard F. Teichgraeber, eds., The Culture of the Market: Historical Essays (Cambridge, 1993), 395-440.
"A Tent on the Porch: The Divided Heart of Frederick Jackson Turner," American Heritage, July/August 1993, 88-93. (A reassessment of Turner's "frontier thesis," published on the hundredth anniversary of his 1893 paper "The Significance of the Frontier in American History.")
"Religion in Politics, Politics in Religion," Commentary, Vol. 86, No. 4, October 1988, 43-49. Selections were reprinted in the inaugural issue (Spring 1989) of In Trust (published by the Washington Theological Foundation and the Lilly Endowment), 28-30. Also reprinted in Patrick Allitt, ed., Major Problems in American Religious History (Houghton Mifflin, 1999).
"A Babylonian in Zion," Reviews in American History, Vol. 16, No. 1, March 1988, 73-78. (Review of John McCormick, George Santayana: A Biography.)
"Lewis Mumford: From the Belly of the Whale," American Scholar, Vol. 57, No. 1, Winter 1988, 111-18.
"Weimar in America," American Scholar, Vol. 55, No. 1, Winter 1985?86, 119-28.
"Two Versions of the Genteel Tradition: Santayana and Brooks," New England Quarterly, Vol. 55, No. 3, September 1982, 368-91.
PROFESSIONAL AND EDITORIAL APPOINTMENTS
Contributing Editor, Historically Speaking, 2004---.Editorial Board, First Things, 2003---.
Editorial Board, Society, 2003---.
Editorial Board, The Public Interest, 2002---.
Member, National Council on the Humanities, 2002---.
Member, Board of Governors, The Historical Society, 2002---.
Fellow, Society of Scholars, James Madison Program,
Contributing Editor, Touchstone, 2001---.
Editorial Board, American Quarterly (journal of the American Studies Association), 1999-2002.
Board of Editorial Advisors, Wilson Quarterly (journal of the
Editorial Advisory Board, The University Bookman, 1999---.
Editorial Board, Continuity: A Journal of History, 1997---.
General Editor, American Intellectual Culture, a book series published by Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 1997---.
Editorial Board, American Quarterly (journal of the American Studies Association), 1999--2002.
Series Editor, American Intellectual Culture, a book series published by Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 1998---.
HONORS AND AWARDS
Appointed SunTrust Bank Chair of Excellence in Humanities, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, 1999---.Appointed to Royden B. Davis Chair in Interdisciplinary Studies, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C. Established by Georgetown as a tribute to its former Dean, and endowed by the gifts of alumni and friends of the University, the Davis Chair was created to enable the University "to honor individuals distinguished in the humanities, arts, sciences, or social sciences with a year's residence at the University."
Templeton Honor Rolls, 1997, awarded by the John Templeton Foundation for distinguished teaching and scholarship in American higher education.
Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 1997-98.
University Fellowship, National Endowment for the Humanities, 1997-98.
1996 Faculty Research Award, Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Tulane University, awarded annually to a single member of the Tulane LAS faculty for outstanding recent achievements.
1995 Merle Curti Award in Intellectual History, for the best book in that field published in the years 1993-1994, awarded by the Organization of American Historians to The Masterless: Self and Society in Modern America.
Howard Foundation Fellow, 1993-94.
National Academy of Education, Spencer Postdoctoral Fellow, 1993-94.
Master Teacher, Pew Fellows Program, Pew Charitable Trusts, 1992-93.
Earhart Foundation Research Fellow, Spring 1991.
Arthur O. Lovejoy Honorary Fellow, Department of History, Johns Hopkins University, 1984-85.
Danforth Graduate Fellow, Danforth Foundation, 1980-84.
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