Coordinates	51°37′″N21°19′″N
Name	Harvard University
Image name	Harvard_Wreath_Logo_1.svg
Motto	''Veritas''
Established	September 8, 1636 (OS)
Mottoeng	Truth
Type	Private
Calendar	Semester
Endowment	US$27.4 billion
Harvard corporation chairman	James R. Houghton
President	Drew Gilpin Faust
Students	21,225
Undergrad	7,181 total6,655 College526 Extension
Postgrad	14,044
Staff	2,497 non-medical10,674 medical
Faculty	2,107
City	Cambridge
State	Massachusetts
Country	U.S.
Campus	Urban (Main campus) (Medical campus) (Allston campus)
Athletics	41 Varsity TeamsIvy LeagueNCAA Division I
Colors	Crimson
Free label	Newspaper
Free	''The Harvard Crimson''
Nickname	Harvard Crimson
Website	harvard.edu
Logo
Publictransit	Harvard (MBTA station) }}

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation (officially ''The President and Fellows of Harvard College'') chartered in the country. Harvard's history, influence, and wealth have made it one of the most prestigious universities in the world.

Harvard was named after its first benefactor, John Harvard. Although it was never formally affiliated with a church, the college primarily trained Congregationalist and Unitarian clergy. Harvard's curriculum and students became increasingly secular throughout the 18th century and by the 19th century had emerged as the central cultural establishment among Boston elites. Following the American Civil War, President Charles W. Eliot's forty year tenure (1869–1909) transformed the college and affiliated professional schools into a centralized research university, and Harvard became a founding member of the Association of American Universities in 1900. James Bryant Conant led the university through the Great Depression and World War II and began to reform the curriculum and liberalize admissions after the war. The undergraduate college became coeducational after its 1977 merger with Radcliffe College. Drew Gilpin Faust was elected the 28th president in 2007 and is the first woman to lead the university. Harvard has the largest financial endowment of any academic institution in the world, standing at $27.4 billion as of September 2010.

The university comprises eleven separate academic units — ten faculties and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study — with campuses throughout the Boston metropolitan area. Harvard's main campus is centered on Harvard Yard in Cambridge, approximately northwest of downtown Boston. The business school and athletics facilities, including Harvard Stadium, are located across the Charles River in Allston and the medical, dental, and public health schools are located in the Longwood Medical Area.

As of 2010, Harvard employs about 2,100 faculty to teach and advise approximately 6,700 undergraduates (Harvard College) and 14,500 graduate and professional students. Eight U.S. presidents have graduated from Harvard and 75 Nobel Laureates have been affiliated with the university as students, faculty, or staff. Harvard is also the alma mater of sixty-two living billionaires, the most in the country. The Harvard University Library is the largest academic library in the United States, and the second largest library in the country.

The Harvard Crimson competes in 41 intercollegiate sports in the NCAA Division I Ivy League. Harvard has an intense athletic rivalry with Yale University traditionally culminating in ''The Game'', although the Harvard–Yale Regatta predates the football game.

History

Colonial

Harvard was founded in 1636 by vote of the Great and General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, making it the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States. Initially called "New College" or "the college at New Towne", the institution was renamed ''Harvard College'' on March 13, 1639. It was named after John Harvard, a young English clergyman from Southwark, London, an alumnus of the University of Cambridge (after which Cambridge, Massachusetts is named), who bequeathed the College his library of four hundred books and £779 pounds sterling, which was half of his estate. The charter creating the corporation of Harvard College came in 1650. In the early years, the College trained many Puritan ministers. The college offered a classic academic course based on the English university model—many leaders in the colony had attended Cambridge University—but one consistent with the prevailing Puritan philosophy. The college was never affiliated with any particular denomination, but many of its earliest graduates went on to become clergymen in Congregational and Unitarian churches throughout New England. An early brochure, published in 1643, described the founding of the college as a response to the desire "to advance learning and perpetuate it to posterity, dreading to leave an illiterate ministry to the churches".

The leading Boston divine Increase Mather served as president from 1685 to 1701. In 1708, John Leverett became the first president who was not also a clergyman, which marked a turning of the College toward intellectual independence from Puritanism.

19th century

Religion and philosophy

The takeover of Harvard by the Unitarians in 1805 resulted in the secularization of the American college. By 1850 Harvard was the "Unitarian Vatican." The "liberals" (Unitarians) allied themselves with high Federalists and began to create a set of private societies and institutions meant to shore up their cultural and political authority, a movement that prefigured the emergence of the Boston Brahmin class. On the other hand, the theological conservatives used print media to argue for the maintenance of open debate and democratic governance through a diverse public sphere, seeing the liberals' movement as an attempt to create a cultural oligarchy in opposition to Congregationalist tradition and republican political principles.

In 1846, the natural history lectures of Louis Agassiz were acclaimed both in New York and on the campus at Harvard College. Agassiz's approach was distinctly idealist and posited Americans' 'participation in the Divine Nature' and the possibility of understanding 'intellectual existences.' Agassiz's perspective on science combined observation with intuition and the assumption that one can grasp the 'divine plan' in all phenomena. When it came to explaining life-forms, Agassiz resorted to matters of shape based on a presumed archetype for his evidence. This dual view of knowledge was in concert with the teachings of Common Sense Realism derived from Scottish philosophers Thomas Reid and Dugald Stewart, whose works were part of the Harvard curriculum at the time. The popularity of Agassiz's efforts to 'soar with Plato' probably also derived from other writings to which Harvard students were exposed, including Platonic treatises by Ralph Cudworth, John Norris, and, in a Romantic vein, Samuel Coleridge. The library records at Harvard reveal that the writings of Plato and his early modern and Romantic followers were almost as regularly read during the 19th century as those of the 'official philosophy' of the more empirical and more deistic Scottish school.

Charles W. Eliot, president 1869–1909, eliminated the favored position of Christianity from the curriculum while opening it to student self-direction. While Eliot was the most crucial figure in the secularization of American higher education, he was motivated not by a desire to secularize education, but by Transcendentalist Unitarian convictions. Derived from William Ellery Channing and Ralph Waldo Emerson, these convictions were focused on the dignity and worth of human nature, the right and ability of each person to perceive truth, and the indwelling God in each person.

20th century

During the 20th century, Harvard's international reputation grew as a burgeoning endowment and prominent professors expanded the university's scope. Explosive growth in the student population continued with the addition of new graduate schools and the expansion of the undergraduate program. Radcliffe College, established in 1879 as sister school of Harvard College, became one of the most prominent schools for women in the United States.

Meritocracy

James Bryant Conant (president, 1933–1953) reinvigorated creative scholarship to guarantee its preeminence among research institutions. He saw higher education as a vehicle of opportunity for the talented rather than an entitlement for the wealthy, so Conant devised programs to identify, recruit, and support talented youth. In 1943, he asked the faculty make a definitive statement about what general education ought to be, at the secondary as well as the college level. The resulting ''Report'', published in 1945, was one of the most influential manifestos in the history of American education in the 20th century.

In 1945–1960 admissions policies were opened up to bring in students from a more diverse applicant pool. No longer drawing mostly from rich alumni of select New England prep schools, the undergraduate college was now open to striving middle class students from public schools; many more Jews and Catholics were admitted, but few blacks, Hispanics or Asians.

Women

Women remained segregated at Radcliffe, though more and more took Harvard classes. Nonetheless, Harvard's undergraduate population remained predominantly male, with about four men attending Harvard College for every woman studying at Radcliffe. Following the merger of Harvard and Radcliffe admissions in 1977, the proportion of female undergraduates steadily increased, mirroring a trend throughout higher education in the United States. Harvard's graduate schools, which had accepted females and other groups in greater numbers even before the college, also became more diverse in the post-World War II period.

In 1999, Radcliffe College, founded in 1879 as the "Harvard Annex for Women", merged formally with Harvard University, becoming the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.

Drew Gilpin Faust, the Dean at Radcliffe, became the first woman president of Harvard in 2007.

Liberalism

Harvard and its affiliates, like many American universities, are considered by some to be politically liberal (left of center). Conservative author William F. Buckley, Jr. quipped that he would rather be governed by the first 2000 names in the Boston phone book than by the Harvard faculty, Richard Nixon famously referred to Harvard as the "Kremlin on the Charles" around 1970, and Vice President George H.W. Bush disparaged what he saw to be Harvard's liberalism during the 1988 presidential election. Republicans remain a small minority of faculty, and the University has refused to officially recognize the Harvard Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) program — forcing students to commission through nearby MIT. The Harvard College Handbook explains, "Current federal policy of excluding known lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals from admission to ROTC or of discharging them from service is inconsistent with Harvard’s values as stated in its policy on discrimination." In 2011, Harvard announced that it will reinstate the ROTC program, following the repeal of Don't ask don't tell.

President Lawrence Summers resigned his presidency in 2006. His resignation came just one week before a second planned vote of no confidence by the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Former president Derek Bok served as interim president. Members of Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences, which instructs graduate students in GSAS and undergraduates in Harvard College, had passed an earlier motion of "lack of confidence" in Summers' leadership on March 15, 2005 by a 218–185 vote, with 18 abstentions. The 2005 motion was precipitated by comments about the causes of gender demographics in academia made at a closed academic conference and leaked to the press. In response, Summers convened two committees to study this issue: the Task Force on Women Faculty and the Task Force on Women in Science and Engineering. Summers had also pledged $50 million to support their recommendations and other proposed reforms. Drew Gilpin Faust is the 28th president of Harvard. An American historian, former dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and Lincoln Professor of History at Harvard University, Faust is the first female president in the university's history.

Administration and organization

A faculty of approximately 2,160 professors, lecturers, and instructors serve as of school year 2008-09, with 6,715 undergraduate and 12,424 graduate students. The school color is crimson, which is also the name of the Harvard sports teams and the daily newspaper, ''The Harvard Crimson''. The color was unofficially adopted (in preference to magenta) by an 1875 vote of the student body, although the association with some form of red can be traced back to 1858, when Charles William Eliot, a young graduate student who would later become Harvard's 21st and longest-serving president (1869–1909), bought red bandanas for his crew so they could more easily be distinguished by spectators at a regatta.

Harvard has a friendly rivalry with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which dates back to 1900 when a merger of the two schools was frequently discussed and at one point officially agreed upon (ultimately canceled by Massachusetts courts). Today, the two schools cooperate as much as they compete, with many joint conferences and programs, including the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, the Broad Institute, the Harvard-MIT Data Center and formerly the Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology. In addition, students at the two schools can cross-register in undergraduate or graduate classes without any additional fees, for credits toward their own school's degrees.

Organizations

Governing bodies

Harvard is governed by two boards, one of which is the President and Fellows of Harvard College, also known as the Harvard Corporation, founded in 1650, and the other is the Harvard Board of Overseers. The President of Harvard University is the day-to-day administrator of Harvard and is appointed by and responsible to the Harvard Corporation. There are 16,000 staff and faculty.

Faculties and schools

Harvard today has the following faculties, listed below in order of foundation:

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences and its sub-faculty, the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, which together serve:

* Harvard College, the university's undergraduate portion (1636)

* The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (organized 1872)

* The Harvard Division of Continuing Education, including Harvard Summer School (1871) and Harvard Extension School (1910).

Harvard Medical School (1782)

Harvard School of Dental Medicine (1867).

Harvard Divinity School (1816)

Harvard Law School (1817)

Harvard Business School (1908)

Graduate School of Design (1914)

Harvard Graduate School of Education (1920)

Harvard School of Public Health (1922)

Harvard Kennedy School (1936)

In 1999, the former Radcliffe College was reorganized as the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.

In February 2007, the Harvard Corporation and Overseers formally approved the Harvard Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences to become the 14th School of Harvard (Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences).

The Real Colegio Complutense at Harvard (Cambridge, Massachusetts): The RCC was founded in 1990 as a joint cooperative institution to foster intellectual and scientific interaction between Harvard University and Complutense, with the support of HM King Juan Carlos I, HM Queen Sofia of Spain and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. It follows the tradition of the Royal Spanish College, founded in 1364 to host Spanish Visiting Scholars at the University of Bologna. The RCC accord is the only one of its sort ever to have been approved by Harvard. The institution is directed jointly by the President of Harvard and the Rector of Complutense University, with an academic council formed by 5 Harvard professors and 5 Complutense professors. It permits a select number of Complutense professors to conduct their research at Harvard as Visiting Scholars. ''RCC Fellows'' enjoy the same privileges as Harvard's non-tenured Faculty. Each year the institution hosts the RCC Fellows Lectures, a conference cycle during which the Visiting Scholars deliver lectures revealing the results of their investigations to an audience of Harvard professors and students. Finally, it also permits a small number of students to attend doctoral school at the University as ''Research Associates'', under scholarships hosted by the Spanish Royal Family.

Endowment

Harvard has the largest university endowment in the world. At the end of June 2009, it was worth $25.7 billion, about 30% less than at the same time in 2008. In December 2008, Harvard announced that its endowment had lost 22% (approximately $8 billion) from July to October 2008, necessitating budget cuts. Later reports suggest the loss was actually more than double that figure, a reduction of nearly 50% of its endowment in the first four months alone. Forbes in March 2009 estimated the loss to be in the range of $12 billion. One of the most visible results of Harvard's attempt to re-balance its budget was their halting of construction of the $1.2 billion Allston Science Complex that had been scheduled to be completed by 2011, resulting in protests from local residents.

Large endowments like Harvard's have been criticized for "hoarding" money. Most philanthropies are required by federal law to distribute 5% of their assets per year, but university endowments are not required to spend anything. Many universities with very large endowments would require an expenditure of less than 5% of their endowment to cover full tuition for all their students. For example, it has been estimated that if in 2006 all the Harvard students paid the maximum in tuition and fees, it would amount to less than $300 million. In 2007, if Harvard had allocated 6% of its $34.6 billion endowment toward tuition, all Harvard undergraduate and graduate students could attend for free and the university would still have $1.3 billion left over. It would require less than 1% of the endowments of Harvard and Yale to allow all students to attend tuition-free; Stanford, MIT, Princeton and Rice would require less than 2% of their endowments and 29 schools would require less than 3% for all their students to attend tuition-free. Despite the decreasing values of endowments, congressmen, including Charles Grassley, have questioned whether the endowments are contributing enough to maintain their tax-exempt status. Peter Hotez of George Washington University has claimed that pharmaceutical companies are contributing more to the poorest people than are wealthy universities.

Campus

Harvard's main campus is centered on Harvard Yard in Cambridge, approximately northwest of downtown Boston and extends into the surrounding Harvard Square neighborhood. Harvard Yard itself contains the central administrative offices and main libraries of the university, academic buildings including Sever Hall and University Hall, Memorial Church, and the majority of the freshman dormitories. Sophomore, junior, and senior undergraduates live in twelve residential Houses, nine of which are south of Harvard Yard along or near the Charles River. The other three are located in a residential neighborhood half a mile northwest of the Yard at the Quadrangle (commonly referred to as the Quad), which formerly housed Radcliffe College students until Radcliffe merged its residential system with Harvard. The Harvard MBTA station provides public transportation via bus service and the Red Line subway.

The Harvard Business School and many of the university's athletics facilities, including Harvard Stadium, are located on a campus opposite the Cambridge campus in Allston. The John W. Weeks Bridge is a pedestrian bridge over the Charles River connecting both campuses. The Harvard Medical School, Harvard School of Dental Medicine, and the Harvard School of Public Health are located on a campus in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area approximately southwest of downtown Boston and south of the Cambridge campus. A private shuttle bus connects the Longwood campus to the Cambridge campus via Massachusetts Avenue making stops in the Back Bay and at MIT as well.

Each residential house contains rooms for undergraduates, House masters, and resident tutors, as well as a dining hall, library, and various other student facilities. The facilities were made possible by a gift from Yale University alumnus Edward Harkness.

Radcliffe Yard, formerly the center of the campus of Radcliffe College (and now home of the Radcliffe Institute), is adjacent to the Graduate School of Education and the Cambridge Common.

From 2006 - 2008, Harvard University reported on-campus crime statistics that included 48 forcible sex offenses, 10 robberies, 15 aggravated assaults, 750 burglaries, and 12 cases of motor vehicle theft.

Satellite facilities

Apart from its major Cambridge/Allston and Longwood campuses, Harvard owns and operates Arnold Arboretum, in the Jamaica Plain area of Boston; the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, in Washington, D.C.; the Harvard Forest in Petersham, Massachusetts; and the Villa I Tatti research center in Florence and the Harvard Shanghai Center in China.

Major campus expansion

Throughout the past several years, Harvard has purchased large tracts of land in Allston, a walk across the Charles River from Cambridge, with the intent of major expansion southward. The university now owns approximately fifty percent more land in Allston than in Cambridge. Various proposals to connect the traditional Cambridge campus with the new Allston campus include new and enlarged bridges, a shuttle service and/or a tram. Ambitious plans also call for sinking part of Storrow Drive (at Harvard's expense) for replacement with park land and pedestrian access to the Charles River, as well as the construction of bike paths, and an intently planned fabric of buildings throughout the Allston campus. The institution asserts that such expansion will benefit not only the school, but surrounding community, pointing to such features as the enhanced transit infrastructure, possible shuttles open to the public, and park space which will also be publicly accessible.

One of the foremost driving forces for Harvard's pending expansion is its goal of substantially increasing the scope and strength of its science and technology programs. The university plans to construct two 500,000 square foot (50,000 m²) research complexes in Allston, which would be home to several interdisciplinary programs, including the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and an enlarged Engineering department.

In addition, Harvard intends to relocate the Harvard Graduate School of Education and the Harvard School of Public Health to Allston. The university also plans to construct several new undergraduate and graduate student housing centers in Allston, and it is considering large-scale museums and performing arts complexes as well. Unfortunately the large drop in endowment has halted these plans for now.

Sustainability

In 2000, Harvard hired a full-time campus sustainability professional and launched the Harvard Green Campus Initiative, since institutionalized as the Office for Sustainability (OFS). With a full-time staff of 25, dozens of student interns, and a $12 million Loan Fund for energy and water conservation projects, OFS is one of the most advanced campus sustainability programs in the country. Harvard was one of 27 schools to receive a grade of "A-" from the Sustainable Endowments Institute on its College Sustainability Report Card 2010, the highest grade awarded.

Academics

Harvard is a large, highly residential research university. The university has been accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges since 1929. The university offers 46 undergraduate concentrations (majors), 134 graduate degrees, and 32 professional degrees. For the 2008–2009 academic year, Harvard granted 1,664 baccalaureate degrees, 400 masters degrees, 512 doctoral degrees, and 4,460 professional degrees.

The four year, full-time undergraduate program comprises a minority of enrollments at the university and emphasizes instruction with an "arts & sciences focus". Between 1978 and 2008, entering students were required to complete a "Core Curriculum" of seven classes outside of their concentration. Since 2008, undergraduate students have been required to complete courses in eight General Education categories: Aesthetic and Interpretive Understanding, Culture and Belief, Empirical and Mathematical Reasoning, Ethical Reasoning, Science of Living Systems, Science of the Physical Universe, Societies of the World, and United States in the World. Harvard offers a comprehensive doctoral graduate program and there is a high level of coexistence between graduate and undergraduate degrees. The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, ''The New York Times'', and some students have criticized Harvard for its reliance on teaching fellows for some aspects of undergraduate education; they consider this to adversely affect the quality of education.

Harvard's academic programs operate on a semester calendar beginning in early September and ending in mid-May. Undergraduates typically take four half-courses per term and must maintain a four-course rate average to be considered full time. In many concentrations, students can elect to pursue a basic program or a honors-eligible program requiring a senior thesis and/or advanced course work. Students graduating in the top 4-5% of the class are awarded degrees ''summa cum laude'', students in the next 15% of the class are awarded ''magna cum laude'', and the next 30% of the class are awarded ''cum laude''. Harvard has chapters of academic honor societies such as Phi Beta Kappa and various committees and departments also award several hundred named prizes annually. Harvard, along with other universities, has been accused of grade inflation, although there is evidence that the quality of the student body and its motivation have also increased. Harvard College reduced the number of students who receive Latin honors from 90% in 2004 to 60% in 2005. Moreover, the honors of "John Harvard Scholar" and "Harvard College Scholar" will now be given only to the top 5 percent and the next 5 percent of each class.

Undergraduate tuition for the 2009–2010 school year was $33,696 and the total cost with fees, room, and board was $48,868. Under financial aid guidelines adopted in 2007, parents in families with incomes of less than $60,000 will no longer be expected to contribute any money to the cost of attending Harvard for their children, including room and board. Families with incomes in the $60,000 to $80,000 range contribute an amount of only a few thousand dollars a year. In December 2007, Harvard announced that families earning between $120,000 and $180,000 will only have to pay up to 10% of their annual household income towards tuition. In 2009, Harvard offered grants totaling $414.1 million across all 11 divisions; $339.5 million came from institutional funds, $35.3 million from federal support, and $39.2 million from other outside support. Grants total 87.7% of Harvard's aid for undergraduate students, with aid also provided by loans (8.4%) and work-study (3.9%).

Rankings

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Harvard's undergraduate program is ranked first among "National Universities" by ''U.S. News & World Report'' and sixth by ''Forbes''. The university is ranked ninth nationally by ''The Washington Monthly''.

Internationally, Harvard is ranked first in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings and second in the QS World University Rankings. When the two lists were published in partnership between 2004 and 2009 as the Times Higher Education-QS World University Rankings, Harvard was ranked first each year. Harvard is ranked first by the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), a position it has held since the first ARWU rankings were released in 2003. In its individual subject tables, ARWU ranked Harvard first in natural sciences and mathematics, life and agricultural sciences, clinical medicine and pharmacy, social sciences, and 42nd in engineering/technology and computer sciences. In individual fields in 2010, Harvard is ranked first in Physics and Economics/Business, second in Chemistry, third in Mathematics, and ninth in Computer Science in the world.

In the 2009 QS Global 200 Business Schools Report, Harvard was ranked first in North America.

In 2010, according to University Ranking by Academic Performance (URAP), Harvard is the best overall university in the world.

Research

Berkman Center for Internet & Society

Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard

Harvard Clinical Research Institute

Harvard Institute of Economic Research

Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute

Institute for Quantitative Social Science

Laboratory for Nanomedicine (at the Harvard Medical School-affiliated Brigham and Women's Hospital)

Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies (one of Harvard's 14 schools)

Schepens Eye Research Institute

W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research

Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering

;Research centers attached to schools and departments Department of Psychology: Prosopagnosia Research Centers at Harvard University and University College London Graduate School of Design: Center for Alternative Futures, Joint Center for Housing Studies, Center for Technology & the Environment Harvard Law School: Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice, Institute for Global Law & Policy (former European Law Research Center), John M. Olin Center of Law, Economics and Business ;Independent organizations affiliated to the university

The Forsyth Institute

Libraries and museums

The Harvard University Library System is centered in Widener Library in Harvard Yard and comprises over 80 individual libraries and over 15 million volumes. According to the American Library Association, this makes it the largest academic library in the United States, and the third largest library in the country. Harvard describes its library as the "largest academic library in the world".

Cabot Science Library, Lamont Library, and Widener Library are three of the most popular libraries for undergraduates to use, with easy access and central locations. There are rare books, manuscripts and other special collections throughout Harvard's libraries; Houghton Library, the Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, and the Harvard University Archives consist principally of rare and unique materials. America's oldest collection of maps, gazetteers, and atlases both old and new is stored in Pusey Library and open to the public. The largest collection of East-Asian language material outside of East Asia is held in the Harvard-Yenching Library.

Harvard operates several arts, cultural, and scientific museums:

The Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, designed by Le Corbusier, is home to the University's film archive and the department of Visual and Environmental Studies.

The Harvard Art Museums, including:

* The Arthur M. Sackler Museum, which includes ancient, Asian, Islamic and later Indian art

* The Busch-Reisinger Museum, formerly the Germanic Museum, covers central and northern European art.

* The Fogg Museum of Art, with galleries featuring history of Western art from the Middle Ages to the present. Particular strengths are in Italian early Renaissance, British pre-Raphaelite, and 19th century French art

The Harvard Museum of Natural History complex, including:

* The Harvard Mineralogical Museum

* The Harvard University Herbaria, which contains the famous Blaschka Glass Flowers exhibit

* The Museum of Comparative Zoology

The Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, specializing in the cultural history and civilizations of the Western Hemisphere

The Semitic Museum.

Student activities

        In 2005, ''The Boston Globe'' reported obtaining a 21-page Harvard internal memorandum that expressed concern about undergraduate student satisfaction based on a 2002 Consortium on Financing Higher Education (COFHE) survey of 31 top universities.  The ''Globe'' presented COFHE survey results and quotes from Harvard students that suggest problems with faculty availability, quality of instruction, quality of advising, social life on campus, and sense of community dating back to at least 1994.  The magazine section of the ''Harvard Crimson'' echoed similar academic and social criticisms.  ''The Harvard Crimson'' quoted Harvard College Dean Benedict Gross as being aware of and committed to improving the issues raised by the COFHE survey.

A longer list of Harvard student groups can be found under Harvard College.

''The Harvard Crimson'', founded in 1873, describes itself as "the nation's oldest continuously published daily college newspaper"; it counts among its many editors numerous Pulitzer Prize winners and two U.S. Presidents, John F. Kennedy and Franklin D. Roosevelt.  The Harvard University Band, founded in 1919, is a non-traditional, student-run marching band, notable for being a scramble band; other bands which also fall under the umbrella organization of HUB are The Harvard Wind Ensemble, the Harvard Summer Pops Band, and the Harvard Jazz Bands.

The Harvard International Relations Council includes several famous student organizations, including the ''Harvard International Review'' (''HIR''), Harvard Model United Nations (HMUN), and its Harvard National Model United Nations (HNMUN).  The ''HIR'' has 35,000 readers in more than 70 countries and regularly features prominent scholars and policymakers from around the globe.  HMUN is the oldest high-school-level Model United Nations simulation in the world, having begun as a League of Nations simulation in the 1920s.  HNMUN is similarly the longest-running college-level simulation in the world and among the largest in the United States. The IRC has the most members of any Harvard student organization.

The ''Harvard Lampoon'' is an undergraduate humor organization and publication founded in 1876.  It has a long-standing rivalry with ''The Crimson'' and counts among its former members Robert Benchley, John Updike, George Plimpton, Steve O'Donnell, Conan O'Brien, Mark O'Donnell, and Andy Borowitz.  This sporadically issued rag was originally modelled on the British magazine of satire, Punch, and has now outlived it, becoming the world's second-oldest humor magazine after the ''Yale Record''.  Conan O'Brien was president of the ''Lampoon'' during his last two undergraduate years.  (The ''National Lampoon'' was founded as an offshoot in 1970 from the Harvard publication.)

The Harvard Glee Club, founded in 1858, is the oldest college choir in the country; the Harvard University Choir is the oldest university-affiliated choir in the country; and the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra, founded in 1808, technically is older than the New York Philharmonic, though it has only been a symphony orchestra for about half of its existence.  The Bach Society Orchestra of Harvard University is a chamber orchestra that is staffed, managed, and conducted entirely by students.

The Hasty Pudding Theatricals, founded in 1844, is a theatrical society known for its burlesque musicals and annual "Man of the Year" and "Woman of the Year" ceremonies; past members include Alan Jay Lerner, Jack Lemmon, and John Lithgow.  The ''Harvard Advocate'', founded in 1866, is the nation's oldest college literary magazine; its past members include Theodore Roosevelt, T. S. Eliot, and Mary Jo Salter.  The ''Harvard Salient '' is the campus's biweekly conservative magazine, whose past editors include many prominent conservative thinkers and journalists.

WHRB (95.3 FM Cambridge), the campus radio station, is run exclusively by Harvard students out of the basement of Pennypacker Hall, a freshman dorm.  Known throughout the Boston metropolitan area for its classical, jazz, underground rock and hip-hop, and blues programming, especially its reading period "orgies", when the entire oeuvre of a particular composer, orchestra, band, or artist is played without commercial break, sometimes for several days in succession, to give the station's DJs a chance to catch up on their studies before the semester's final exams.

The Harvard Institute of Politics (IOP) is a living memorial to President Kennedy which promotes public service among undergraduates by sponsoring non-credit courses and workshops and internships in the public sector.  The IOP is also home to the Harvard Political Review, a nonpartisan quarterly magazine whose alumni include Al Gore, E.J. Dionne, and Jonathan Alter.  The IOP is located within the Harvard Kennedy School.

The Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization which serves as the umbrella organization for dozens of community service and social change programs at Harvard.  It has 1,600 volunteers who serve over 10,000 people in the greater Boston area.  Its notable alumni include Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Roger Nash Baldwin, Robert Coles, and David Souter.

Harvard Student Agencies is the largest student-run corporation in the world, with revenues of $6 million in 2006; its notable alumni include Thomas Stemberg, founder of Staples, Inc. and Michael Cohrs, a Board Member at Deutsche Bank in London.  Harvard Model Congress is the nation's oldest and largest congressional simulation conference, providing thousands of high school students from across the U.S. and abroad with the opportunity to experience participatory American democracy first-hand.

The Harvard Ichthus is the college's first journal of Christian thought, inspiring the founding of over 20 such journals throughout the Northeast through the Augustine Project; it has featured contributions by students as well as notable theologians such as Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Stanley Hauerwas, Glen Stassen, and Fr. Richard Schall.  The Harvard Chess Club, founded in 1874, is one of the oldest collegiate chess clubs in the country.  An annual match versus Yale on the morning of the Harvard-Yale football game has taken place since 1906.  Harvard has won several intercollegiate national chess championships, with alumni including International Grandmaster and two-time United States Champion Patrick Wolff.

Harvard/MIT Cooperative Society is a cooperative bookstore that includes undergraduates on its board of directors.  The Harvard Boxing Club is a club sport open to all undergraduates and graduates.  It holds practices six days a week, and hosts an annual exhibition (Fight Night) at the end of Spring semester.  The Harvard Wireless Club, founded in 1909, is the nation's oldest amateur radio club.  Their radio station call sign is W1AF.  "Professor George W. Pierce was the first president, and Nikola Tesla, Thomas A. Edison, Guglielmo Marconi, Greenleaf W. Pickard and R. A. Fessenden were honorary members."

Students

{| style="text-align:center; float:right; font-size:85%; margin-left:2em; margin:auto;" class="wikitable" |+ ''Demographics of student body'' ! !! Undergraduate !! Graduate !! Professional !! U.S. Census |- ! Black/Non-Hispanic | 8% || 3% || 6% || 12.1% |- ! Asian/Pacific Islander | 17% || 9% || 12% || 4.3% |- ! White/Non-Hispanic | 42% || 42% || 43% || 65.8% |- ! Hispanic | 7% || 3% || 5% || 14.5% |- ! Native American | 1% || 0.2% || 0.6% || 0.9% |- ! International Students | 11% || 33% || 22% || N/A |}

In the last six years, Harvard's student population ranged between 19,000 and 21,000, across all programs. Harvard enrolled 6,655 students in undergraduate programs, 3,738 students in graduate programs, and 10,722 students in professional programs. The undergraduate population is 51% female, the graduate population is 48% female, and the professional population is 49% female.

Undergraduate admission to Harvard is characterized by the Carnegie Foundation as "more selective, lower transfer-in". Harvard College received 27,462 applications for admission to the Class of 2013, 2,175 were admitted (7.9%), and 1,658 enrolled (76.2%). The interquartile range on the SAT was 2080–2370 and 95% of first year students graduated in the top tenth of their high school class. Harvard also enrolled 266 National Merit Scholars, the most in the nation. 88% of students graduate within 4 years and 98% graduate within 6 years.

Harvard College accepted 6.9% of applicants for the class of 2014, a record low for the school's entire history. The number of acceptances was lower for the class of 2013 partially because the university anticipated increased rates of enrollment after announcing a large increase in financial aid in 2008. Harvard College ended its early admissions program in 2007 as the program was believed to disadvantage low-income and under-represented minority applicants applying to selective universities. However, undergraduate admissions office's preference for children of alumni policies have been the subject of scrutiny and debate as it primarily aids whites and the wealthy.

Athletics

Harvard's athletic rivalry with Yale is intense in every sport in which they meet, coming to a climax each fall in their annual football meeting, which dates back to 1875 and is usually called simply "The Game". While Harvard's football team is no longer one of the country's best as it often was a century ago during football's early days (it won the Rose Bowl in 1920), both it and Yale have influenced the way the game is played. In 1903, Harvard Stadium introduced a new era into football with the first-ever permanent reinforced concrete stadium of its kind in the country. The stadium's structure actually played a role in the evolution of the college game. Seeking to reduce the alarming number of deaths and serious injuries in the sport, the Father of Football, Walter Camp (former captain of the Yale football team), suggested widening the field to open up the game. But the state-of-the-art Harvard Stadium was too narrow to accommodate a wider playing surface. So, other steps had to be taken. Camp would instead support revolutionary new rules for the 1906 season. These included legalizing the forward pass, perhaps the most significant rule change in the sport's history.

Harvard has several athletic facilities, such as the Lavietes Pavilion, a multi-purpose arena and home to the Harvard basketball teams. The Malkin Athletic Center, known as the "MAC", serves both as the university's primary recreation facility and as a satellite location for several varsity sports. The five story building includes two cardio rooms, an Olympic-size swimming pool, a smaller pool for aquaerobics and other activities, a mezzanine, where all types of classes are held at all hours of the day, and an indoor cycling studio, three weight rooms, and a three-court gym floor to play basketball. The MAC also offers personal trainers and specialty classes. The MAC is also home to Harvard volleyball, fencing, and wrestling. The offices of several of the school's varsity coaches are also in the MAC.

Weld Boathouse and Newell Boathouse house the women's and men's rowing teams, respectively. The men's crew also uses the Red Top complex in Ledyard, Connecticut, as their training camp for the annual Harvard-Yale Regatta. The Bright Hockey Center hosts the Harvard hockey teams, and the Murr Center serves both as a home for Harvard's squash and tennis teams as well as a strength and conditioning center for all athletic sports.

As of 2006, there were 41 Division I intercollegiate varsity sports teams for women and men at Harvard, more than at any other NCAA Division I college in the country. As with other Ivy League universities, Harvard does not offer athletic scholarships.

Older than ''The Game'' by 23 years, the Harvard-Yale Regatta was the original source of the athletic rivalry between the two schools. It is held annually in June on the Thames river in eastern Connecticut. The Harvard crew is typically considered to be one of the top teams in the country in rowing. Today, Harvard fields top teams in several other sports, such as the Harvard Crimson men's ice hockey team (with a strong rivalry against Cornell), squash, and even recently won NCAA titles in Men's and Women's Fencing. Harvard also won the Intercollegiate Sailing Association National Championships in 2003.

Harvard's men's ice hockey team won the school's first NCAA Championship in any team sport in 1989. Harvard was also the first Ivy League institution to win a NCAA championship title in a women's sport when its women's lacrosse team won the NCAA Championship in 1990.

''Harvard Undergraduate Television'' has footage from historical games and athletic events including the 2005 pep-rally before the Harvard-Yale Game. Harvard's official athletics website has more comprehensive information about Harvard's athletic facilities.

Song

Harvard has several fight songs, the most played of which, especially at football, are "Ten Thousand Men of Harvard" and "Harvardiana." While "Fair Harvard" is actually the alma mater, "Ten Thousand Men" is better known outside the university. The Harvard University Band performs these fight songs, and other cheers, at football and hockey games. These were parodied by Harvard alumnus Tom Lehrer in his song "Fight Fiercely, Harvard," which he composed while an undergraduate.

Notable people

Faculty and staff

Prominent conservative and prominent liberal voices are among the faculty of the various schools, such as Martin Feldstein, Harvey Mansfield, Greg Mankiw, Baroness Shirley Williams, and Alan Dershowitz. Leftists like Michael Walzer and Stephen Thernstrom and libertarians such as Robert Nozick have in the past graced its faculty. Between 1964 and 2009, a total of 38 faculty and staff members affiliated with Harvard or its teaching hospitals were awarded Nobel Prizes (17 during the last quarter century, 6 the last 25 years).

Alumni

Among the best-known people who have attended Harvard University are American political leaders John Hancock, John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Rutherford B. Hayes, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Al Gore, George W. Bush and Barack Obama; Canadian Governor General David Lloyd Johnston, Canadian Prime Ministers Mackenzie King and Pierre Trudeau, and Canadian political leader Michael Ignatieff; Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Shaun Donovan; religious leader, businessman & philanthropist Aga Khan IV; businessman & philanthropist Bill Gates; philanthropist Huntington Hartford; Mexican Presidents Felipe Calderón, Carlos Salinas de Gortari and Miguel de la Madrid; Chilean President Sebastian Piñera; Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos; Costa Rican President José María Figueres; Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou; Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu; Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo; Albanian Prime Minister Fan S. Noli; UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon; philosopher Henry David Thoreau; authors Ralph Waldo Emerson and William S. Burroughs; educator Harlan Hanson; poets Wallace Stevens, T. S. Eliot and E. E. Cummings; conductor Leonard Bernstein; cellist Yo Yo Ma; comedian and television show host and writer Conan O'Brien; actors Jack Lemmon, Natalie Portman, Mira Sorvino, Ashley Judd, Tatyana Ali, Elisabeth Shue, Rashida Jones, Scottie Thompson, Hill Harper, Matt Damon and Tommy Lee Jones; film directors Darren Aronofsky, Mira Nair, Whit Stillman, and Terrence Malick; television executive Brian Graden; architect Philip Johnson; musicians Rivers Cuomo, Tom Morello, and Gram Parsons; musician, producer and composer Ryan Leslie; Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg; unabomber Ted Kaczynski; programmer and activist Richard Stallman; and civil rights leader W. E. B. Du Bois.

Among its most famous current faculty members are biologist E. O. Wilson, cognitive scientist Steven Pinker, physicists Lisa Randall and Roy Glauber, chemists Elias Corey, Dudley R. Herschbach and George M. Whitesides, Shakespeare scholar Stephen Greenblatt, writer Louis Menand, critic Helen Vendler, historian Niall Ferguson, economists Amartya Sen, N. Gregory Mankiw, Robert Barro, Stephen A. Marglin, Don M. Wilson III and Martin Feldstein, political philosophers Harvey Mansfield and Michael Sandel, political scientists Robert Putnam, Joseph Nye, and Stanley Hoffmann, scholar/composers Robert Levin and Bernard Rands.

Seventy-five Nobel Prize winners are affiliated with the university. Since 1974, 19 Nobel Prize winners and 15 winners of the American literary award, the Pulitzer Prize, have served on the Harvard faculty.

In fiction and popular culture

Harvard's central place in American elite circles has made it the setting for many novels, plays, films and other cultural works.

In literature

Numerous novels are set at Harvard or feature characters with Harvard connections.

;Books

''The Accidental Billionaires'' by Ben Mezrich is a narrative account of Facebook's founding set partially at Harvard

''Hacking Harvard'' is novel by Robin Wasserman, a Harvard University alumna.

In ''The Handmaid's Tale'', Margaret Atwood's post-apocalyptic novel, much of the action takes place in Cambridge, with vaguely recognizable Harvard landmarks occasionally making their way into the narrator's place descriptions.

''Love Story'' (1970), by Harvard alumnus (and Yale classics professor) Erich Segal, concerns a romance between a wealthy Harvard pre-law hockey player (Ryan O'Neal) and a brilliant Radcliffe student of musicology on scholarship (Ali MacGraw). Both novel and movie are deeply infused with Cambridge color. One enduring Harvard tradition in recent years has been the annual screening of ''Love Story'' to incoming freshmen, during which members of the Crimson Key Society, the tour-giving organization on campus, make catcalls and other offerings of mock abuse. Other works of Erich Segal, ''The Class'' (1985) and ''Doctors'' (1988) also featured the leading characters as Harvard students.

''The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane'', a 2009 bestselling novel by Katherine Howe, prominently features the university and several of its buildings .

''Prozac Nation'' is an autobiography by Harvard College graduate, Elizabeth Wurtzel.

''The Second Happiest Day'' (1953) by "John Phillips" (John P. Marquand, Jr.) depicts the Harvard of the generation of World War II.

''The Sound and the Fury'', by William Faulkner, features Quentin Compson's experiences at Harvard.

''Thidwick the Big-Hearted Moose'' (1948), by Dr. Seuss, remarks on "Harvard Club Wall".

''The Women's Room'', by Marilyn French, largely features protgonist Mira's experiences at Harvard University

;Series In Dan Brown's novels (''The Da Vinci Code'' and ''Angels and Demons''), main character Robert Langdon is described as a Harvard "professor of symbology", (although "symbology" is not the name of an actual academic discipline).

Pamela Thomas-Graham's series of mystery novels (''Blue Blood'', ''Orange Crushed'', and ''A Darker Shade Of Crimson''), protagonist Nikki Chase is an African-American Harvard economics professor.

Douglas Preston's ex-CIA agent, Wyman Ford, is a Harvard alumnus. Ford appears in the novels ''Tyrannosaur Canyon'' and ''Blasphemy''.

Cecilia Tan's romance novel series, commonly known as the "Magic University series" and including the books ''The Siren and the Sword'' and ''The Tower and the Tears'', is set at the magical university hidden inside Harvard known as "Veritas".

In music

Mariah Carey, in her 2009 song "Up Out My Face", sings: "Even the Harvard University graduating class of 2010 couldn't put us back together again."

Onscreen

Harvard has been featured in many U.S. film and television productions. Since the filming of ''Love Story'' in the 1960s the university, until the summer of 2007 filming of ''The Great Debaters'', did not allow any movies to be filmed in campus buildings; most films are shot in look-alike cities, such as Toronto, and at colleges such as UCLA, Wheaton, and Bridgewater State, although outdoor and aerial shots of Harvard's Cambridge campus are often used.

''21'' (2008 film) - filming took place, in part, at Harvard Medical School

Ally McBeal, of the eponymous series, is a Harvard Law School alumna

''Cheers'' and ''Frasier'' co-star, Dr. Frasier Crane, is a graduate of both Harvard College and Harvard Medical School

''The Firm'' (1993 film) - features Mitch McDeere (Tom Cruise) as a young man with a promising future in law who, about to graduate from Harvard Law School, is made an offer he can't refuse by Memphis firm Bendini, Lambert & Locke, 'The Firm'

''Fringe'' (TV series) - the university was prominently featured in the 2008 television series pilot. Although ''Fringe'' portrays its setting as Harvard, the visible campus buildings are at Yale University.

''Gilligan's Island'' 's resident aristocrat Thurston Howell, III (played by Jim Backus), is a Harvard graduate

''Gilmore Girls''

''Good Will Hunting''

''Gossip Girl'' (TV series) - the university was prominently featured in the second series.

''Harvard Man''

''Heaven's Gate'' The film opens with the main characters graduating from the college in 1870.

''How High''

''Ivory Tower'' - a student-produced Harvard Undergraduate Television show about fictional Harvard students.

''Legally Blonde''

''Love Story in Harvard'' - a Korean hit TV series set at Harvard but filmed at the University of Southern California

''M*A*S*H'''s pompous Boston Brahmin, Major Charles Emerson Winchester III (played by David Ogden Stiers), is a graduate of both Harvard College and Harvard Medical School)

''Matlock'' principal character, Ben Matlock, is a Harvard Law School graduate

''The Paper Chase''

''Queer as Folk'' (North American TV series)

''Sex and the City'' character, Miranda Hobbes, is a Harvard Law School graduate

''The Social Network''

''Soul Man'' (film)

''Stealing Harvard''

''Sugar & Spice''

''The Suite Life on Deck'' (Disney Channel show) - In Season 1, Cody Martin hopes to get into Harvard

''With Honors'' (film) - The graduation scene was filmed in front of Foellinger Auditorium at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Other

Professors Dr. Richard Alpert, later known as Ram Dass, and Dr. Timothy Leary were fired from Harvard in May 1963. Popular opinion attributes their discharge to their activism involving psychedelics, and the popularization and dispensation of psilocybin to students.

See also

Academic dress of Harvard University

Harvard University Police Department

Secret Court of 1920

References

Further reading

Abelmann, Walter H., ed. ''The Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology: The First 25 Years, 1970–1995'' (2004). 346 pp.

Beecher, Henry K. and Altschule, Mark D. ''Medicine at Harvard: The First 300 Years'' (1977). 569 pp.

Bentinck-Smith, William, ed. ''The Harvard Book: Selections from Three Centuries'' (2d ed.1982). 499 pp.

Bethell, John T.; Hunt, Richard M.; and Shenton, Robert. ''Harvard A to Z'' (2004). 396 pp. excerpt and text search

Bethell, John T. ''Harvard Observed: An Illustrated History of the University in the Twentieth Century'', Harvard University Press, 1998, ISBN 0-674-37733-8

Bunting, Bainbridge. ''Harvard: An Architectural History'' (1985). 350 pp.

Carpenter, Kenneth E. ''The First 350 Years of the Harvard University Library: Description of an Exhibition'' (1986). 216 pp.

Cuno, James et al. ''Harvard's Art Museums: 100 Years of Collecting'' (1996). 364 pp.

Elliott, Clark A. and Rossiter, Margaret W., eds. ''Science at Harvard University: Historical Perspectives'' (1992). 380 pp.

Hall, Max. ''Harvard University Press: A History'' (1986). 257 pp.

Hay, Ida. ''Science in the Pleasure Ground: A History of the Arnold Arboretum'' (1995). 349 pp.

Hoerr, John, ''We Can't Eat Prestige: The Women Who Organized Harvard;'' Temple University Press, 1997, ISBN 1-56639-535-6

Howells, Dorothy Elia. ''A Century to Celebrate: Radcliffe College, 1879–1979'' (1978). 152 pp.

Keller, Morton, and Phyllis Keller. ''Making Harvard Modern: The Rise of America's University'' (2001), major history covers 1933 to 2002 online edition

Lewis, Harry R. ''Excellence Without a Soul: How a Great University Forgot Education'' (2006) ISBN 1586483935

Morison, Samuel Eliot. ''Three Centuries of Harvard, 1636–1936'' (1986) 512pp; excerpt and text search

Powell, Arthur G. ''The Uncertain Profession: Harvard and the Search for Educational Authority'' (1980). 341 pp.

Reid, Robert. ''Year One: An Intimate Look inside Harvard Business School'' (1994). 331 pp.

Rosovsky, Nitza. ''The Jewish Experience at Harvard and Radcliffe'' (1986). 108 pp.

Seligman, Joel. ''The High Citadel: The Influence of Harvard Law School'' (1978). 262 pp.

Sollors, Werner; Titcomb, Caldwell; and Underwood, Thomas A., eds. ''Blacks at Harvard: A Documentary History of African-American Experience at Harvard and Radcliffe'' (1993). 548 pp.

Trumpbour, John, ed., ''How Harvard Rules. Reason in the Service of Empire'', Boston: South End Press, 1989, ISBN 0-89608-283-0

Ulrich, Laurel Thatcher, ed. ''Yards and Gates: Gender in Harvard and Radcliffe History'' (2004). 337 pp.

Winsor, Mary P. ''Reading the Shape of Nature: Comparative Zoology at the Agassiz Museum'' (1991). 324 pp.

Wright, Conrad Edick. ''Revolutionary Generation: Harvard Men and the Consequences of Independence'' (2005). 298 pp.

External links

Harvard mobile site

Category:1636 establishments in the Thirteen Colonies Category:Association of American Universities Category:Colonial Colleges Category:Educational institutions established in the 1630s Category:Ivy League Category:National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities members Category:New England Association of Schools and Colleges Category:Universities and colleges in Cambridge, Massachusetts Category:Universities and colleges in Massachusetts

als:Harvard-Universität ar:جامعة هارفارد ast:Universidá de Harvard az:Harvard Universiteti bn:হার্ভার্ড বিশ্ববিদ্যালয় be:Гарвардскі ўніверсітэт be-x-old:Гарвардзкі ўнівэрсытэт br:Skol-veur Harvard bg:Харвардски университет ca:Universitat de Harvard cv:Харвăрт Университечĕ cs:Harvard University cy:Prifysgol Harvard da:Harvard de:Harvard University et:Harvardi ülikool el:Πανεπιστήμιο Χάρβαρντ es:Universidad de Harvard eo:Universitato Harvard eu:Harvard Unibertsitatea fa:دانشگاه هاروارد fo:Harvard University fr:Université Harvard ga:Ollscoil Harvard gd:Oilthigh Harvard gl:Universidade Harvard hak:Harvard Thai-ho̍k ko:하버드 대학교 hi:हार्वर्ड विश्वविद्यालय hr:Sveučilište Harvard id:Universitas Harvard is:Harvard-háskóli it:Università di Harvard he:אוניברסיטת הרווארד kn:ಹಾರ್ವರ್ಡ್ ವಿಶ್ವವಿದ್ಯಾನಿಲಯ ka:ჰარვარდის უნივერსიტეტი sw:Chuo Kikuu cha Harvard la:Universitas Harvardiana lv:Hārvarda universitāte lb:Harvard Universitéit lt:Harvardo universitetas hu:Harvard Egyetem mk:Харвард mr:हार्वर्ड विद्यापीठ ms:Harvard University my:ဟားဗတ် တက္ကသိုလ် nl:Harvard-universiteit ja:ハーバード大学 no:Harvard University oc:Universitat de Harvard pnb:ہارورڈ یونیورسٹی pl:Harvard University pt:Universidade Harvard ro:Universitatea Harvard qu:Harvard Yachay Suntur ru:Гарвардский университет sa:हार्वर्ड् विश्वविद्यालयम् sq:Harvard scn:Univirsitati di Harvard simple:Harvard University sk:Harvardova univerzita sl:Univerza Harvard sr:Харвард sh:Univerzitet Harvard fi:Harvardin yliopisto sv:Harvard University ta:ஹார்வர்டு பல்கலைக்கழகம் tt:Harvard universitetı te:హార్వర్డ్ విశ్వవిద్యాలయం th:มหาวิทยาลัยฮาร์วาร์ด tr:Harvard Üniversitesi uk:Гарвардський університет ur:جامعہ ہارورڈ ug:خارۋارد ئۇنىۋېرسىتېتى vi:Đại học Harvard yi:הארווארד אוניווערסיטעט yo:Yunifásítì Harvard zh:哈佛大学

Faculty may refer to:

In education:

Faculty (division), a division of a university

Faculty (teaching staff), academic staff of a university or college

In other uses:

Faculty (instrument), an instrument or warrant in canon law, especially a judicial or quasi-judicial warrant from an ecclesiastical court or tribunal

''The Faculty'', a horror/sci-fi movie by Robert Rodriguez

Abilities, such as:

* the senses of sight, hearing, touch, etc. ("perceptive faculties")

*the aspects of intelligence ("cognitive faculties")

''Indriya'', "spiritual faculties" in Buddhism

The rights of a priest to celebrate or perform various Liturgical functions

See also

Facility (disambiguation)

de:Fakultät es:Facultad fr:Faculté io:Fakultato nl:Faculteit no:Fakultet ru:Факультет (значения) sk:Fakulta

Major Jackson (born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is an American poet and professor. He is the author of three collections of poetry: ''Holding Company'' (W.W. Norton, 2010) and Hoops (W.W. Norton, 2006), both finalists for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literature-Poetry, and Leaving Saturn (University of Georgia, 2002), winner of the 2001 Cave Canem Poetry Prize and finalist for a National Book Critics Award Circle.

Life

He earned degrees from Temple University and the University of Oregon. He is a professor of English at the University of Vermont and a faculty member of the Bennington College Writing Seminars. He serves as the Poetry Editor of the ''Harvard Review.''

His poems have been published in literary journals and magazines including ''The New Yorker'', ''The American Poetry Review'', ''Callaloo'', ''Poetry'', and ''Tin House.'' His poetry has received critical attention in ''The Boston Globe'', ''Christian Science Monitor'', ''Parnassus'', ''Philadelphia Inquirer,'' and on National Public Radio's ''All Things Considered''. His work has been included in anthologies such as ''The Best American Poetry 2004'' (Scribner, 2004), ''The Pushcart Prize XXIX: Best of the Small Presses'', (W.W. Norton & Company, 2004) ''Schwerkraft'', ''From the Fishouse'' (Persea Books, 2009), and ''The Word Exchange: Anglo-Saxon Poems in Translation'' (W.W. Norton & Company, 2010).

Honors and awards

His honors include a 2003 Whiting Writers' Award, a 1995 Pew Fellowship in the Arts, and a 2003 Witter Bynner Fellowship. He was poet in residence at The Frost Place in 2004, and has served as a creative arts fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, the Jack Kerouac Writer-in-Residence at the University of Massachusetts Lowell., and the Sidney Harman Writer-in-Residence at Baruch College.

Poetry Collections

References

External links

Video:''Basic Black'' Major Jackson Interview on WGBH 89.7

Video:Interview with Major Jackson at the NYS Writers Institute in 2008

Audio: ''The Cortland Review'' > Major Jackson Reading ''Superfluities''

Audio:Major Jackson reading for From the Fishouse

Interview: Major Jackson Interview on Identity Theory

Author’s Booking Agency: Blue Flower Arts > Major Jackson Author Page

Author Page: W.W. Norton > Major Jackson Bio & Books

Category:American poets Category:Living people Category:People from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Category:Writers from Pennsylvania Category:Writers from Vermont Category:Temple University alumni Category:University of Oregon alumni Category:American academics Category:The New Yorker people Category:University of Vermont faculty Category:People from Burlington, Vermont Category:Pew Fellows in the Arts

Coordinates	51°37′″N21°19′″N
Name	Niall Ferguson
Birth date	April 18, 1964
Birth place	Glasgow, Scotland
Nationality	British
Fields	Financial and economic history
Workplaces	Harvard University Harvard Business SchoolLondon School of Economics
Alma mater	Magdalen College, Oxford
Known for	Counterfactual historyEconomic historyHistory of empire and imperialism
Influences	A J P Taylor, Kenneth Clark, Adam Smith, Karl Marx, John Maynard Keynes
Religion	Atheist
Signature
Footnotes	}}

Niall Campbell Douglas Ferguson (born April 18, 1964) is a British historian who specialises in financial and economic history, particularly hyperinflation and the bond markets, as well as the history of colonialism.

Ferguson, who was born in Glasgow, is the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University as well as William Ziegler Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School, and also currently the Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs at the London School of Economics. He was educated at the private Glasgow Academy in Scotland, and at Magdalen College, Oxford. During the 2008 U.S. presidential election, Ferguson advised Senator John McCain's campaign.

In the UK, Ferguson is probably best known as the author of ''Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World''. In 2008, Ferguson published ''The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World'', which he also presented as a Channel 4 television series. Both at Harvard College and at LSE, Ferguson teaches a course entitled "Western Ascendancy: The Mainsprings of Global Power from 1600 to the Present."

Early life

Ferguson was born the son of a doctor father and a physics teacher mother in Glasgow on April 18th 1964, and lived for a time near Ibrox Park. He attended The Glasgow Academy.

Ferguson cites his father as instilling in him a strong sense of self-discipline and of the moral value of work, whilst his mother encouraged his creative side. His journalist maternal grandfather encouraged him to write. Unable to decide on studying an English or a History degree at university, Ferguson cites his reading of War and Peace as persuading him towards History. Of late 1970s Glasgow, Ferguson describes "the main industries" of the city as "sectarianism and strike action".

University of Oxford

Ferguson received a Demyship (half-scholarship) at Magdalen College, Oxford, graduating with a first-class honours degree in History in 1985. He became a Thatcherite by 1982, identifying the position with "the Sex Pistols' position in 1977: it was a rebellion against the stuffy corporatism of the 70s." Whilst at university "He was very much a Scot on the make...Niall was a witty, belligerent bloke who seemed to have come from an entirely different planet." according to Simon Winder. Ferguson has stated that "I was surrounded by insufferable Etonians with fake Cockney accents who imagined themselves to be working-class heroes in solidarity with the striking miners. It wasn't long before it became clear that the really funny and interesting people on campus were Thatcherites."

Rachel Johnson has said of Ferguson at the time: :''He was attractive. He was clever. And I still remember him making me sob with laughter by describing how a man feels if he succeeds in bringing a woman to orgasm (like Jesse Owens at the Olympic stadium in Berlin, he said, raising his arms aloft).''

Johnson commisioned Ferguson to write an essay for a collection: :''Ferguson's piece was one of the first to come in. I can't remember much about it, but it wasn't quite the ticket. I remember sending him a photocopied letter that I was sending to all the contributors, with suggestions, pertaining to his essay, at the bottom. I found his reply in my pigeonhole, a few days later. "Dear Rachel Johnson," it read. "F--- off. Yours, Niall Ferguson." I assumed that he wanted nothing to do with the book again, so I re-commissioned the piece.''

Regarding slights and criticism, Ferguson has stated: "Nobody should ever imagine that they can do that kind of thing to me with impunity. Life is long, and revenge is a dish that tastes best cold. I'm very unforgiving."

Ferguson thus went on to attack Johnson's collection of essays (minus his own contribution) in a newspaper review.

At Oxford, Ferguson improved his German by reading Nietzsche whilst drinking Guinness in the pub with Norman Stone.

Career

Academic career

1983-1986 B.A History Magdalen College, Oxford.

1987–88 Hanseatic Scholar, Hamburg and Berlin

1989–90 Research Fellow, Christ’s College, University of Cambridge

1990–92 Official Fellow and Lecturer, Peterhouse, University of Cambridge

1992–2000 Fellow and Tutor in Modern History, Jesus College, University of Oxford

2000–02 Professor of Political and Financial History, University of Oxford

2002–04 John Herzog Professor in Financial History at Stern School of Business, New York University

2004, continuing. Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History, Harvard University and William Ziegler Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School.

2010, continuing. Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs at the London School of Economics, located within LSE IDEAS, beginning in 2010.

Ferguson is a Senior Research Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford University and a Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is a resident faculty member of the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, and an advisory fellow of the Barsanti Military History Center at the University of North Texas.

In May 2010 he announced that Education Secretary Michael Gove in the U.K's newly elected Conservative/Lib Dem government had invited him to advise on the development of a new history syllabus—"history as a connected narrative"— for schools in England and Wales. In June 2011 it was announced that he would join the professoriate of New College of the Humanities, a private college in London.

Business career

In 2007, Ferguson was appointed as an Investment Management Consultant by GLG Partners, focusing on geopolitical risk as well as current structural issues in economic behaviour relating to investment decisions. GLG is a UK-based hedge fund management firm headed by Noam Gottesman.

Career as commentator

In October 2007, Niall Ferguson left ''The Sunday Telegraph'' to join the ''Financial Times'', where he is now a contributing editor. He also writes for ''Newsweek''.

Ferguson has often described the European Union as a disaster waiting to happen, and has criticised President Vladimir Putin of Russia for authoritarianism. In Ferguson's view, certain of Putin's policies, if they continue, may stand to lead Russia to catastrophes equivalent to those that befell Germany during the Nazi era.

Subject matter

World War I

In 1998 Ferguson published the critically acclaimed ''The Pity of War: Explaining World War One'', which with the help of research assistants he was able to write in just five months. This is an analytic account of what Ferguson considered to be the ten great myths of the Great War. The book generated much controversy, particularly Ferguson's suggestion that it might have proved more beneficial for Europe if Britain had stayed out of the First World War in 1914, thereby allowing Germany to win. Ferguson has argued that the British decision to intervene was what stopped a German victory in 1914–15. Furthermore, Ferguson expressed disagreement with the ''Sonderweg'' interpretation of German history championed by some German historians such as Fritz Fischer, Hans-Ulrich Wehler, Hans Mommsen and Wolfgang Mommsen, who argued that the German Empire deliberately started an aggressive war in 1914 and that the Second Reich was little more than a dress rehearsal for the Third Reich. Likewise, Ferguson has often attacked the work of the German historian Michael Stürmer, who argued that it was Germany's geographical situation in Central Europe that determined the course of German history.

On the contrary, Ferguson maintained that Germany waged a preventive war in 1914, a war largely forced on the Germans by reckless and irresponsible British diplomacy. In particular, Ferguson accused the British Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey of maintaining an ambiguous attitude to the question of whether Britain would enter the war or not, and thus confusing Berlin over just what was the British attitude towards the question of intervention in the war. Ferguson accused London of unnecessarily allowing a regional war in Europe to escalate into a world war. Moreover, Ferguson denied that the origins of National Socialism could be traced back to Imperial Germany; instead Ferguson asserted the origins of Nazism could only be traced back to the First World War and its aftermath.

The “myths” of World War I that Ferguson attacked, with his counter-arguments in parentheticals, are: That Germany was a highly militarist country before 1914 (Ferguson claims Germany was Europe’s most anti-militarist country) That naval challenges mounted by Germany drove Britain into informal alliances with France and Russia before 1914 (Ferguson claims the British were driven into alliances with France and Russia as a form of appeasement due to the strength of those nations, and an Anglo-German alliance failed to materialize due to German weakness) That British foreign policy was driven by legitimate fears of Germany (Ferguson claims Germany posed no threat to Britain before 1914, and that all British fears of Germany were due to irrational anti-German prejudices) That the pre-1914 arms race was consuming ever larger portions of national budgets at an unsustainable rate (Ferguson claims that the only limitations on more military spending before 1914 were political, not economic) That World War I was, as Fritz Fischer claimed, a war of aggression on part of Germany that necessitated British involvement to stop Germany from conquering Europe (Ferguson claims that if Germany had been victorious, something like the European Union would have been created in 1914, and that it would have been for the best if Britain had chosen to opt out of war in 1914) That most people were happy with the outbreak of war in 1914 (Ferguson claims that most Europeans were saddened by the coming of war) That propaganda was successful in making men wish to fight (Ferguson argues the opposite) That the Allies made the best use of their economic resources (Ferguson argues that the Allies “squandered” their economic resources) That the British and the French had the better armies (Ferguson claims the German Army was superior) That the Allies were more efficient at killing Germans (Ferguson argues that the Germans were more efficient at killing the Allies) That most soldiers hated fighting in the war (Ferguson argues most soldiers fought more or less willingly) That the British treated German prisoners of war well (Ferguson argues the British routinely killed German POWS) That Germany was faced with reparations after 1921 that could not be paid except at ruinous economic cost (Ferguson argues that Germany could easily have paid reparations had there been the political will)

Another controversial aspect of the ''Pity of War'' was Ferguson's use of counterfactual history. Ferguson presented a counter-factual version of Europe under Imperial German domination that was peaceful, prosperous, democratic and without ideologies like Communism and fascism. In Ferguson's view, had Germany won World War I, then the lives of millions would have been saved, something like the European Union would have been founded in 1914, and Britain would have remained an empire and the world's dominant financial power. ''The House of Rothschild: Volume 2: The World's Banker: 1849–1999'' The books won the Wadsworth Prize for Business History and were also short-listed for the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Award and the American National Jewish Book Award.

Counterfactual history

Ferguson is an academic champion of counterfactual history, and edited a collection of essays exploring the subject titled ''Virtual History: Alternatives and Counterfactuals'' (1997). Ferguson likes to imagine alternative outcomes as a way of stressing the contingent aspects of history. For Ferguson, great forces don't make history; individuals do and nothing is predetermined. Thus, for Ferguson there are no paths in history that will determine how things will work out. The world is neither progressing nor regressing; only the actions of individuals will determine whether we live in a better or worse world. His championing of the method has been controversial within the field.

In a recent review of Ferguson's book Civilisation, Noel Malcolm who is Senior Research Fellow in History at All Souls College, Oxford University stated that: "Students may find this an intriguing introduction to a wide range of human history; but they will get an odd idea of how historical argument is to be conducted, if they learn it from this book."

Henry Kissinger

In 2003, former United States Secretary of State Henry Kissinger provided Ferguson with access to his White House diaries, letters, and archives for what Ferguson calls a "warts-and-all biography" of Kissinger.

Colonialism

Ferguson is critical of what he calls the "self-flagellation" that he says characterizes modern European thought.

"The moral simplification urge is an extraordinarily powerful one, especially in this country, where imperial guilt can lead to self-flagellation," he told a reporter. "And it leads to very simplistic judgments. The rulers of western Africa prior to the European empires were not running some kind of scout camp. They were engaged in the slave trade. They showed zero sign of developing the country's economic resources. Did Senegal ultimately benefit from French rule? Yes, it's clear. And the counterfactual idea that somehow the indigenous rulers would have been more successful in economic development doesn't have any credibility at all."

Richard Drayton, Professor of Colonial History at the University of London, has stated that it is correct to associate "Ferguson with an attempt to "rehabilitate empire" in the service of contemporary great power interests."

Islam and Eurabia

Matthew Carr wrote in ''Race & Class'' that "Niall Ferguson, the conservative English historian and enthusiastic advocate of a new American empire, has also embraced the Eurabian idea in a widely reproduced article entitled ‘Eurabia?’, in which he laments the ‘de-Christianization of Europe’ and its culture of secularism that leaves the continent ‘weak in the face of fanaticism’." Carr adds that "Ferguson sees the recent establishment of a department of Islamic studies in his Oxford college as another symptom of the ‘the creeping Islamicization of a decadent Christendom’" and that in a 2004 lecture at the American Enterprise Institute entitled ‘The end of Europe?’, "Ferguson struck a similarly Spenglerian note, conjuring the term ‘impire’ to depict a process in which a ‘political entity, instead of expanding outwards towards its periphery, exporting power, implodes – when the energies come from outside into that entity’. In Ferguson’s opinion, this process was already under way in a decadent ‘post-Christian’ Europe that was drifting inexorably towards the dark denouement of a vanquished civilisation and the fatal embrace of Islam."

Iraq war

Ferguson supported the Iraq war and isn't necessarily opposed to future incursions in the world.

"It's all very well for us to sit here in the west with our high incomes and cushy lives, and say it's immoral to violate the sovereignty of another state. But if the effect of that is to bring people in that country economic and political freedom, to raise their standard of living, to increase their life expectancy, then don't rule it out."

Economic policy

In its August 15, 2005 edition, ''The New Republic'' published "The New New Deal", an essay by Ferguson and Laurence J. Kotlikoff, a Professor of Economics at Boston University. The two scholars called for the following changes to the American government's fiscal and income security policies:

Replacing the personal income tax, corporate income tax, Federal Insurance Contributions Act tax (FICA), estate tax, and gift tax with a 33% Federal Retail Sales Tax (FRST), plus a monthly rebate, amounting to the FRST a household with similar demographics would pay if its income were at the poverty line. See also: FairTax;

Replacing the Old Age benefits paid under Social Security with a Personal Security System, consisting of private retirement accounts for all citizens, plus a government benefit payable to those whose savings were insufficient to afford a minimum retirement income;

Replacing Medicare and Medicaid with a Medical Security System that would provide health insurance vouchers to all citizens, the value of which would be determined by one's health;

Cutting federal discretionary spending by 20%.

A recent ''New Republic'' piece with Harvard's Samuel J. Abrams explored attitudes towards immigration in Europe and the United States.

Criticisms

As scholar

Fellow academics have questioned Ferguson's commitment to scholarship. Benjamin Wallace-Wells, an editor of ''The Washington Monthly'', comments that

"''The House of Rothschild'' remains Ferguson's only major work to have received prizes and wide acclaim from other historians. Research restrains sweeping, absolute claims: Rothschild is the last book Ferguson wrote for which he did original archival work, and his detailed knowledge of his subject meant that his arguments for it couldn't be too grand."

John Lewis Gaddis, a renowned Cold War era historian, characterized Ferguson as having unrivaled "range, productivity and visibility" at the same time as criticising his work as being "unpersuasive". Gaddis goes on to state that "several of Ferguson's claims, moreover, are contradictory".

Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm has praised Ferguson as an excellent historian. However, he has also criticised Ferguson, saying, on the BBC Radio programme "Start the Week", that he was a "nostalgist for empire". Ferguson responded to the above criticisms in a Washington Post "Live Discussions" online forum in 2006.

Exchange with Krugman

In May 2009, Ferguson became involved in a high-profile exchange of views with economist Paul Krugman (then the most recent Economics Nobel Prize winner) arising out of a panel discussion hosted by Pen/New York Review on April 30, 2009, regarding the U.S. economy. Ferguson contended that the Obama administration's policies are simultaneously Keynesian and monetarist, in an incoherent mix, and specifically that the government's issuance of a multitude of new bonds will cause an increase in interest rates. Krugman then extended the criticism to China and the European Union, as both pursued policies more in accord with Ferguson's stance than Krugman's.

Krugman has argued that Ferguson's view is "resurrecting 75-year old fallacies" and full of "basic errors". He has also stated that Ferguson is a "poseur" who "...hasn't bothered to understand the basics, relying on snide comments and surface cleverness to convey the impression of wisdom. It's all style, no comprehension of substance." J. Bradford DeLong of Berkeley agreed with Krugman, concluding "Niall Ferguson does indeed know a lot less than economists knew in the 1920s".

Ferguson criticized Krugman in his December 7, 2009 Newsweek cover story, "An Empire at Risk", claiming that Krugman's partisanship caused him to change his position between 2003 and 2004. Ferguson wrote:

Now, who said the following? 'My prediction is that politicians will eventually be tempted to resolve the [fiscal] crisis the way irresponsible governments usually do: by printing money, both to pay current bills and to inflate away debt. And as that temptation becomes obvious, interest rates will soar.' Seems pretty reasonable to me. The surprising thing is that this was none other than Paul Krugman, the high priest of Keynesianism, writing back in March 2003. A year and a half later he was comparing the U.S. deficit with Argentina's (at a time when it was 4.5 percent of GDP). Has the economic situation really changed so drastically that now the same Krugman believes it was 'deficits that saved us,' and wants to see an even larger deficit next year? Perhaps. But it might just be that the party in power has changed.

Personal life

He married journalist Susan Douglas, whom he met in 1987 when she was his editor at the ''Daily Mail''. They have three children. They separated in 2010 and began divorce proceedings in 2011.

His younger sister is a professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

Ferguson was the inspiration for Alan Bennett's play ''The History Boys'', particularly the character of Irwin, a history teacher who urges his pupils to find a counterintuitive angle, and goes on to become a television historian.

Ferguson rises at 6am every day.

Ferguson's self confessed workaholism has placed strains on his personal relations in the past. Ferguson has commented that: :''from 2002, the combination of making TV programmes and teaching at Harvard took me away from my children too much. You don't get those years back. You have to ask yourself: "Was it a smart decision to do those things?" I think the success I have enjoyed since then has been bought at a significant price. In hindsight, there would have been a bunch of things that I would have said no to.''

Relationship with Ayaan Hirsi Ali

In February 2010 the ''Daily Mail'' reported that, following a series of affairs, Ferguson had left his wife for former Dutch MP and feminist critic of Islam Ayaan Hirsi Ali. A similar story in ''The Independent'' was followed by the publication of a correction, noting that Ferguson's marriage had broken down before he met Ali. As of June 2011, Ali is reportedly five months pregnant with Ferguson's child. Ferguson dedicated his book ''Civilization'' to "Ayaan". In an interview with ''The Guardian'', Ferguson spoke about his love for Ali, who, he writes in the preface, "understands better than anyone I know what Western civilisation really means – and what it still has to offer the world".

Ali, he continued,

"grew up in the Muslim world, was born in Somalia, spent time in Saudi Arabia, was a fundamentalist as a teenager. Her journey from the world of her childhood and family to where she is today is an odyssey that's extremely hard for you or I to imagine. To see and hear how she understands western philosophy, how she understands the great thinkers of the Enlightenment, of the 19th-century liberal era, is a great privilege, because she sees it with a clarity and freshness of perspective that's really hard for us to match. So much of liberalism in its classical sense is taken for granted in the west today and even disrespected. We take freedom for granted, and because of this we don't understand how incredibly vulnerable it is."

See also

Anglosphere

Chimerica

Bibliography

''The Cash Nexus''

In his 2001 book, ''The Cash Nexus'', which he wrote following a year as Houblon-Norman Fellow at the Bank of England, Ferguson argues that the popular saying, "money makes the world go 'round", is wrong; instead he presented a case for human actions in history motivated by far more than just economic concerns.

''Colossus'' and ''Empire''

In his books ''Colossus'' and ''Empire'', Ferguson presents a nuanced and partially apologetic view of the British Empire and in conclusion proposes that the modern policies of the United Kingdom and the United States, in taking a more active role in resolving conflict arising from the failure of states, are analogous to the 'Anglicization' policies adopted by the British Empire throughout the 19th century. In ''Colossus'', Ferguson explores the United States' hegemony in foreign affairs and its future role in the world.

''War of the World''

The ''War of the World'', published in 2006, had been ten years in the making and is a comprehensive analysis of the savagery of the 20th century. Ferguson shows how a combination of economic volatility, decaying empires, psychopathic dictators, and racially/ethnically motivated (and institutionalized) violence resulted in the wars and the genocides of what he calls "History's Age of Hatred". The New York Times Book Review named ''War of the World'' one of the 100 Notable Books of the Year in 2006, while the ''International Herald Tribune'' called it "one of the most intriguing attempts by an historian to explain man's inhumanity to man". Ferguson addresses the paradox that, though the 20th century was "so bloody", it was also "a time of unparalleled [economic] progress". As with his earlier work ''Empire'', ''War of the World'' was accompanied by a Channel 4 television series presented by Ferguson.

''The Ascent of Money''

Published in 2008, ''The Ascent of Money'' examines the long history of money, credit, and banking. In it he predicts a financial crisis as a result of the world economy and in particular the United States using too much credit. Specifically he cites the China–America dynamic which he refers to as Chimerica where an Asian "savings glut" helped create the subprime mortgage crisis with an influx of easy money.

''Civilization''

Published in 2011, ''Civilization: The West and the Rest'' examines what Ferguson calls the most "interesting question" of our day: "Why, beginning around 1500, did a few small polities on the western end of the Eurasian landmass come to dominate the rest of the world?" He attributes this divergence to the West's development of six "killer apps" largely missing elsewhere in the world - "competition, science, democracy, medicine, consumerism and the work ethic". A related documentary ''Civilization: Is the West History?'' was broadcast as a six part series on Channel 4 in March and April of 2011.

Publications

(also a Channel 4 series)

As Contributor

“Europa nervosa”, in Nader Mousavizadeh (ed.), The Black Book of Bosnia (New Republic/Basic Books, 1996), pp. 127–32

“The German inter-war economy: Political choice versus economic determinism” in Mary Fulbrook (ed.), German History since 1800(Arnold, 1997), pp. 258–278

“The balance of payments question: Versailles and after” in Manfred F. Boemeke, Gerald D. Feldman and Elisabeth Glaser (eds.), The Treaty of Versailles: A Reassessment after 75 Years (Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 401–440

“‘The Caucasian Royal Family’: The Rothschilds in national contexts” in R. Liedtke (ed.), ‘Two Nations’: The Historical Experience of British and German Jews in Comparison (J.C.B. Mohr, 1999)

“Academics and the Press”, in Stephen Glover (ed.), Secrets of the Press: Journalists on Journalism (Penguin, 1999), pp. 206–220

“Metternich and the Rothschilds: A reappraisal” in Andrea Hamel and Edward Timms (eds.), Progress and Emancipation in the Age of Metternich: Jews and Modernisation in Austria and Germany, 1815–1848 (Edwin Mellen Press, 1999), pp. 295–325

“The European economy, 1815–1914” in T.C.W. Blanning (ed.), The Short Oxford History of Europe: The Nineteenth Century (Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 78–125

“How (not) to pay for the war: Traditional finance and total war” in Roger Chickering and Stig Förster (eds.), Great War, Total War: Combat and Mobilization on the Western Front (Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp. 409–34

“Introduction” in Frederic Manning , Middle Parts of Fortune (Penguin, 2000), pp. vii-xviii

“Clashing civilizations or mad mullahs: The United States between informal and formal empire” in Strobe Talbott (ed.), The Age of Terror (Basic Books, 2001), pp. 113–41

“Public debt as a post-war problem: The German experience after 1918 in comparative perspective” in Mark Roseman (ed.), Three Post-War Eras in Comparison: Western Europe 1918-1945-1989 (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2002), pp. 99–119

“Das Haus Sachsen-Coburg und die europäische Politik des 19. Jahrhunderts”, in Rainer von Hessen (ed.), Victoria Kaiserin Friedrich (1840–1901): Mission und Schicksal einer englischen Prinzessin in Deutschland (Campus Verlag, 2002), pp. 27–39

“Max Warburg and German politics: The limits of financial power in Wilhelmine Germany”, in Geoff Eley and James Retallack (eds.), Wilhelminism and Its Legacies: German Modernities, Imperialism and the Meaning of Reform, 1890-1930 (Berghahn Books, 2003), pp. 185–201

“Introduction”, The Death of the Past by J. H. Plumb (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), pp. xxi-xlii

“Globalization in historical perspective: The political dimension”, in Michael D. Bordo, Alan M. Taylor and Jeffrey G. Williamson (eds.), Globalisation in Historical Perspective (National Bureau of Economic Research Conference Report) (University of Chicago Press, 2003)

“Introduction to Tzvetan Todorov” in Nicholas Owen (ed.), Human Rights, Human Wrongs: Oxford Amnesty Lectures (Amnesty International, 2003)

“The City of London and British imperialism: New light on an old question”, in Youssef Cassis and Eric Bussière (eds.), London and Paris as International Financial Centres in the Twentieth Century (Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 57–77

“A bolt from the blue? The City of London and the outbreak of the First World War”, in Wm. Roger Louis (ed.), Yet More Adventures with Britainnia: Personalities, Politics and Culture in Britain (I.B. Tauris, 2005), pp. 133–145

“The first ‘Eurobonds’: The Rothschilds and the financing of the Holy Alliance, 1818–1822”, in William N. Goetzmann and K. Geert Rouwenhorst (eds.), The Origins of Value: The Financial Innovations that Created Modern Capital Markets (Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 311–323

“Prisoner taking and prisoner killing in the age of total war”, in George Kassemiris (ed.), The Barbarization of Warfare (New York University Press, 2006), pp. 126–158

“The Second World War as an economic disaster”, in Michael Oliver (ed.), Economic Disasters of the Twentieth Century (Edward Elgar, 2007), pp. 83–132

“The Problem of Conjecture: American Strategy after the Bush Doctrine”, in Melvyn Leffler and Jeff Legro (eds.), To Lead the World: American Strategy After the Bush Doctrine (Oxford University Press, 2008)

Television documentaries

Empire (2003)

American Colossus (2004)

The War of the World (2006)

The Ascent of Money (2008)

Civilization: Is The West History? (2011)

References

Notes

General references

External links

niallferguson.org, Ferguson's official website

RSA Vision webcast - Niall Ferguson on "The Ascent of Money"

Audio: Niall Ferguson in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion programme ''The Forum''

Hans Koning's Review of 'The Pity of War' (from The Nation)

A Banker to the Rescue, Martin Rubin, The Wall Street Journal, 26 June 2010

"Yesterday's Banker" Liaquat Ahamed, ''The New York Times'', 30 July 2010

Historian vs. Futurist on Human Progress discussion with Stewart Brand and Peter Schwartz (futurist) at The Long Now Foundation, May 2008

On the Edge of Chaos discussion of his work at Centre for Independent Studies, July 2010

'The Sun Sets in the West', review of ''Civilization'' in the ''Oxonian Review''

An Interview with Niall Ferguson, ''Oxonian Review'', 9 April 2011

Category:1964 births Category:Living people Category:Alumni of Christ's College, Cambridge Category:Alumni of Magdalen College, Oxford Category:British foreign policy writers Category:Fellows of Jesus College, Oxford Category:Fellows of Peterhouse, Cambridge Category:Harvard Business School faculty Category:Harvard University faculty Category:New York University faculty Category:People from Glasgow Category:Scottish historians Category:World War I historians

de:Niall Ferguson es:Niall Ferguson fr:Niall Ferguson ko:니얼 퍼거슨 hr:Niall Ferguson it:Niall Ferguson he:ניל פרגוסון ja:ニーアル・ファーガソン no:Niall Ferguson pl:Niall Ferguson fi:Niall Ferguson

Coordinates	51°37′″N21°19′″N
name	Bill Maher
birth name	William Maher, Jr.
birth date	January 20, 1956
birth place	New York, New York, U.S.
alma mater	Cornell University
medium	Stand-Up, Television, Film, Books
nationality	American
active	1979–present
genre	Satire, Political satire, News Satire, Observational comedy
subject	American politics, current events, American culture, pop culture, freedom of speech, environmentalism, religion, human sexuality, recreational drug use, libertarianism, American liberalism, American conservatism
influences	Steve Allen, George Carlin, Johnny Carson, David Frost, Robert Klein, Don Rickles, Gore Vidal, Lenny Bruce
notable work	Elliot on Charlie HooverHost of Politically Incorrect Host of Real Time with Bill Maher''Religulous''
website	BillMaher.com
footnotes	}}

William "Bill" Maher, Jr. (; born January 20, 1956) is an American stand-up comedian, television host, political commentator, author and actor. Before his current role as the host of HBO's ''Real Time with Bill Maher'', Maher hosted a similar late-night talk show called ''Politically Incorrect'' originally on Comedy Central and later on ABC.

Maher is known for his political satire and sociopolitical commentary, which targets a wide swath of topics including: religion, politics, bureaucracies of many kinds, political correctness, the mass media, greed among people and persons in positions of high political and social power, and the lack of intellectual curiosity of the electorate. He supports the legalization of marijuana and same-sex marriage, and serves on the board of PETA. He is also a critic of religion and is an advisory board member of Project Reason, a foundation to promote scientific knowledge and secular values within society. In 2005, Maher ranked at number 38 on Comedy Central's 100 greatest stand-up comedians of all time. Bill Maher received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star on September 14, 2010.

Early life and education

Maher was born in New York City, the son of Julie (née Berman), a nurse, and William Maher, Sr., a network news editor and radio announcer. He was raised in his Irish American father's Catholic religion, remaining unaware that his mother was Jewish until his early teenage years. Maher's family stopped attending church services when Maher was thirteen, due to his father's disagreement with the Catholic Church's position on birth control.

Maher was raised in River Vale, New Jersey, and graduated from Pascack Hills High School in Montvale in 1974. He received a B.A. in English and history from Cornell University in 1978.

Early career

Maher began his career as a stand-up comedian and actor. He was host of the New York City comedy club Catch a Rising Star in 1979. Thanks to Steve Allen, he began appearing on Johnny Carson's and David Letterman's shows in 1982. He made limited television appearances including a recurring role in ''Sara'' (1985), appeared in ''Max Headroom'' (1987), two separate appearances on ''Murder, She Wrote'' (1989, 1990), a recurring role in ''Charlie Hoover'' (1991) and other productions. He has also appeared in several films, usually in a comic role. His feature film debut was in ''D.C. Cab'' (1983), and he also appeared in ''Ratboy'' (1986) ''Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death'' (1988) and ''Pizza Man'' (1991), among others.

Television career

''Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher''

Maher assumed the host role ''Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher'', a late-night political talk show that ran on Comedy Central from 1993 to 1997 and on ABC from 1997 to 2002. The show regularly began with a topical monologue by Maher preceding the introduction of four guests, usually a diverse group of individuals from show business, popular culture, political pundits, political consultants, authors, and occasionally news figures. The group would discuss topical issues selected by Maher, who also participated in the discussions. Jerry Seinfeld, a regular guest on the show, stated that ''Politically Incorrect'' reminded him of talk shows from the 1950s and 60s "when guests interacted with each other as much as with the host."

''Politically Incorrect'' won an array of awards, including an Emmy Award for Outstanding Technical Direction, two CableACE awards for Best Talk Show Series, and a Genesis Award for Best Television Talk Show. Maher earned numerous award nominations for his producing, writing and hosting of ''Politically Incorrect'', including ten Emmy nominations, two TV Guide nominations, and two Writers Guild nominations. ABC decided against renewing Maher's contract for ''Politically Incorrect'' in 2002, after he made a controversial on-air remark shortly after the September 11 attacks. He agreed with his guest, conservative pundit Dinesh D'Souza, that the 9/11 terrorists did not act in a cowardly manner (in rebuttal to President Bush's statement calling 9/11 hijackers cowards). Maher said, "We have been the cowards. Lobbing cruise missiles from two thousand miles away. That's cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building. Say what you want about it. Not cowardly. You're right." Maher later clarified that his comment was not anti-military in any way whatsoever, referencing his well-documented longstanding support for the American military.

In the context of the attacks, some corporate advertisers found the comment too insensitive and controversial. Several companies, including FedEx and Sears Roebuck, pulled their advertisements from the show, costing the show more than it returned.

The show was cancelled on June 16, 2002, and the Sinclair Broadcast Group had dropped the show from its ABC-affiliated stations months prior. On June 22, 2002, just six days after the cancellation of ''Politically Incorrect'', Maher received the Los Angeles Press Club president's award (for "championing free speech"). Maher was on the board of judges one year for the PEN/Newman's Own First Amendment Award.

Maher's remarks after 9/11 were not the first time he had sparked controversy on ''Politically Incorrect''. In the same year, Maher was widely criticized for comparing dogs to retarded children. He apologized for his comments.

''Real Time with Bill Maher''

In 2003, Maher became the host, co-producer and co-writer of ''Real Time with Bill Maher'', a weekly hour-long political comedy talk show on the cable television network HBO. During an interview, Maher told Terry Gross (on NPR's ''Fresh Air'') that he much prefers having serious and well-informed guests on his program, as opposed to the random celebrities that fleshed out his roundtable discussions on ''Politically Incorrect''.

As with his previous show, ''Politically Incorrect'', Maher begins ''Real Time'' with a comic opening monologue based upon current events and other topical issues. He proceeds to a one-on-one interview with a guest, either in-studio or via satellite. Following the interview, Maher sits with three panelists, usually consisting of pundits, authors, activists and journalists, for a discussion of the week's events. In the segment "New Rules" at the end of each show, Maher delivers a humorous editorial on popular culture and American politics.

In late May 2005, Alabama Congressman Spencer Bachus sent a letter to Time Warner's board of directors requesting ''Real Time'' be cancelled after remarks Maher made after noting the military had missed its recruiting goals by 42 percent. Bachus said he felt the comments were demeaning to the military and treasonous. Maher stated his highest regard and support for the troops and asked why the congressman criticized him instead of doing something about the recruitment problem.

''Real Time'' has earned widespread praise. It has been nominated for more than ten Primetime Emmy Awards and six Writer's Guild awards. In 2007, Maher and his co-producers were awarded the Television Producer of the Year Award in Variety Television.

In early 2006, ''Real Time'' was released as an audio CD, along with another CD entitled ''Bill Maher's New Rules'' which features clips, segments and teasers from Real Time. Starting with Episode 67 (2-23-06), ''Real Time'' became available in the USA on iTunes as a free weekly audio podcast.

Maher holds the record for the most Emmy nominations without a win, having been nominated on 22 occasions and not winning once. Eleven of the nominations were for ''Politically Incorrect'', while nine were for ''Real Time.'' The other two were nominations for two of his HBO comedy specials: ''Bill Maher: I'm Swiss'' and ''Bill Maher: The Decider.''

HBO announced in July 2011 the show was renewed for a tenth season.

Christine O'Donnell

On September 17, 2010, Maher aired a clip of Delaware Republican Senatorial candidate Christine O'Donnell from the October 29, 1999 episode of his old show ''Politically Incorrect'' on his current show ''Real Time with Bill Maher'', where she discussed that she had "dabbled in witchcraft." This was one of the most notable of numerous controversial statements by O'Donnell that made her the most covered candidate in the 2010 mid-term election cycle.

Political commentator

Maher is a frequent commentator on various cable news networks, namely CNN, MSNBC, and HLN. Maher has regularly appeared on CNN's ''The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer'' and has also been a frequent guest on MSNBC's ''Hardball with Chris Matthews'', ''The Rachel Maddow Show'' and ''Countdown with Keith Olbermann''. Maher has also appeared as a guest on HLN's ''The Joy Behar Show''.

Maher hosted the January 13, 2006 edition of ''Larry King Live'', on which he was a frequent guest. Maher appeared as a special guest on the June 29, 2010 edition of the show, on which CNN anchor Larry King announced his retirement. Maher co-emceed the final show of ''Larry King Live'' on December 16, 2010 with Ryan Seacrest.

Since May 2005, he has been a contributing blogger at ''The Huffington Post''.

Views and beliefs

Politics

Maher eschews political labels, referring to himself as "practical". In the past, he has described himself as a libertarian and has also referred to himself "as a progressive, as a sane person".

Maher favors a partial privatization of Social Security, ending corporate welfare and federal funding of non-profits, and legalization of gambling, prostitution, and marijuana. Maher is a member of NORML's Advisory Board, an organization which supports regulated legalization of marijuana. He describes himself as an environmentalist, and he has spoken in favor of the Kyoto treaty on global warming on his show ''Real Time''. He often criticizes industry figures involved in environmental pollution.

Maher is a board member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. He has expressed his distaste for the pharmaceutical and health care industries in general, on the grounds that they make their money out of curing people who are made sick by consuming unhealthy food that corporations urge upon the public. He maintains that mass consumption of high-fructose corn syrup is a contributor to the rise in frequency of obesity in the United States. :" If you believe you need to take all the pills the pharmaceutical industry says you do, then you're already on drugs!"

Before the 2004 U.S. presidential election, Maher became candid in his stated opposition to the re-election of George W. Bush and in his support for John Kerry.

Known for protesting against the demonization of the word "liberal", during the campaign Maher criticized Kerry for being ashamed of the word. On his show, the comedian has noted the paradox of people claiming they distrusted "elite" politicians while at the same time wanting elite doctors to treat them and elite lawyers to represent them in court. Maher supports the death penalty, the legality of abortion and euthanasia. Since the 9/11 attacks, he has endorsed the use of racial profiling at airports.

He was originally against the Iraq War, and has summarized his opinion by saying that the United States and the world have had to pay too high a price for the war. He is skeptical of Iraq surviving without civil war.

In the 2008 U.S. presidential election, Maher announced his support for Barack Obama. Although Maher welcomed Obama's electoral victory, he has subjected him to criticism once in office for not acting boldly on health care reform and other progressive issues.

Religion

Maher is highly critical of religion, and views it as not worth the bother. He has referred to himself as an apatheist, instead of an agnostic or atheist, on ''Scarborough Country'' on April 24, 2007, and again in July 2011. He has reiterated this stance in subsequent interviews, rejecting both the certitude of the existence, as well as the certitude of nonexistence of deities, concluding, "I'm saying that doubt is the only appropriate response for human beings." He is an advisory board member of author Sam Harris's The Reason Project, a foundation that promotes scientific knowledge and secular values within society.

Maher and director Larry Charles teamed up to make the feature film ''Religulous'' (2008), described by trade publication ''Variety'' as a documentary "that spoofs religious extremism across the world." It was released on October 3, 2008.

While Maher is critical towards Christianity, he is an outspoken critic of religion as a whole, including Islam. On October 29, 2010, during a Real Time segment, Maher commented on a news story saying that the name Mohammed had become the most popular baby name in the United Kingdom. He asked, "Am I a racist to feel alarmed by that? Because I am. And it’s not because of the race, it’s because of the religion. I don’t have to apologize, do I, for not wanting the Western world to be taken over by Islam in 300 years? Sharia law is being institutionalized in England? Well, then I am right, I should be alarmed." He later defended his comments on CNN, saying, "And when I say Westerner, I mean someone who believes in the values that Western people believe in that a lot of the Muslim world does not. Like separation of church and state. Like equality of the sexes. Like respect for minorities, free elections, free speech, freedom to gather. These things are not just different from cultures that don’t have them. … It’s better. … I would like to keep those values here."

Maher received the Richard Dawkins Award for 2009 from Atheist Alliance International "for his efforts to further the values science and reason in the world."

Maher was ranked first by MormonVoices, a group associated with Foundation for Apologetic Information & Research, on its Top Ten Anti-Mormon Statements of 2011 list for saying "By any standard, Mormonism is more ridiculous than any other religion".

Health care

Maher has stated that the AMA is a powerful lobbying group and one of the primary reasons why the United States had failed to enact health care reform.

On August 24, 2009, Maher was a guest on ''The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien'' and on the topic of getting universal health care legislation passed, Maher stated that Obama should forget about trying to get 60 votes for it, "he only needs 51." "Forget getting the sixty votes or sixty percent — sixty percent of people don't believe in evolution in this country — he just needs to drag them to it, like I said, they're stupid; get health care done, with or without them."

Maher has expressed the view that most illness is generally the result of poor diet and lack of exercise, and that medicine is often not the best way of addressing illness. In an episode of his show about the 2008 presidential candidates' health plans, Maher stated that poor nutrition is a primary cause of illness, and that "the answer isn't another pill."

In a discussion with Michael Moore about the film ''Sicko'', Maher asks, "The human body is pretty amazing; it doesn't get sick, usually, for no reason. I mean, there's some genetic stuff that can get to you, but, basically, people are sick in this country because they're poisoned. The environment is a poisoning factor, but also, we gotta say, they poison themselves. They eat shit. People eat shit, and that's, to my way of thinking, about 90 percent of why people are sick, is because they eat shit. Would you agree?"

On October 9, 2009, on his HBO show, Maher debated the effectiveness of flu vaccinations with Bill Frist and stated, "Why would you let them be the ones to stick a disease into your arm? I would never get a swine flu vaccine or any vaccine. I don’t trust the government, especially with my health." Maher also expressed skepticism about the seriousness of the swine flu and whether completely healthy people could die from it. His comments have generated criticism, and his remarks have been called unscientific and even harmful.

Maher responded to the criticism, noting, "What I've read about what they think I'm saying is not what I've said. I'm not a germ theory denier. I believe vaccinations can work. Polio is a good example. Do I think in certain situations that inoculating Third World children against malaria or diphtheria, or whatever, is right? Of course. In a situation like that, the benefits outweigh costs. But to me living in Los Angeles? To get a flu shot? No." (see Vaccine controversy)

Criticism of 9/11 conspiracy theories

Maher has been a critic of 9/11 conspiracy theories. On October 19, 2007, Maher confronted several 9/11 truthers and had them ejected from his show audience after they interrupted the live show numerous times by calling out from the audience. The incident drew significant media attention and praise from Fox News talk show host and frequent critic John Gibson.

Personal life

Maher has never married. In 2003, he began dating former Playboy Cyber Girl Coco Johnsen. In November 2004, at the end of their 17-month relationship, she sued him for USD $9 million for "pain and suffering" for alleged "insulting, humiliating and degrading racial comments." Her suit stated that Maher promised to marry her and father her children, support her financially, and purchase a Beverly Hills home. Her suit also alleged that she quit her job as a flight attendant and occasional model to be with him. Maher's lawyers in their response filed on November 23, 2004, in Los Angeles Superior Court said Maher is a "confirmed bachelor, and a very public one at that" who "never promised to marry [Johnsen] or to have children with her."

Maher's filing stated that "When the dating ended, [Johnson] (sic) launched a campaign to embarrass, humiliate, and extort ridiculous sums of money from Bill Maher." Johnsen accused another former boyfriend of rape and kidnapping in 1997, and the charges were later dismissed for lack of evidence. Her lawsuit against Maher was dismissed on May 2, 2005.

Maher enjoys his bachelor status and states that he does not want to get married. On his website, he is quoted as saying, "I'm the last of my guy friends to have never gotten married, and their wives — they don't want them playing with me. I'm like the escaped slave — I bring news of freedom."

In 2005, he began dating Karrine Steffans, best-selling author and former hip hop model. When commentators suggested there was a pattern to his dating because both his girlfriend and former girlfriend were black, Maher said, "People say I'm into black women. Robert De Niro is into black women. I'm just into women who are real, and they happen to be black."

Credits

Bibliography

''True Story : A Novel'', 1994 (ISBN 0-7432-4251-3)

''Does Anybody Have a Problem With That? Politically Incorrect's Greatest Hits'', 1996 (ISBN 0-679-45627-9)

''Does Anybody Have a Problem with That? The Best of Politically Incorrect'', 1997 (ISBN 0-345-41281-8)

''When You Ride Alone You Ride With Bin Laden: What the Government Should Be Telling Us to Help Fight the War on Terrorism'', 2003 (ISBN 1-893224-90-2)

''Keep the Statue of Liberty Closed: The New Rules'', 2004 (ISBN 1-932407-47-2)

''New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer'', 2005 (ISBN 1-59486-295-8)

''The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody but Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass'', 2011 (ISBN 0-39915-841-3)

Filmography

Film
! Year	! Title	! Role
1983	''D.C. Cab''	Bob
	''Rags to Riches''	Freddie
''Club Med''	Rick
''Ratboy''	Party Guest
1987	''House II: The Second Story''	John
1988		Maxwell Taylor
1989	''Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death''	Jim
1991	''Pizza Man''	Elmo Bunn
1996	''Don't Quit Your Day Job!''	Comic's Table
1997	''Bimbo Movie Bash''	Unknown
1998	''EDtv''	Himself
2001	''Tomcats (film)''	Carlos
2005		Himself
		Himself
''Religulous''	Himself
2009	''New Rules: Best of''	Himself
2010	''Sex, Drugs & Religion (2010)''	Himself
HBO Specials
! Year	! Title	! Role
1989	''One Night Stand''	Himself
1992	''One Night Stand''	Himself
1995	''Stuff that Struck Me Funny''	Himself
1997	''The Golden Goose Special''	Himself
2000		Himself
2003	''Victory Begins at Home''	Himself
2005	''I'm Swiss''	Himself
2007		Himself
2010		Himself
Television
! Year	! Title	! Role
1985		Marty Lang
		Unknown
	Haskel
1989–90	''Murder, She Wrote''	(2 episodes)
1990	''The Midnight Hour''	Host
1991	''Charlie Hoover''	Elliot
1992	''Say What?''	Host
	''Married... with Children''	Adam Gold
''Roseanne''	Photographer
1997	''Dharma & Greg''	Himself
1993–2002	''Politically Incorrect''	Host
2002	''Just for Laughs''	Himself
2003–present	''Real Time with Bill Maher''	Host
2008	''True Blood''	Himself
2010		Himself
2010	''Family Guy''	Himself

References

External links

in 2004

HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" site

2006 Maher Interview with ''The A.V. Club''

2009 Maher Interview with writers at the ''Religulous'' DVD release

Category:1956 births Category:Writers from New York Category:Actors from New Jersey Category:Writers from New Jersey Category:American people of Jewish descent Category:American agnostics Category:American cannabis activists Category:American film actors Category:American libertarians Category:American satirists Category:American stand-up comedians Category:American television actors Category:American television talk show hosts Category:Cornell University alumni Category:American comedians of Irish descent Category:American writers of Irish descent Category:Living people Category:People from Beverly Hills, California Category:People from River Vale, New Jersey Category:Religious skeptics Category:Former Roman Catholics Category:Actors from New York City Category:Drug policy reform activists Category:Animal rights advocates

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