Jonathan Lear

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Jonathan David Lear (October 9, 1948 – September 22, 2025) was an American philosopher and psychoanalyst. He was the John U. Nef Distinguished Service Professor in the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago and served as the Roman Family Director of the Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society from 2014 to 2022.[1]

Background and career

Jonathan David Lear was born in New York City on October 9, 1948.[2] His father and Norman Lear were first cousins.[2] Lear was brought up in West Hartford, Connecticut.[2]

Lear earned his B.A. (cum laude) in history at Yale in 1970 and his B.A. in philosophy at Cambridge in 1973.[2] He then received his Ph.D. in philosophy at Rockefeller University with a dissertation on Aristotle's logic directed by Saul Kripke.[2] He also trained at the Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis in 1995. He subsequently won the Gradiva Award from the National Association for Psychoanalysis three times for work that advances psychoanalysis.

Before moving to Chicago permanently in 1996, Lear taught philosophy at Cambridge University (1979-1985), where he was a fellow and the director of studies in philosophy of Clare College. He also taught philosophy at Yale University and was chair of the department of philosophy (1978–79, 1985–1996). He is a member of the International Psychoanalytical Association. In 2009, he received the Mellon Distinguished Achievement Award in the Humanities.[3]

During his time as the Roman Family Director of the Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society was able to work with the Apsáalooke Nation and the Field Museum of Natural History to sponsor the exhibit Apsáalooke Women and Warriors.[4]

In 2017, he was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[5] He was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 2019.[6]

Lear was first married to Cynthia Farrar, with whom he had a daughter before divorcing.[2] In 2003, he married fellow academic Gabriel Richardson, with whom he had a son.[2] Jonathan Lear died from stomach cancer at his home in Chicago on September 22, 2025, at the age of 76.[2][7]

Philosophical work

Lear's early work focused on formal logic and ancient Greek philosophy. Much of his work involves the intersection of psychoanalysis and philosophy. In addition to work involving Sigmund Freud, he also wrote widely on Aristotle, Plato, Immanuel Kant, Søren Kierkegaard and Ludwig Wittgenstein, focusing on ideas of the human psyche. His most recent work explores the ethical task of managing to live with the fears and anxieties of world-catastrophe.[8][9]

Lear argues that mourning is a central human practice through which we confront transience, reclaim meaning after loss, and shape how we live ethically in a finite world.[10]

Awards and honors

Works

  • Aristotle and Logical Theory (1980)
  • Aristotle: The Desire to Understand (1988)
  • Love and Its Place in Nature (1990)
  • Open Minded: Working Out the Logic of the Soul (1998)
  • Happiness, Death, and the Remainder of Life (2000)
  • Therapeutic Action: An Earnest Plea for Irony (2003)
  • Freud (2005)
  • Radical Hope: Ethics in the Face of Cultural Devastation (2006)
  • A Case for Irony (2011)
  • Wisdom Won From Illness: Essays in Philosophy and Psychoanalysis (2017)
  • The Idea of a Philosophical Anthropology: The Spinoza Lectures (2017)
  • Imagining the End: Mourning and Ethical Life (2022)[16]

See also

References

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  1. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Jonathan Lear named Roman Family Director of Neubauer Collegium". 6 October 2014.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Rosenwald, Michael S. (October 8, 2025). "Jonathan Lear, Philosopher Who Embraced Freud, Dies at 76". The New York Times. Retrieved October 8, 2025.
  3. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Mellon Foundation award to fund Lear's ongoing work on human imagination". 26 March 2010.
  4. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."The Neubauer Collegium". The Neubauer Collegium. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  5. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Newly Elected Fellows". Archived from the original on 2016-04-24.
  6. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Jonathan Lear Elected to the American Philosophical Society | Division of the Humanities". humanities.uchicago.edu. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  7. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Weinberg, Justin (22 September 2025). "Jonathan Lear (1948–2025)". Daily Nous. Retrieved 23 September 2025.
  8. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Q&A with... Jonathan Lear". chronicle.uchicago.edu. Retrieved 2025-09-27.
  9. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."PHF | Jonathan Lear". humanities.sas.upenn.edu. Archived from the original on 2005-04-02. Retrieved 2025-09-27.
  10. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Why Mourning Is Essential to Our Well-Being: Big Brains podcast with Jonathan Lear". University of Chicago News. Retrieved 2025-09-27.
  11. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 2024-03-20.
  12. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Jonathan Lear | American Academy of Arts and Sciences". www.amacad.org. 2024-03-20. Retrieved 2024-03-20.
  13. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Mellon Foundation". www.mellon.org. Retrieved 2024-03-20.
  14. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Jonathan D. Lear". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation... Retrieved 2024-03-20.
  15. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Harvard University Press".
  16. ^ Reviewed at: Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Griffiths, Paul J. (January 2023). "Mourned or lamented?". Commonweal. 150 (1): 54–56.

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