Catharine R. Stimpson

Catharine R. Stimpson, the inaugural Helen Pond McIntyre Lecturer, has long-standing ties to the Barnard Center for Research on Women. From 1963-1980, when she was a member of Barnard’s faculty, Catharine Stimpson helped to found the Center, serving as both chair of the Task Force that brought the Center into being and as its first director. She also initiated the teaching of courses important to the developing field of women’s studies, including the first courses in Women and Literature and Black Literature. While at Barnard, Professor Stimpson founded Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, which remains to this day a premier women’s studies journal and a cutting-edge resource for feminist scholarship. Professor Stimpson’s many publications include the book Where the Meanings Are: Feminism and Cultural Spaces and the Library of America’s Gertrude Stein: Writings 1903-1932. The author of a novel, Class Notes, she is the editor of seven books and has published over 150 monographs, essays, stories, and reviews in the Transatlantic Review, The Nation, The New York Times Book Review, Critical Inquiry, boundary 2, and others. She has served as chairperson for the National Center for Research on Women and the Ms. Magazine Board of Scholars, as well as president of the Modern Language Association. Professor Stimpson is currently University Professor and Dean of the Graduate School of Arts & Science at New York University.