Alison Winter

Alison Winter (19 November 1965 – 22 June 2016) was an American academic.

Biography

Born on 19 November 1965 in New Haven, Connecticut,[1] Winter spent her early childhood in Bonn, Germany, and attended high school in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where her father taught mathematics at the University of Michigan.[2] His influence led her to study the history of science at the University of Chicago beginning in 1983.[3] Winter moved to the United Kingdom for graduate study, where she met Adrian Johns in 1987. The two married in 1992.[4] Winter completed her M. Phil at the University of Cambridge in 1991, followed by a PhD in 1993.[5] She began teaching at the California Institute of Technology in 1994, and returned to Chicago as a faculty member in 2001.[6]

Winter's doctoral dissertation was published by the University of Chicago Press as the book Mesmerized: Powers of Mind in Victorian Britain in 1998. The work covered the early history of animal magnetism and Franz Mesmer,[7] as well as its spread throughout England from the 1830s to the 1870s,[8] and focused on the work of John Elliotson.[9] Research for Winter's second book Memory: Fragments of a Modern History was funded by the Guggenheim Fellowship, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and National Science Foundation.[3] Memory was written in eleven chapters that can be read separately,[10][11] as each chapter covers a different topic and several examples relating to memory.[11][12] Alluding to its title,[13][14] Memory sought to help readers "understand the broad historical developments precisely by bringing fragments of memory's history to life."[15] Following its publication by the University of Chicago Press in 2012, Winter received the Gordon J. Laing Award in 2014.[16]

Winter was diagnosed with glioblastoma in 2015,[6] and died of a brain tumor on 22 June 2016, aged 50.[3]

References

  1. ^ Reisz, Matthew (25 August 2016). "Alison Winter, 1965-2016". Times Higher Education. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  2. ^ Graydon Megan (30 June 2016). "Alison Winter, University of Chicago historian, dies at 50". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  3. ^ a b c Peters, Mark (24 June 2016). "Alison Winter, historian of science, 1965-2016". University of Chicago. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  4. ^ "Remembering Alison Winter". University of Chicago. 16 November 2016. Archived from the original on 9 February 2019. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  5. ^ "Alison Winter AB'87, historian of the mind, 1965–2016". University of Chicago. June 23, 2016. Archived from the original on February 9, 2019. Retrieved February 8, 2019.
  6. ^ a b Richards, Robert J. (January 2017). "In Memoriam: Alison Winter". History of Science Society. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  7. ^ Gravitz, Melvin A. (2000). "Winter, Alison (1998). Mesmerized: Powers of mind in Victorian Britain. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, xiv + 464 Pages, $30.00 (Cloth)". American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis. 43 (1): 77–78. doi:10.1080/00029157.2000.10404257. S2CID 143918056.
  8. ^ Pols, Hans (1999). "Mesmerized: Powers of Mind in Victorian Britain (review)". Bulletin of the History of Medicine. 73 (4): 711–712. doi:10.1353/bhm.1999.0187. S2CID 72447023 – via Project Muse.
  9. ^ Hunt, Bruce J. (1 October 2000). "Alison Winter. Mesmerized: Powers of Mind in Victorian Britain. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1998. Pp. xiv, 464. $30.00". The American Historical Review. 105 (4): 1388–1389. doi:10.1086/ahr/105.4.1388.
  10. ^ Danziger, Kurt (September 2013). "Book review: Memory: Fragments of a Modern History". Memory Studies. 6 (4): 497–499. doi:10.1177/1750698013492681d. S2CID 164083162.
  11. ^ a b Collins, Alan (12 January 2012). "Memory: Fragments of a Modern History". Times Higher Education. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  12. ^ "Memory: Fragments of a Modern History". Science News. 27 January 2012. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  13. ^ Ballenger, Jesse F. (2012). "Memory: Fragments of a Modern History (review)". Bulletin of the History of Medicine. 86 (2): 291–292. doi:10.1353/bhm.2012.0040. S2CID 57333253.
  14. ^ Balmer, Andrew S. (December 2014). "Alison Winter, Memory: Fragments of a Modern History. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2012. Pp. x+319. ISBN 978-0-226-90258-6. £21.00 (hardback)". The British Journal for the History of Science. 47 (4): 750–751. doi:10.1017/S000708741400082X.
  15. ^ Howe, Edmund G. (2016). "Memory: Fragments of a Modern History, by Alison Winter". Psychiatry. 79 (2): 184–189. doi:10.1080/00332747.2016.1179515. S2CID 41262483.
  16. ^ Ingmire, Jann (25 April 2014). "2014 UChicago Press Laing Prize awarded to Alison Winter". University of Chicago. Retrieved 8 February 2019.