Clare Hall is a

constituent college A collegiate university is a university in which functions are divided between a central administration and a number of constituent colleges. Historically, the first collegiate university was the University of Paris and its first college was the C ...

of the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

, England. Founded in 1966 by

Clare College Clare College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England. The college was founded in 1326 as University Hall, making it the second-oldest surviving college of the University after Peterhouse. It was refounded ...

, Clare Hall is a college for advanced study, admitting only postgraduate students alongside postdoctoral researchers and fellows. It was established to serve as an Institute of Advanced Studies and has slowly grown and developed into a full constituent college. Clare Hall is one of the smallest colleges with 200 graduate students, but around 125 Fellows, making it the highest Fellow to Student ratio at Cambridge University. Notwithstanding its small size, the college is also notable for its high number of Nobel Laureate affiliates. Clare Hall maintains many Cambridge traditions including formal hall and the tutorial system.

History

Clare Hall was founded by

(which had previously been known as "Clare Hall" from 1338 to 1856) as a centre for advanced study, but was also intended to become a social group of men and women with their families that would include graduate students studying for higher degrees in the university, research fellows working at

post-doctoral A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a Doctor of Philosophy, PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral rese ...

level, permanent fellows holding faculty or research posts in the university, and

visiting fellow In academia, a visiting scholar, visiting researcher, visiting fellow, visiting lecturer, or visiting professor is a scholar from an institution who visits a host university to teach, lecture, or perform research on a topic for which the visitor ...

s on leave from universities around the world. After Clare College decided to establish this new centre in January 1964, the initial planning was carried through by a small group of fellows of the college chaired by the Master, Sir Eric Ashby. It was soon agreed that the new centre would be called Clare Hall, the ancient name by which the college itself had been known for more than five hundred years until the mid-19th century. Clare Hall maintains close ties with Clare College, sharing some facilities and annual events. The Institute of Advanced Studies at the

University of Bologna The University of Bologna ( it, Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna, UNIBO) is a public research university in Bologna, Italy. Founded in 1088 by an organised guild of students (''studiorum''), it is the oldest university in continuo ...

is so far the only institution abroad explicitly modelled upon Clare Hall.

Buildings

The architect Ralph Erskine was appointed to design the buildings for Clare Hall, which were to include common rooms, offices and dining facilities, a house for the President, and twenty apartments for visiting fellows. A neighbouring house, Elmside in Grange Road, provided rooms for the relatively small number of graduate students. Sir Eric Ashby, then Master of Clare College and Vice-Chancellor of the University, formally opened Clare Hall in September 1969.

Brian Pippard Sir Alfred Brian Pippard, FRS (7 September 1920 – 21 September 2008), was a British physicist. He was Cavendish Professor of Physics from 1971 until 1982 and an Honorary Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge, of which he was the first President. ...

, the first President of Clare Hall, had already moved into the President's house with his family; twelve research students were living on the college site in Elmside and a number of visiting fellows with their families were living in the newly built college apartments. Among the early visiting fellows was

Ivar Giaever Ivar Giaever ( no, Giæver, ; born April 5, 1929) is a Norwegian-American engineer and physicist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1973 with Leo Esaki and Brian Josephson "for their discoveries regarding tunnelling phenomena in solids". G ...

, who was awarded a

Nobel Prize for Physics ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...

in 1973. Joseph Brodsky, a visiting fellow and poet in residence at Clare Hall in 1977, was awarded the

Nobel Prize for Literature ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , caption = , awarded_for = Outstanding contributions in literature , presenter = Swedish Academy , holder = Annie Ernaux (2022) , location = Stockholm, Sweden , year = 1901 , ...

in 1987.

William Nordhaus William Dawbney Nordhaus (born May 31, 1941) is an American economist, a Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale University, best known for his work in economic modeling and climate change, and one of the 2 recipients of the 2018 Nobel Memoria ...

, a visiting fellow in 1970, was awarded the

Nobel Prize for Economics The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, officially the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel ( sv, Sveriges riksbanks pris i ekonomisk vetenskap till Alfred Nobels minne), is an economics award administered ...

in 2018. Other facilities in the college grounds include a sports complex with a multi-gym and swimming pool and an adjacent tennis court. It also has a dining room which is used for

Formal Hall Formal hall or formal meal is a meal held at some of the oldest universities in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland (as well as some other Commonwealth countries) at which students usually dress in formal attire and often gowns to d ...

. The university athletics track is a short run from the main college buildings.

Growth

In 1978 a second neighbouring house, now called

Leslie Barnett Leslie Barnett (born 12 October 1920 as Margaret Leslie Collard – died 10 February 2002) was a British biologist who worked with Francis Crick, Sydney Brenner, and Richard J. Watts-Tobin to genetically demonstrate the genetic code, triplet na ...

House, was obtained for graduate student accommodation. This purchase also allowed the Michael Stoker and Brian Pippard Buildings to be built in the college grounds, providing further student rooms. The Anthony Low Building in the garden of Elmside was completed in 2000, providing further common rooms and the Garden Bar for the graduates on the main college site. In the summer of 1996, the college purchased a substantial property, formerly the Cambridge family home of

Victor Rothschild, 3rd Baron Rothschild Nathaniel Mayer Victor Rothschild, 3rd Baron Rothschild (31 October 1910 – 20 March 1990) was a British banker, scientist, intelligence officer during World War II, and later a senior executive with Royal Dutch Shell and N M Rothschild & Son ...

(1910–1990), which is about five minutes' walk from the college at the western end of Herschel Road. It was renamed Clare Hall West Court and, after conversion and some major building works, now provides public rooms, studies, apartments, study bedrooms, a fitness centre and a swimming pool.

Student life

Unlike other colleges in the university, Clare Hall does not have a

High Table The high table is a table for the use of fellows (members of the Senior Common Room) and their guests in large university dining halls in anglo-saxon countries, where the students eat in the main space of the hall at the same time. They remain ...

at meals or a

Senior Common Room A common room is a group into which students and the academic body are organised in some universities in the United Kingdom and Ireland—particularly collegiate universities such as Oxford and Cambridge, as well as the University of Bristol ...

, and it is a single society for all social functions and in the use of the various college common rooms and other facilities. This encourages interaction between graduate students, distinguished visiting fellows and other senior members, aided also by the wide variety of national backgrounds and research interests of the members. The interaction between members of Clare Hall is encouraged also by college seminars, lunchtime discussions and formal lecture series. The latter includes the annual series of lectures relating to human values, given by a distinguished international scholar and sponsored by the Tanner Foundation. They also include the annual Ashby lecture, given by a visiting fellow, and the more frequent ASH seminar (arts, social sciences and history) that were initiated by some of the visiting life members. Other events include art exhibitions, films and small concerts which supplement the wealth of music available in the university.

People associated with the college

Presidents

The President's term of office is fixed at seven years. Previous presidents include,

(1963–70),

Robert Honeycombe Sir Robert William Kerr Honeycombe, (2 May 1921 – 14 September 2007) was a Goldsmiths' Professor of Metallurgy and Professor Emeritus of the University of Cambridge. He was an Honorary Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge. Born in Melbourne, Austra ...

, Goldsmiths Professor and Head of the Department of Metallurgy (1973–80); Sir Michael Stoker (1980–87), former director of the Imperial Cancer Research Laboratories;

Anthony Low Donald Anthony Low (22 June 1927 – 12 February 2015), known as Anthony Low or D. A. Low, was a historian of modern South Asia, Africa, the British Commonwealth, and, especially, decolonization. He was the Emeritus Smuts Professor of Hi ...

(1987–94), Professor of Commonwealth History and formerly Vice-Chancellor of the

Australian National University The Australian National University (ANU) is a public research university located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton encompasses seven teaching and research colleges, in addition to several national academies and ...

; Dame Gillian Beer (1994–2001), King Edward VII Professor of English Literature;

Ekhard Salje Ekhard Karl Hermann Salje, FRS (born 1946) is an Emeritus Professor, and formerly Professor of Mineralogy and Petrology and Head of the Department of Earth Sciences, Cambridge University. Education and career Ekhard Salje completed his Univer ...

(2001–08), Head of the Department of Earth Sciences; Sir Martin Harris (2008–13), former Vice-Chancellor of the

University of Manchester , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

and David Ibbetson, Regius Professor of Civil Law Professor

C. Alan Short Charles Alan Short (born 1955) is a British architect and academic. He has been Professor of Architecture at the University of Cambridge since 2001, and President of Clare Hall, Cambridge since 2020. He champions low-energy buildings that will be re ...

, Professor of Architecture (Cambridge), Fellow and Vice-President of Clare Hall, became the ninth President of Clare Hall from 1st August 2020. He is the Professor of Architecture (1970) of the University of Cambridge.

Fellows

The late Lord Ashby was elected as the first honorary fellow of Clare Hall in 1975, on his retirement from the Mastership of Clare College. Present honorary fellows include two former visiting fellows,

Kim Dae-Jung Kim Dae-jung (; ; 6 January 192418 August 2009), was a South Korean politician and activist who served as the eighth president of South Korea from 1998 to 2003. He was a 2000 Nobel Peace Prize recipient for his work for democracy and human ...

, former President of the

Republic of Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its east ...

and

Nobel Peace Prize The Nobel Peace Prize is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Swedish industrialist, inventor and armaments (military weapons and equipment) manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Chemistry, Physics, Physiolog ...

winner in 2000, and

Lee Bollinger Lee Carroll Bollinger (born April 30, 1946) is an American lawyer and educator who is serving as the 19th and current president of Columbia University, where he is also the Seth Low Professor of the University and a faculty member of Columbia La ...

, who later became President of the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

and

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

. They also include the retired presidents of the College, together with Ralph Erskine, architect of the early buildings, and Richard Eden, one of the founding fellows. Clare Hall has a strong tradition in theoretical physics.

, its first President, was

Cavendish Professor of Physics The Cavendish Professorship is one of the senior faculty positions in physics at the University of Cambridge. It was founded on 9 February 1871 alongside the famous Cavendish Laboratory, which was completed three years later. William Cavendish, 7th ...

. Notable current fellows include Michael Green, former

Lucasian Professor of Mathematics The Lucasian Chair of Mathematics () is a mathematics professorship in the University of Cambridge, England; its holder is known as the Lucasian Professor. The post was founded in 1663 by Henry Lucas, who was Cambridge University's Member of Pa ...

;

John D. Barrow John David Barrow (29 November 1952 – 26 September 2020) was an English cosmologist, theoretical physicist, and mathematician. He served as Gresham Professor of Geometry at Gresham College from 2008 to 2011. Barrow was also a writer of pop ...

, a

Templeton Prize The Templeton Prize is an annual award granted to a living person, in the estimation of the judges, "whose exemplary achievements advance Sir John Templeton's philanthropic vision: harnessing the power of the sciences to explore the deepest quest ...

laureate; and

Stephen Toope Stephen John Toope (born February 14, 1958) is a Canadian legal scholar, academic administrator and a scholar specializing in human rights, public international law and international relations. In April 2013 he announced he was stepping down ...

, Vice-Chancellor of the University from 2017. Notable past fellows include David J. Thouless, winner of a 2016

Nobel Prize in Physics ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...

;

, winner of a 1973

; Stephen Adler, permanent faculty at the

Institute for Advanced Study The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), located in Princeton, New Jersey, in the United States, is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholar ...

;

Michael R. Douglas Michael R. Douglas (born November 19, 1961) is an American theoretical physicist, best known for his work in string theory and mathematical physics. Biography Douglas was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the son of Nancy and Ronald G. Douglas, a ...

of Stony Brook University; J. David Jackson of the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

. Other American academics who were past fellows include

Andreas Acrivos Andreas Acrivos (born 13 June 1928) is the Albert Einstein Professor of Science and Engineering, Emeritus at the City College of New York. He is also the director of the Benjamin Levich Institute for Physicochemical Hydrodynamics. Education and c ...

(fluid dynamics) of Stanford,

Leila Ahmed Leila Ahmed ( ar, لیلى أحمد); (born 1940) is an Egyptian-American scholar of Islam. In 1992 she published her book ''Women and Gender in Islam'', which is regarded as a seminal historical analysis of the position of women in Arab Muslim s ...

(divinity) of

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

David Epel David Epel is a researcher at Hopkins Marine Station in Pacific Grove, California, and a Professor (Emeritus) in the Department of Biology at Stanford University. Epel earned his Ph.D. at University of California Berkeley under Daniel Mazia. He a ...

(marine biology) of Stanford.

Notable alumni and past fellows

Paul Berg Paul Berg (born June 30, 1926) is an American biochemist and professor emeritus at Stanford University. He was the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1980, along with Walter Gilbert and Frederick Sanger. The award recognized their con ...

, 1980 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry * Joseph Brodsky, 1987 Nobel Laureate in Literature * José Wendell Capili, Filipino writer * Michele Chiaruzzi, Sammarinese ambassador *

Jeff Colyer Jeffrey William Colyer (born June 3, 1960) is an American surgeon and politician who served as the 47th governor of Kansas from January 31, 2018, to January 14, 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he was the 49th lieutenant governor of Kansa ...

, Governor of Kansas *

Kim Dae-jung Kim Dae-jung (; ; 6 January 192418 August 2009), was a South Korean politician and activist who served as the eighth president of South Korea from 1998 to 2003. He was a 2000 Nobel Peace Prize recipient for his work for democracy and human ...

, Former President of South Korea, 2000 Nobel Laureate in Peace *

, 1973 Nobel Laureate in Physics *

Tamala Krishna Goswami Tamal Krishna Goswami (; 1946–2002), born Thomas G. Herzig in New York City, New York, United States, served on the International Society for Krishna Consciousness's Governing Body Commission since its inception in 1970. He completed a b ...

, Hindu theologian *

Seamus Heaney Seamus Justin Heaney (; 13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature.

, 1995 Nobel Laureate in Literature *

Tobias Hecht Tobias Hecht (born 18 February 1964) is an American anthropologist, ethnographer, and translator. Hecht was born in Seattle, Washington. He received his B.A. from Columbia University in 1986 and his Ph.D. in Social Anthropology in 1995 from the ...

, American anthropologist *

Howard Markel Howard Markel (born April 23, 1960) is an American physician and medical historian. Markel is the George E. Wantz Distinguished Professor of the History of Medicine at the University of Michigan and Director of the University of Michigan's Center ...

, American historian of medicine and physician *

, 2018 Nobel Laureate in Economics *

Barbara Sahakian Barbara Jacquelyn Sahakian, is Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology at the Department of Psychiatry and Medical Research Council (MRC)/Wellcome Trust Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge. She is also an Ho ...

, Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology *

Phyllis Starkey Phyllis Margaret Starkey (née Williams; born 4 January 1947) is a British Labour party politician, who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Milton Keynes South West from 1997 to 2010. She had previously served as Leader of Oxford City Counci ...

, former Labour Party MP *

Budiman Sudjatmiko Budiman Sudjatmiko (born 10 March 1970 in Cilacap, Central Java) is an Native Indonesians, Indonesian activist and politician from Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle. He was a political prisoner during the final years of the Suharto regime. ...

, Indonesian activist and politician * David J. Thouless, 2016 Nobel Laureate in Physics *

Michael Toch Michael Toch (born 1946) is professor of medieval history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He specialises in the history of the Jews in the Middle Ages, the early modern history of Germany and Europe, the social and economic history of mediev ...

, Professor of medieval history

References

* * Richard Eden (2009), ''Clare Hall. The Origins and Development of a College for Advanced Study'', Cambridge.

External links

*
Clare Hall on Cambridge University Alternative Prospectus
{{Authority control Colleges of the University of Cambridge Educational institutions established in 1966 1966 establishments in England Postgraduate schools in the United Kingdom