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''Lingua Franca'' was an American magazine about intellectual and literary life in
academia An academy ( Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy ...
.


Founding

The magazine was founded in 1990 by Jeffrey Kittay, an editor and professor of French literature at
Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...
. Kittay, as the ''
New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' reported, "saw a niche for vivid reporting about the academic world and especially about its many personal feuds and intellectual controversies." Kittay told the newspaper, "I was an academic who was very, very hungry for information about what made my profession so alive, where people became passionate about abstract ideas." Describing the magazine's impact years later, in the ''
New York Observer New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created. New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz Albums and EPs * ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 * ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator ...
'', Ron Rosenbaum wrote that "It soon became a much-talked-about phenomenon inside and outside academia." In November, 2000, on the journal's tenth anniversary, the ''
Village Voice ''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture paper, known for being the country's first alternative newspaper, alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf (publisher), Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Mailer, th ...
'' commented that "''Lingua Francas influence on nineties magazine culture has been so strong, it's sometimes hard to remember that it was unique in academia when it began."


Contents and contributors

In a 2002 retrospective article, Andrew Delbanco wrote about the magazine that "It ran stories about everything, from a historians’ quarrel over the efficacy of the 1960s student movement, to a dispute among anthropologists over whether cannibalism ever existed, to the fight between the Harvard biologists E.O. Wilson and Richard Lewontin over the extent to which genes control human behavior, to the question of whether dissertation advisers should sleep with their students." Contributors included editors and writers who went on to careers at ''
The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hu ...
'', ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, t ...
'', ''
Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic ro ...
'', ''
The New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read ...
'', ''
The Nation ''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's ''The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper tha ...
'', ''
The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econ ...
'', ''
The London Review of Books The ''London Review of Books'' (''LRB'') is a British literary magazine published twice monthly that features articles and essays on fiction and non-fiction subjects, which are usually structured as book reviews. History The ''London Review o ...
'', the ''
Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large na ...
'', and ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issue ...
'':
Peter Beinart Peter Alexander Beinart (; born February 28, 1971) is an American liberal columnist, journalist, and political commentator. A former editor of ''The New Republic'', he has also written for ''Time'', ''The New York Times'', and ''The New York Revie ...
,
Lev Grossman Lev Grossman (born June 26, 1969) is an American novelist and journalist who wrote ''The Magicians Trilogy'': '' The Magicians'' (2009), ''The Magician King'' (2011), and '' The Magician's Land'' (2014). He was the book critic and lead technology ...
, Fred Kaplan, Robert S. Boynton, Warren St. John,
Jonathan Mahler Jonathan may refer to: *Jonathan (name), a masculine given name Media * ''Jonathan'' (1970 film), a German film directed by Hans W. Geißendörfer * ''Jonathan'' (2016 film), a German film directed by Piotr J. Lewandowski * ''Jonathan'' (2018 ...
, Jennifer Schuessler, Matthew Steinglass, Daniel Mendelsohn,
Laura Secor Laura Secor is an American journalist whose work has focused on Iranian politics and Iran–United States relations. She has written about personal stories, such as the experience of poet Asieh Amini, and has also written a book, ''Children of P ...
, Hillary Frey,
Lawrence Osborne Lawrence Osborne (born 1958) is a British novelist and journalist who is currently residing in Bangkok. Osborne was educated at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, and at Harvard University, and has since led a nomadic life, residing for years in ...
, Caleb Crain, Rachel Donadio,
Jeet Heer Jeet Heer is a Canadian author, comics critic, literary critic and journalist. He is a national affairs correspondent for ''The Nation'' magazine and a former staff writer at ''The New Republic''. As of 2014, he was writing a doctoral thesis at Yor ...
,
Corey Robin Corey Robin (born 1967) is an American political theorist, journalist and professor of political science at Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He has written books on the role of fear in political life, tr ...
, Chris Mooney, James Ryerson, Emily Nussbaum,
Clive Thompson Clive Thompson may refer to: * Clive Thompson (businessman) (born 1943), Deputy Chairman of Strategic Equity Capital * Clive Thompson (journalist) (born 1968), Canadian freelance journalist, blogger and science and technology writer {{hndis, Th ...
, and Adam Shatz. As cultural critic
Ron Rosenbaum Ronald Rosenbaum (born November 27, 1946) is an American literary journalist, literary critic, and novelist. Life and career Rosenbaum was born into a Jewish family in New York City, New York and grew up in Bay Shore, New York. He graduated fro ...
wrote in ''
The New York Observer ''The New York Observer'' was a weekly newspaper printed from 1987 to 2016, when it ceased print publication and became the online-only newspaper ''Observer''. The media site focuses on culture, real estate, media, politics and the entertainmen ...
'', "The kind of writing about ideas that once found a home at ''Lingua Franca'' has since — with the assistance of many talented ''Lingua Franca'' alumni, both writers and editors — succeeded in changing the face of serious journalism for the better."


Editors

Jeffrey Kittay served as the magazine's editor-in-chief. For its first year, the editor was Peter Edidin. From 1991 to 1994, ''Lingua Franca'' was co-edited by Judith Shulevitz and
Margaret Talbot Margaret Talbot is an American essayist and non-fiction writer. She is also the daughter of the veteran Warner Bros. actor Lyle Talbot, whom she profiled in an October 2012 '' The New Yorker'' article and in her book ''The Entertainer: Movies, ...
. In late 1994, Alexander Star became the editor, joined by Emily Eakin. The ''
New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' critic A.O. Scott served as a senior editor, as did ''
New Yorker New Yorker or ''variant'' primarily refers to: * A resident of the State of New York ** Demographics of New York (state) * A resident of New York City ** List of people from New York City * ''The New Yorker'', a magazine founded in 1925 * '' The ...
'' features editor Daniel Zalewski. Historian and journalist
Rick Perlstein Eric S. Perlstein (born September 3, 1969) is an American historian and journalist who has garnered recognition for his chronicles of the post-1960s American conservative movement. The author of five bestselling books, Perlstein received the 200 ...
, the author of '' Nixonland'', began his journalism career as an intern there, later becoming associate editor.


Sokal Affair

''Lingua Franca'' was where the
Sokal Affair The Sokal affair, also called the Sokal hoax, was a demonstrative scholarly hoax performed by Alan Sokal, a physics professor at New York University and University College London. In 1996, Sokal submitted an article to ''Social Text'', an acade ...
— a parody of academic practices and
post-structuralist Post-structuralism is a term for philosophical and literary forms of theory that both build upon and reject ideas established by structuralism, the intellectual project that preceded it. Though post-structuralists all present different critique ...
language — was first revealed; ''Lingua Franca'' editors later produced a book of selected papers on the subject, ''The Sokal Hoax'', published by the University of Nebraska Press.


Final issue

The magazine halted publication during the 2001 economic downturn, after a financial backer withdrew support. ''New Yorker'' editor
David Remnick David J. Remnick (born October 29, 1958) is an American journalist, writer and editor. He won a Pulitzer Prize in 1994 for his book '' Lenin's Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire'', and is also the author of ''Resurrection'' and ''King of t ...
told ''The New York Times'', "That is terrible. I really enjoyed it — I always found something fascinating to read in that magazine, and not infrequently something that I wish we had had for ''The New Yorker''." The company behind the magazine declared bankruptcy in April 2002. Later in 2002, editor Alexander Star assembled an anthology: ''Quick Studies: The Best of Lingua Franca'', published by Farrar Straus Giroux. In 2006, at age 19,
Aaron Swartz Aaron Hillel Swartz (November 8, 1986 – January 11, 2013) was an American computer programmer, entrepreneur, writer, political organizer, and Internet hacktivist. A prolific programmer, Swartz helped develop the web feed format RSS, the tech ...
wrote a program to put up a mirror archive of the magazine on the web.


Honors

''Lingua Franca'' received the
National Magazine Award The National Magazine Awards, also known as the Ellie Awards, honor print and digital publications that consistently demonstrate superior execution of editorial objectives, innovative techniques, noteworthy enterprise and imaginative design. Or ...
for General Excellence (under 100,000 circulation) in 1993.Paula Span, "Lingua Franca, the Magazine of Naked Academia; It's Taken the Starch Out of Scholars and The Ivy Off the Walls," ''The Washington Post'', May 25, 1993. The magazine was nominated again in 1994, 1996, 1998, and 1999.


See also

*
Sokal Affair The Sokal affair, also called the Sokal hoax, was a demonstrative scholarly hoax performed by Alan Sokal, a physics professor at New York University and University College London. In 1996, Sokal submitted an article to ''Social Text'', an acade ...
* Arts & Letters Daily


References


External links


Lingua Franca Article Archive
* * ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''
Chronicle of Academic Life Suspends Publication"When Intellectuals Had a Real Magazine: Viva Lingua Franca!"
By Ron Rosenbaum in
The New York Observer ''The New York Observer'' was a weekly newspaper printed from 1987 to 2016, when it ceased print publication and became the online-only newspaper ''Observer''. The media site focuses on culture, real estate, media, politics and the entertainmen ...
, (April 2006).
Sokal Affair: Alan Sokal, "A Physicist Experiments With Cultural Studies," Lingua Franca, May/June, 1996.
*{{cite book, title=Quick studies: the best of Lingua Franca, editor=Alexander Star, publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux, year= 2002, isbn= 978-0-374-52863-8 Defunct literary magazines published in the United States Magazines established in 1990 Magazines disestablished in 2001