Nancie Schermerhorn Struever (born December 2, 1928) is an American historian of the Renaissance. She is a professor emerita in the department of comparative thought and literature at the Johns Hopkins Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences where she joined the faculty in 1974.[1] Struever was previously a professor at the Hobart and William Smith Colleges.

Nancy Struever
Born
Nancie Schermerhorn

(1928-12-02) December 2, 1928 (age 95)
Children3
Academic background
Alma materFrances Shimer Academy
Connecticut College
University of Rochester
ThesisRhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Italian Humanism; Rhetorical and Historical Modes in Coluccio Salutati, Leonardo Bruni, and Poggio Bracciolini (1966)
Doctoral advisorHayden White
Other advisorsBernard Nicholas Schilling
Academic work
DisciplineRenaissance studies, comparative literature
InstitutionsHobart and William Smith Colleges
Johns Hopkins University

Early life and education

edit

Nancie Schermerhorn Struever was born December 2, 1928, in LaSalle, Illinois.[2] She is the daughter of Olive M. Schermerhorn.[3] She graduated from LaSalle-Peru High School in June 1945. From 1945 to 1946, Struever attended Frances Shimer Academy where she won the Elizabeth Percy Konrad trophy for excellence in English and the Phi Theta Kappa scholastic award.[2][4] She majored in history during her junior a senior year at Connecticut College from 1946 to 1948.[2]

Struever married Carl C. Struever Jr., an engineer at Eastman Kodak.[2] She later completed a bachelor's degree in history at the University of Rochester College for Women[5] where she graduated with distinction and Phi Beta Kappa in June 1954.[2] She completed a M.A. in English in June 1957 at the University of Rochester. Her master's thesis conducted under advisor Bernard Nicholas Schilling [Wikidata] was titled, A Comparison of the Historical Method and Literary Style of Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and Tomas Carlyle's French Revolution.[2]

Struever commenced her doctoral studies in May 1961 under advisor Hayden White.[2] While completing graduate courses, she studied Greek at the Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School.[2] During the school year 1963 to 1964, she was awarded a $3,000 fellowship by the American Association of University Women, allowing her to spend a summer Florence. While there, she researched in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze and read Florentine manuscripts at the British Museum. Stuever was an instructor in the history department at Hobart and William Smith Colleges beginning in 1964. In 1966, Struever completed a Ph.D. in medieval history. Her dissertation was titled, Rhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Italian Humanism; Rhetorical and Historical Modes in Coluccio Salutati, Leonardo Bruni, and Poggio Bracciolini.[2] The dissertation became the basis of her first book published in 1970.[6]

At the time she completed her doctorate, Struever had a daughter and son in college and her youngest son was a freshman in high school. In a 1971 interview, Struever shared of her experiences as a doctoral student that, "...attitudes among the faculty ranged from encouraging to horrified. My worst problem was that U of R would not give me a graduate fellowship, because history obviously could only be my avocation, not my vocation. They didn't think I could be serious, so I spent two years as a teaching assistant without pay, in order to get my teaching credits."[6]

Career

edit

In 1971, Struever, a professor of history at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, was awarded an American Council of Learned Societies fellowship that she would use to take a sabbatical from 1972 to 1973 in Italy to research for her second book.[7]

In 1974, Struever became a professor at Johns Hopkins University.[8]

In 1990, Struever was the president of the International Society for the History of Rhetoric [Wikidata].[9]

In March 1998, the humanities center at Johns Hopkins sponsored a symposium in honor of her retirement.[10]

Personal life

edit

In 1974, Struever moved to Tuscany-Canterbury, Baltimore.[8] Struever's sons Bill and Fred are real estate developers in Baltimore.[8] She owns a home in Maine.[11] Struever and her daughter, Molly, shared ownership of the Children's Bookstore in Baltimore with JoAnn Fruchtman. By 1999, Fruchtman reported that she bought the Struevers out a few years after opening.[12]

Selected works

edit
  • Struever, Nancy S. (1970). The Language of History in the Renaissance: Rhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-06180-1.[13]
  • Vickers, Brian; Struever, Nancy S. (1985). Rhetoric and the Pursuit of Truth: Language Change in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, University of California.[14]
  • Struever, Nancy S. (1992). Theory as Practice: Ethical Inquiry in the Renaissance. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-77742-9.[15]
  • Struever, Nancy S. (2009). Rhetoric, Modality, Modernity. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-77750-4.[16]
  • Struever, Nancy S. (2009). The History of Rhetoric and the Rhetoric of History. Ashgate. ISBN 978-0-7546-5999-0.[17]
  • Pender, Stephen; Struever, Nancy S., eds. (2012). Rhetoric and Medicine in Early Modern Europe. Ashgate. ISBN 978-1-4094-3022-3.[18]

References

edit
  1. ^ "Nancy Struever". Johns Hopkins University. 21 November 2017. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Struever, Nancie Schermerhorn (1966). Rhetoric and historical consciousness in italian humanism: rhetorical and historiacl modes in Coluccio Salutati, Leonardo Bruni and Poggio Bracciolini (Ph.D. thesis). Ann Arbor, Michigan. OCLC 434907528.
  3. ^ "Set Schermerhorn Estate at $67,000". The Times. 1954-03-11. p. 24. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  4. ^ "Announce Awards at Frances Shimer Commencement". Freeport Journal-Standard. 1946-06-10. p. 3. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  5. ^ "Candidates for Degrees from the College for Women". Democrat and Chronicle. 1954-06-14. p. 15. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  6. ^ a b Converse, Margaret (1971-01-31). "Trim, Tenacious Nancy". Democrat and Chronicle. p. 81. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  7. ^ "Fellowship Award". Democrat and Chronicle. 1972-02-28. p. 19. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  8. ^ a b c "Struevers". The Baltimore Sun. 2001-04-01. p. 69. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  9. ^ "Plans set for memorial lecture". The Daily Tar Heel. 1990-02-16. p. 3. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  10. ^ "Incipitque Semper". MLN. 113 (5): 1250–1252. 1998. doi:10.1353/mln.1998.0090. ISSN 1080-6598.
  11. ^ "On the move, 'saving the city'". The Baltimore Sun. 2001-04-01. p. 71. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  12. ^ "Bookstore for the young and young-at-heart". The Baltimore Sun. 1999-10-19. p. 70. Retrieved 2022-02-20.
  13. ^ Reviews of The Language of History in the Renaissance:
    • Temelini, Walter (1972). "Review of The Language of History in the Renaissance: Rhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism". Renaissance and Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme. 8 (3): 121–122. ISSN 0034-429X. JSTOR 43465965.
    • Weinstein, Donald (1972). "In Whose Image and Likeness? Interpretations of Renaissance Humanism". Journal of the History of Ideas. 33 (1): 165–176. doi:10.2307/2709064. ISSN 0022-5037. JSTOR 2709064.
    • Hay, Denys (1972). "Review of Savonarola and Florence: Prophecy and Patriotism in the Renaissance; The Language of History in the Renaissance. Rhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism". The Modern Language Review. 67 (4): 922–923. doi:10.2307/3724534. ISSN 0026-7937. JSTOR 3724534.
    • Gilmore, Myron Piper (1971). "Review of Foundations of Modern Historical Scholarship: Language, Law, and History in the French Renaissance; The Language of History in the Renaissance: Rhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism". The American Historical Review. 76 (4): 1152–1154. doi:10.2307/1849279. ISSN 0002-8762. JSTOR 1849279.
    • Wilcox, Donald J. (1973). "Review of The Language of History in the Renaissance: Rhetorical and Historical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism". Renaissance Quarterly. 26 (1): 43–44. doi:10.2307/2859461. ISSN 0034-4338. JSTOR 2859461. S2CID 191955027.
    • Van Eerde, Katherine S. (1971). "Review of The Language of History in the Renaissance: Rhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism". The Historian. 34 (1): 125–126. ISSN 0018-2370. JSTOR 24442799.
    • Hyde, J. Kenneth (1973). "Review of THE LANGUAGE OF HISTORY IN THE RENAISSANCE". History. 58 (192): 90. ISSN 0018-2648. JSTOR 24408284.
    • Kelley, Donald R. (1972). "Review of The Language of History in the Renaissance. Rhetoric and Historical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism; The Development of Florentine Humanist Historiography in the Fifteenth Century". The Catholic Historical Review. 58 (2): 286–288. ISSN 0008-8080. JSTOR 25019082.
  14. ^ Reviews of Rhetoric and Pursuit of Truth:
    • Miller, Brian Donald Hewens (1991). "Review of Rhetoric and the Pursuit of Truth: Language Change in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries". The Review of English Studies. 42 (166): 237–239. doi:10.1093/res/XLII.166.237. ISSN 0034-6551. JSTOR 515942.
    • "Review of Rhetoric and the Pursuit of Truth. Language Change in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries". Social Studies of Science. 18 (3): 565. 1988. ISSN 0306-3127. JSTOR 285242.
  15. ^ Reviews of Theory as Practice:
  16. ^ Reviews of Rhetoric, Modality, Modernity:
  17. ^ Reviews of The History of Rhetoric and the Rhetoric of History:
  18. ^ Reviews of Rhetoric and Medicine in Modern Europe: