Harvard Profs Win Humanities Medals

President George W. Bush and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) honored two members of Harvard’s Faculty on Thursday for significant contributions to their respective fields.

Professor of History Emeritus Richard E. Pipes and Professor of Yiddish Literature Ruth R. Wisse were both named as recipients of the 2007 National Humanities Medal.

Pipes was awarded the medal for “his peerless scholarship on Russia and Eastern Europe and for his dedication to the cause of freedom.” Wisse was awarded the medal for “her scholarship and teaching that have illuminated Jewish literary traditions.”

The medal, first awarded in 1997, “honors individuals or groups whose work has deepened the nation’s understanding of the humanities, broadened our citizens’ engagement with the humanities, or helped preserve and expand Americans’ access to important resources in the humanities,” according to the NEH Web site.

Recipients of the National Humanities Medal are anonymously recommended by people around the country. NEH creates a short list and then selects the recipients, who are awarded the medal at the discretion of the President.

Pipes, who was also the Director of Eastern European and Soviet Affairs in President Reagan’s National Security Council, first became interested in the Soviet Union during World War II. His family fled Poland following the Nazi/Soviet invasion of September 1939. Pipes ended up in the United States, where he learned Russian as a member of the U.S. Air Corps, the predecessor to the U.S. Air Force.

“Everyone was interested in Russia largely because of World War II. Following the war, the study of Russia was a wide-open, exciting field and there were few American experts at the time,” Pipes said in an interview with The Crimson.

Wisse became interested in Yiddish literature while attending graduate school in 1960. Wisse, who was studing English literature at the time, said she “decided it would be a terrific challenge to open up a new field in Yiddish literature.”

“Yiddish was the language of my home,” she added.

Julia I. Bertelsmann ’09, who has taken both Literature and Arts A-48, “Modern Jewish Literature,” and Literature 153, “Saul Bellow and the New York Intellectuals,” with Wisse, said the scholar is “one of the most brilliant professors I’ve had.”

“She provides opportunities for questions and disagreement that are not always the case at a university like this,” Bertelsmann said.

Wisse’s colleagues echoed these words of praise.

“She is a distinguished intellectual in her field,” said Professor of Hebrew Literature and Philosophy Shaye J.D. Cohen. Noting a difference in political views, Cohen said that though he doesn’t agree with Wisse on many things, he is “delighted that she won this award.”

Both professors acknowledged their gratitude for winning the award and the literal burden that comes with being a recipient.

“It was a very heavy medal,” Pipes said. “At least a pound.”