The Forum | Intellectual Diversity

In Memoriam Stanley Rothman

January 6, 2011 by Michael B. Poliakoff

ACTA is saddened by the news that Stanley Rothman, Mary Huggins Gamble Professor Emeritus of Government at Smith College, a scholar and teacher who was indefatigable in pursuit of truth and justice, has died. He will be remembered warmly by the many students he guided and will long be noted for his outstanding and wide-ranging scholarship–fourteen books that included Roots of Radicalism (1982), Media Elites (1986) American Elites (1996), Hollywood’s America: Social and Political Themes in Motion Pictures (1996), Environmental Cancer: A Political Disease?, The Least Dangerous Branch: The Consequences of Judicial Activism (2002). Colleagues and friends will recall his vigorous presence and participation into his late old age at professional conferences and meetings. He served as chairman of the National Association of Scholars, and his legacy continues in the fine contributions that his son, David, has made to the Association’s journal, Academic Questions. ACTA’s work in intellectual diversity drew inspiration from Professor Rothman’s survey of campus political demography. We mourn his passing but acknowledge with gratitude a long life well lived and contributions to scholarship and society that will endure.

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