Eli P. Bernstein

Research Topic

The Art of Judgment: Thinking and Writing in Early Modern France

Supervisors:

Professor Neil Kenny and Professor David Parrott

My research focuses primarily on the literary and intellectual culture of sixteenth and seventeenth century France. I look at how the pedagogical ideals of humanist education manuals informed the structure of thinking and writing in early modern Europe. In particular, I am exploring the concept of 'judgment' in Renaissance rhetoric and how this shaped the thought of French writers such as Jean Bodin, Étienne Pasquier, and Michel de Montaigne, among others. My hope is to show that judgment was not just a term found on the verbal surface of language, but came to constitute a way of thinking within a temporal and spiritual form of life.

I am a member of the founding committee for the Oxford Centre for Intellectual History. Please do get in touch with me if you would like to be involved with the CIH.

My research is generously supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), the Clarendon Fund, Jesus College, Oxford, and Corpus Christi College Oxford.

Publications:

Eli P. Bernstein, Alex Beeton, et al., (eds.), ‘The Mind is its Own Place? Early Modern Intellectual History in an Institutional Context’, History of Universities, vol. 36, no. 2 (2023)

Teaching:

I teach undergraduate students British and European History 1500-1700, Historiography and Historical Methods, and the History of Political Thought. I also teach masters student's on the strands for Early Modern History and Intellectual History .

You can find me on Twitter here.