Jeffrey Kittay

Jeffrey Kittay

In 1990, Kittay decided to take what he knew about academia (having been a literature professor at Yale) and founded the magazine Lingua Franca: the Review of Academic Life, covering the more adventurous research and red-blooded battles of the mind. It won a National Magazine Award in its third year and was characterized by The New York Times as "a hip trade journal for the cerebral set." The magazine enjoyed 11 years of publication before closing. Kittay founded another publication, University Business, that is still in publication. Many of the young people who worked for Kittay and his publications have gone on to be editors at The New York Times and The New Yorker.

Kittay received a Ph.D. in French literature, and is the recipient of an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Amherst College, as well as the Alumni Achievement Award of the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences of New York University.