History

Lecturer in European History

Office: 114, 26 Gordon Square
Office hour: by appointment

External phone: 020 7679 2075
Internal phone: 32075
E-mail: avi.lifschitz@ucl.ac.uk

2012/13: Research Fellow at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin

My broad area of interest is the intellectual history of Europe in the long eighteenth century (c. 1680-1830). I am particularly interested in the links between Enlightenment anthropology, theology, and political theory.

Another significant aspect of my research concerns translation and cross-cultural transfer, especially between France and different German states. I am also interested in the history of universities, royal academies, and exiled intellectuals in the eighteenth century.

My courses include the full-year survey ‘Enlightenment and Revolution’ and more specialised BA and MA options on eighteenth-century anthropology and early modern theories of language. Additionally, I am co-covnenor of the History of Political Ideas seminar at the Institute of Historical Research and of the London Summer School in Intellectual History.

Areas of Research Supervision:

The Enlightenment; eighteenth-century intellectual and cultural history, especially in Germany and France; language and translation; history of academies and universities.

Select Publications

- Language and Enlightenment: The Berlin Debates of the Eighteenth Century (Oxford University Press, 2012) 

- Epicurus in the Enlightenment, co-edited with Neven Leddy (Voltaire Foundation, 2009)

- 'The Arbitrariness of the Linguistic Sign: Variations on an Enlightenment Theme', Journal of the History of Ideas 73.4 (2012), 537-557

- 'Language as a Means and an Obstacle to Freedom: The Case of Moses Mendelssohn', in Freedom and the Construction of Europe, eds. Quentin Skinner and Martin van Gelderen (Cambridge University Press, 2013), vol. 2, 84-102