Professor Giora Sternberg

I began my academic studies in Tel-Aviv University and came to Oxford for a DPhil in History in 2005. I was then a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows from 2009 to 2012, when I took up my current position at the Faculty of History and at Hertford College.

Research Interests

My research and publications to date have largely focused on two broad themes at the intersection among political, social, and cultural history: symbolic interaction and writing practices. My first book, Status Interaction during the Reign of Louis XIV (OUP, 2014; pbk ed. 2016; shortlisted for the Royal History Society Gladstone Prize), investigates how and why individuals and groups expressed, shaped, and contested social positions in a variety of contexts, from high ceremonies to everyday routines. For contemporaries, status interaction operated as a key tool for defining and redefining identities, relations, and power; for scholars, it provides a novel lens for understanding early modern action and agency. The two themes combine in my work on correspondence, especially in my Past & Present article from 2009, which has offered a systematic framework for understanding letters as textual and material vehicles of status.

My current main research project, titled 'Writing Acts: The Power of Writing in the Ancien Régime' (under contract with Oxford University Press), explores the direct practical impact of manuscript forms in the social and political arenas. Its first major output appeared in The Journal of Modern History in 2013 (see Publications for further details). 

See page on Hertford College website