Classics and Philosophy professor Verity Harte has been named George Eastman Professor at Oxford for the 2025–2026 academic year.
The Eastman Professorship was established in 1929 by George Eastman, founder of the Eastman Kodak Company. Eastman created a chair at Oxford University to be filled on a visiting basis by senior American Scholars of the highest distinction, who remain on the faculty at Oxford for one year. The fund which supports the Eastman Professorship is administered by the Board of Directors of the Association of American Rhodes Scholars through the American Trust for Oxford University. Electors to the Eastman Chair are the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University, four persons appointed by the Council of Oxford University, two persons appointed by the Board of Directors of the AARS, and two persons from Balliol College (with which the visiting professorship is associated).
Past occupants of the Eastman Professorship in Philosophy were Willard Van Orman Quine and Donald Davidson. Past occupants in Classics were Tenney Frank, John H. Finley and Josiah Ober. Occupants from other fields have included the legal scholar and Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter, the anthropologist Clifford Geertz, and actress and scholar Anna Deavere Smith. Read more here.