April 24, 2024 | Cambridge, MA – The American Academy of Arts & Sciences was founded in 1780 to help a young nation face its challenges through shared purpose, knowledge, and ideas.
The Academy elected its first members in 1781 and announces its newest members today. The 250 members elected in 2024 are being recognized for their excellence and invited to uphold the Academy’s mission of engaging across disciplines and divides.
“We honor these artists, scholars, scientists, and leaders in the public, non-profit, and private sectors for their accomplishments and for the curiosity, creativity, and courage required to reach new heights,” said David Oxtoby, President of the Academy. “We invite these exceptional individuals to join in the Academy’s work to address serious challenges and advance the common good.”
The members elected in 2024, in 31 areas of expertise, include:
Developmental psychologist Megan Bang, Northwestern University
Photographer Dawoud Bey, Columbia College Chicago
Columnist Jamelle Bouie, The New York Times
Ecologist and evolutionary biologist Judith Bronstein, University of Arizona
Biochemist and structural biologist William M. Clemons, Jr., California Institute of Technology
Actor, Director, and Producer George Clooney, Clooney Foundation for Justice; Smokehouse Pictures
Economist Cecilia Conrad, Lever for Change
Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook, Apple, Inc.
Historian Thavolia Glymph, Duke University
Violinist and citizen artist Vijay Gupta, Street Symphony Project, Inc.
Investor and philanthropist Grant Hill, Hill Ventures, Inc.
Legal scholar Daniel E. Ho, Stanford Law School
Author Jhumpa Lahiri
Astrodynamics engineer Kristine M. Larson, University of Colorado Boulder
Neuroscientist Marina Picciotto, Yale University
Philosopher Gideon A. Rosen, Princeton University
Cancer researcher David A. Tuveson, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Molecular biologist Mariana F. Wolfner, Cornell University
The 25 new International Honorary Members include geochemist Sigurður Reynir Gíslason, University of Iceland; author Hanif Kureishi; and biochemist Peggy Oti-Boateng, African Academy of Sciences.
For the complete list of members elected in 2024, click HERE.
“With the broad diversity of members elected this year, we are continuing to expand on the commitment to excellence and wide-ranging expertise established by our founders,” said Chair of the Board Goodwin Liu, Associate Justice of the California Supreme Court. “The honor of election comes with an invitation for new members to rededicate themselves to the common good by advancing the Academy’s nonpartisan, cross-disciplinary work in the arts, democracy, education, global affairs, and science.”
Learn more about Academy work.
Founded in 1780 in the midst of revolution – by John Adams, John Hancock, and others – the Academy’s membership and work have changed greatly over the centuries while remaining faithful to a charter founded on ideals that celebrate the life of the mind, the importance of knowledge, and the belief that the arts and sciences are “necessary to the interest, honor, dignity and happiness of a free, independent and virtuous people.”
Learn more about the Academy and its history.
The new class joins Academy members elected before them, including Benjamin Franklin (elected 1781) and Alexander Hamilton (1791) in the eighteenth century; Ralph Waldo Emerson (1864), Maria Mitchell (1848), and Charles Darwin (1874) in the nineteenth; Albert Einstein (1924), Robert Frost (1931), Margaret Mead (1948), Milton Friedman (1959), Martin Luther King, Jr. (1966), and Jacques Derrida (1985) in the twentieth; and, in this century, Madeleine K. Albright (2001), Antonin Scalia (2003), Jennifer Doudna (2003), John Legend (2017), David W. Miliband (2018), Anna Deavere Smith (2019), Salman Rushdie (2022), and Xuedong Huang (2023).
Induction ceremonies for new members will take place in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in September 2024.