Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP

Elizabeth Cabraser Inducted Into American Academy of Arts and Sciences

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Elizabeth J. Cabraser was among one hundred-seventy-nine of the nation's most influential artists, scientists, scholars, authors, and institutional leaders who were inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences at a ceremony here on Saturday, October 1.

Founded in 1780, the American Academy is one of the nation's oldest and most prestigious learned societies, and an independent research center that draws from its members' expertise to conduct studies in science and technology policy, global security, the humanities and culture, social policy, and education.

"Induction recognizes extraordinary individual achievement and marks a commitment on the part of new members to provide fundamental, non-partisan knowledge for addressing today's complex challenges," said American Academy President Leslie C. Berlowitz.

The 231st Class of the Academy includes winners of Nobel, Pritzker, and Pulitzer prizes; the Turing Award; MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowships; Kennedy Center Honors; and Grammy, Golden Globe, and Academy awards. Foreign Honorary Members from Argentina, India, Israel, Japan, and the United Kingdom were also inducted.

Participants in the ceremony included: singer-songwriter Paul Simon, groundbreaking researcher and biologist Frances Arnold of the California Institute of Technology; author and literary critic Denis Donoghue, University Professor and the Henry James Professor of English and American Letters at New York University; Rachel Hadas, renowned poet, essayist, and the Board of Governors Professor of English at Rutgers University; Hollywood film producer Kathleen Kennedy; Will Miller, President of the Wallace Foundation; Annette Gordon-Reed, Harvard University historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of "The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family;" and Sir Adam Roberts, President of the British Academy and one of the foremost experts on international strategic affairs.

New members who attended the Induction include, in the humanities and the arts: novelist Oscar Hijuelos; Shakespeare scholar James Shapiro; novelist and short story writer Luisa Valenzuela; and landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburgh.

In the sciences: groundbreaking cancer researcher Clara Bloomfield, who proved that adult acute leukemia can be cured; Julio Frenk, former Minister of Health for Mexico and  Dean of the Faculty at Harvard School of Public Health; and Nobel laureate and chemist Ei-Ichi Negishi.

In the social sciences: Anthony Bryk, President of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching; Russian studies scholar Timothy Colton; sociologist Claude Fischer, whose research illuminates social networks in urban settings; and Nancy Foner, an influential scholar of the American immigrant experience.

In public affairs, civic leadership, philanthropy and business: veteran diplomat Edward Djerejian; Wanda Austin (The Aerospace Corporation); Hugh Grant (Monsanto Company); Robert Haas (Levi Strauss & Company); Robert Kraft (New England Patriots and The Kraft Group); and Robert Reischauer (Urban Institute).

College and university presidents include: Francisco Cigarroa (University of Texas); Linda Katehi (University of California, Davis); Joseph Klafter (Tel Aviv University); Steven Knapp (George Washington University); David Skorton (Cornell University); and Debora Spar (Barnard College).

Click here to read an alphabetical list of the new Academy members. The new class listed by discipline is can be viewed here.

Since its founding by John Adams, James Bowdoin, John Hancock, and other scholar-patriots, the American Academy has elected leading "thinkers and doers" from each generation. The current membership includes more than 250 Nobel laureates, some 100 Pulitzer Prize winners, and many of the world's most celebrated artists and performers.