About
The American Academy of Sciences and Letters (AASL) promotes scholarship and honors outstanding achievement in the arts, sciences, and learned professions. It encourages the fruitful exchange of ideas within academia and society at large by sponsoring occasions for scholarly interaction and providing platforms for the presentation and dissemination of scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, mathematics, and engineering. A 501(c)(3) non-partisan organization, it offers public programming, supports promising young scholars, and promotes traditional liberal arts ideals and standards of intellectual excellence.
To these ends, the Academy elects scholars to membership in the Academy, and awards ten Barry Prizes each year. The Barry Prize honors scholars of extraordinary achievement and dedication to excellence in the arts, sciences and learned professions. Winners of the Barry Prize receive a cash award and also become members of the Academy. Scholars affiliated with U.S. academic institutions are eligible for election to membership in the Academy and for its awards and prizes. The Academy’s decisions are based on intellectual distinction and dedication to the principles of scholarly integrity and intellectual freedom. The Academy does not participate in academic boycotts.
In addition to the Barry Prizes, AASL supports the fundamental and constitutive mission of colleges and universities as truth-seeking, knowledge advancing institutions in other ways. It produces white papers examining such topics as academic freedom and integrity, the crisis of the humanities, and the responsibilities of educators, and proposes measures to improve the health of the liberal arts in the United States. It is also exploring other possible publishing opportunities, to enable members and non-members alike to publish important lines of argument and analysis that will be of interest to scholars and those interested in scholarship generally, and not only in a particular specialized field. All of these activities are aimed at revitalizing intellectual life and restoring the intellectual rigor and diversity of American colleges, universities, and public intellectual discourse.
The Academy is governed by a board of ten nationally and internationally renowned scholars. Board members represent a broad spectrum of opinion on political, cultural, moral and religious matters, as well as a wide range of fields of expertise. AASL’s President, Dr. Donald Landry, M.D., Ph.D., is the Hamilton Southworth Professor of Medicine and Chair of the Department of Medicine, Columbia University, and served as Physician-in-Chief at New York Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Irving Medical Center from 2008-2023. A recipient of the Presidential Citizens Medal, Dr. Landry was a member of the President’s Council on Bioethics from 2008-2009.
President: Donald Landry, M.D., Ph.D.
Executive Director: Greg Forster, Ph.D.
Associate Director: Karen Taliaferro, Ph.D.
Board of Trustees
The Academy is governed by a board of 10 nationally and internationally renowned scholars.Board members represent a broad spectrum of opinion on political, cultural, moral and religious matters, as well as a wide range of fields of expertise.
