List of Barnard College people

This is an incomplete list, which may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by expanding it with reliably sourced entries.

The following is a list of notable individuals associated with Barnard College through attendance as a student, service as a member of the faculty or staff, or award of the Barnard Medal of Distinction.

Notable alumnæ

Academics and scientists

• Maya Soetoro-Ng, educator and half-sister of President Barack Obama
• Natalie Angier (1978), author, science journalist for the New York Times, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Beat Reporting
• Jacqueline Barton (1974), Caltech chemist and MacArthur Fellows Program "genius grant" winner
• Joanna Cobb Biermann, (1971) musicologist, currently professor of Music History
• Marian Chertow, environmental sciences
• Frances Gardiner Davenport, historian
• Firth Haring Fabend, (1959) novelist and historian
• Ellen V. Futter (1971), President of Barnard College and the American Museum of Natural History
• Virginia Gildersleeve (1899), Dean of Barnard College and delegate to the charter conference of the United Nations in 1945
• Rebecca Goldstein (1972), philosopher, biographer, and novelist
• Karla Jay (1968), pioneer of lesbian and gay studies
• Marta Kuzma, curator, writer, lecturer
• Janna Levin (1988), cosmologist
• Margaret Mead (1923), anthropologist
• Elsie Clews Parsons (1896), first woman elected President of the American Anthropological Association
• Helen Perlstein Pollard (1967), archaeologist, ethnologist, Mesoamericanist scholar, professor of anthropology at MSU
• Helen M. Ranney (1941), first woman to lead a university department of medicine in the U.S., be president of the Association of American Physicians, or serve as a Distinguished Physician of the Veterans Administration
• Louise Rosenblatt (1920s), influential literary theorist and educator
• Anna Schwartz (1933), economist
• Vivian Sobchack (1961), cultural critic
• Beatrice Warde (1920s), calligrapher, librarian, researcher on type matters and influence upon 20th century typography
• Rita Gunther McGrath (1981) Business Book author and Professor at Columbia Business School
• Evelyn Hu, Gordon McKay Professor of Applied Physics and Electrical Engineering at Harvard University

Actresses and performers

• Jane Wyatt (1932), actress
• Peggy McCay (1949), actress
• Joan Rivers (1954), star comedian, TV host
• Lee Remick, actress
• Twyla Tharp (1963), choreographer, dancer
• Jill Eikenberry (1968), actress
• Lauren Graham (1988), actress, played Lorelai Gilmore on TV show Gilmore Girls
• Cynthia Nixon (1988), actress, played Miranda Hobbes on TV show Sex and the City
• Sprague Grayden, actress, played Judith Montgomery on Joan of Arcadia
• Sarah Thompson, television actress
• Sasha Soreff (1994), choreographer
• Chelsea Peretti (2000), actress, writer for TV show Parks and Recreation
• Christy Carlson Romano (2006), actress
• Greta Gerwig (2006), actress
• Clara Bryant (2007), actress
• Jaime Gleicher, reality star
• Zuzanna Szadkowski, actress, plays Dorota on TV Show Gossip Girl

Architects

• Norma Merrick Sklarek (1950), first black woman to be licensed as an architect in the United States
• Christine Wang (1989), architect, curator, artist, founder of Wang Museum of Technology

Artists

• Sarah Charlesworth (1969), photographer and conceptual artist
• Josephine Paddock, painter

Athletes

• Gloria Callen (1946), swimmer
• Robin Wagner (1980), figure-skating coach
• Stacey Borgman (1993), member of crew team for the United States at the 2004 Olympics
• Erinn Smart (2001), fencer for the United States at the 2004 Olympics, silver medalist in team foil fencing at the Beijing 2008 Olympics

Businesswomen

• Joan Whitney Payson, co-founder and majority of owner of the New York Mets
• Iphigene Ochs Sulzberger (1913), wife of New York Times publisher Arthur Hays Sulzberger
• Martha Stewart (1964), business magnate, entrepreneur, homemaking advocate
• Alexis Stewart (1987), daughter of Martha Stewart
• Liz Neumark (1977), founder and CEO of New York catering company Great Performances.

Journalists

• Freda Kirchwey (1915), journalist, editor and publisher of The Nation
• Herawati Diah (1941), Indonesian journalist
• Nonnie Moore (c. 1946), fashion editor at Mademoiselle, Harper's Bazaar and GQ.
• Ellen Willis (1960s), essayist and pop music critic
• Judith Miller (1969), ex-correspondent for New York Times who reported on the story of Iraq's alleged WMD program; Aspen Strategy Group member
• Anna Quindlen (1974), author and columnist for Newsweek who won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1992
• Suzanne Bilello (1977), author who with Rose Marie Arce (Barnard class of 1986) was a member of a Newsday team in 1992 that shared the Pulitzer Prize for spot news reporting
• Natalie Angier (1978), author and science writer for the New York Times who won the Pulitzer Prize for beat reporting in 1991
• Jami Bernard (1978), film critic for The New York Post and The New York Daily News, founder of Barncat Publishing Inc., and author whose books include a memoir of surviving breast cancer
• Ingrid Ciprian-Matthews (1981), vice president, CBS News
• Lis Wiehl (1983), legal analyst for Fox News
• Maria Hinojosa (1984), correspondent for CNN, NOW on PBS, and host of NPR's Latino USA
• Laura Flanders (1984), correspondent for Air America and host of "GritTV"
• Katherine Boo (1988), recipient of Pulitzer Prize for public service in 2000 and the MacArthur Fellows Program "genius grant"
• Alex Kuczynski (1990), Style reporter for The New York Times
• Atoosa Rubenstein (1993), founder of CosmoGirl and editor-in-chief of Seventeen (magazine); youngest ever editor of a teen magazine
• Jeannette Walls, gossip columnist for MSNBC and author of The Glass Castle
• Mona Charen, nationally syndicated columnist, political analyst, and author
• Alison Gregor (1989), writer, New York Times
• Fatima Bhutto, social activist, writer, and niece of Benazir Bhutto
• Cathy Horyn, fashion journalist, New York Times fashion critic
• Lily Koppel (2003), writer, New York Times and author of "The Red Leather Diary"
• Mary Ellis Peltz, music critic, poet, and first chief editor of Opera News
• Susan Stamberg (1959), special correspondent, NPR's Morning Edition
• Kathy Shenkin Seal (1969), journalist and nonfiction author

Musicians, singers, and composers

• Laurie Anderson (1969), musician, NASA's first artist-in-residence
• Suzanne Vega (1981), singer-songwriter famous for Luka, Tom's Diner, etc.
• Jeanine Tesori (1983), Broadway composer
• Louise Post, lead singer and guitarist of alternative rock band Veruca Salt

Political and judicial figures

• Jessie Wallace Hughan (1898, Phi Beta Kappa), United States Senate candidate, author, teacher, founder of Alpha Omicron Pi fraternity
• Helen Gahagan (1924), United States House of Representatives Congresswoman from California
• Jeane Kirkpatrick (1948), first woman to serve as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations
• Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum (1952), United States District Court judge
• Susan Herman, President of the American Civil Liberties Union; Professor at Brooklyn Law School
• Anna Diggs Taylor (1954), United States District Court judge
• Judith Kaye (1958), first woman in highest position in state judiciary, Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals
• Bettye B. Binder (1960), on the governing council of the New York Committee for Democratic Voters that successfully removed Tammany Hall and its leader, Carmine DeSapio, from power in 1961
• Nancy Gertner, (1967) Judge on United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts
• Wilma B. Liebman, (1971) Chair, National Labor Relations Board
• Paula Franzese, professor of real property law at Seton Hall Law School
• Miriam Hughes, United States Ambassador to the Federated States of Micronesia
• Hope Portocarrero, first lady of Nicaragua, the wife of Anastasio Somoza Debayle
• Helene D. Gayle, M.D., M.P.H., president and CEO of CARE, a leading humanitarian aid organization fighting global poverty

Spies

• Judith Coplon (1943), Soviet spy in U.S. Justice Department whose convictions were overturned on technicalities
• Marion Davis Berdecio, accused Soviet spy in U.S. State Department, comrade of Coplon and Wovschin
• Flora Wovschin, Soviet spy in U.S. State Department, stepdaughter of Columbia professor/Soviet spy Enos Wicher

Writers

• Stella George Stern Perry (1898), author, founder of Alpha Omicron Pi fraternity
• Alice Duer Miller (1899), writer and advisory editor of The New Yorker
• Helen Hoyt (1900s), poet
• Mary Antin (1902), author of the immigrant experience
• Babette Deutsch (1917), author, poet, translator and critic
• Faith McNulty (1920s, attended one year), writer
• Léonie Adams (1923), poet
• Charlotte Armstrong (1925), writer
• Zora Neale Hurston (1928), Harlem Renaissance writer
• Elizabeth Janeway (1935), author and critic
• Joan Kahn (late 1930s), mystery editor and anthologist; also novelist and children's writer
• Belva Plain (1939), writer
• Patricia Highsmith (1940), author of The Talented Mr. Ripley
• Yelena Albala (1945), poet
• Francine du Plessix Gray (1952), writer
• Joyce Johnson (1955), writer
• June Jordan (1955), writer and activist
• Sidra Stone (1957), author and co-creator of Voice Dialogue
• Erica Jong (1963), writer
• Monique Raphel High (1969), novelist
• Hallie Ephron (1969), novelist
• Ntozake Shange (1970), playwright
• Mary Gordon (1971), writer
• Sigrid Nunez (1972), novelist
• Jane Leavy (1974), sports biographer
• Jami Bernard (1978), writer and film critic
• Lionel Shriver(1978), novelist and 2005 Orange Prize winner
• Tory Dent (1981), poet and HIV/AIDS activist
• Cristina Garcia (1983), author of Dreaming in Cuban
• Alexa Junge (1984), writer for The West Wing and Friends
• Jhumpa Lahiri (1989), Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Namesake and Interpreter of Maladies
• Ann Brashares (1989), author of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
• Rachel Cohn (1989), author of Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist and Gingerbread
• Edwidge Danticat (1990), writer
• Galaxy Craze (1993), novelist
• Asali Solomon (1995), author of Get Down: Stories
• Sasha Cagen (1996), writer
• Alana Newhouse (1997) writer and editor of Tablet Magazine
• Chelsea Peretti (2000), writer and comedian
• Marisha Pessl (2000), author of Special Topics in Calamity Physics
• Nadine Haobsh (2002), blogger and author of Beauty Confidential and Confessions of a Beauty Addict
• Kait Kerrigan (2003), playwright
• Alexandra Styron (1987), novelist and memoirist

• Joan Abelove, writer
• Fatima Bhutto, Pakistani poet and writer
• Hortense Calisher, writer
• Cassandra Clare, author of The Mortal Instruments
• Diana Chang, pioneering Asian-American novelist
• Elise Cowen, poet of the Beat Generation
• Gina Gionfriddo, playwright
• Indrani Aikath Gyaltsen, writer
• Naomi Foner Gyllenhaal, screenwriter
• Diana Muir writer and historian
• Alice Notley, poet
• Helena Percas de Ponseti, writer, essayist, scholar, and professor
• Yael Lewin (2011), writer, dancer, editor, choreographer

Miscellaneous

• Kang Tongbi (1907), daughter of Kang Youwei and political activist
• Dorothy Olding (1931), literary agent of J.D. Salinger
• Grace Lee Boggs (1935), author and political activist
• Joan Vollmer (1940s), member of the Beat Generation; accidentally killed by her husband, William S. Burroughs
• Sissy Biggers (1979), former host of Ready.. Set... Cook!
• Sharon Blynn (1993), creator of "Bald Is Beautiful" campaign, cancer awareness advocate
• Binta Brown (1995, cum laude), member of New York Governor-Elect Andrew Cuomo's transition team
• Paula Reimers, Rabbi
• Alexandra Guarnaschelli (1991), chef at Butter Restaurant in New York, Iron Chef

Fictional alumnae

• Emily Grimes, the protagonist of Richard Yates' novel The Easter Parade, graduates from Barnard.
• In the 2005 Sigrid Nunez novel The Last of Her Kind, heroines Georgette George and Ann Drayton meet in 1968 as freshmen roommates at Barnard.
• In the television series Mad Men, the character Rachel Menken is a Barnard graduate.

Notable faculty

• Nadia Abu El Haj, anthropologist
• Robert Antoni, Commonwealth Writers Prize winning author
• Randall Balmer, author and noted historian of American religion
• Dave Bayer, mathematician; actor and math consultant for the film A Beautiful Mind; one of few holders of an Erdős-Bacon number
• Ruth Benedict, anthropologist
• Frank Brady, leading figure in international chess
• Harriet Brooks, physicist
• Demetrios James Caraley, Editor of the Political Science Quarterly and President of the Academy of Political Science
• John Cheever (1956-1957), Pulitzer Prize winning novelist and short story writer
• Mary Cochran, former Paul Taylor dancer
• Dennis Dalton (1969–2008), political scientist, renowned nonviolence proponent and scholar of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
• Michael X. Delli Carpini (1987-2003), political scientist, Walter H. Annenberg Dean of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania
• Mortimer Lamson Earle, classicist

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• Theodor Gaster
• Virginia Gildersleeve
• Katie Glasner, former Twyla Tharp dancer
• Mary Gordon, writer
• Ken Hechler, U.S. Congressman from West Virginia
• Peter Henry Juviler (1965-2008), political scientist, co-founder with Irene Bloom in 2000 of the Barnard-Columbia Program on Human Rights
• Charles Knapp, Ph.D., philologist and classical scholar
• Brian Larkin, anthropologist
• Janna Levin, physicist
• Perry Mehrling, economic historian
• Gabriela Mistral, first Latin American Nobel Prize winner for Literature
• Samuel Alfred Mitchell, astronomer
• Raymond Moley (1923-1933), proponent and later critic of the New Deal
• Frederick Neuhouser, philosopher
• Sigrid Nunez, novelist
• Elaine Pagels (1970-1982), scholar of early and gnostic Christianity
• Frances Richard, poet and critic
• Alan F. Segal, ancient Judaism and origins of Christianity, author of Life after Death, and Paul the Convert
• Edmund Ware Sinnott, botanist
• Dolph Sweet, actor
• Elie Wiesel (1997-1999), Nobel Peace Prize winning writer and activist

Recipients of the Medal of Distinction

The Barnard Medal of Distinction is the College's highest honor.

1977

• Joan Mondale

1978

• Samuel R. Milbank
• Richard Rodgers
• Iphigene Ochs Sulzberger '14

1979

• Adelyn Dohme Breeskin
• Helen Gahagan Douglas '24
• Eleanor Thomas Elliott '48
• William Am Marstellar
• Toni Morrison
• Francis T.P. Plimpton

1980

• Dorothy Height
• Julius S. Held
• Mary Dublin Keyserling '30
• Margaret Mahler
• Alan Pifer
• Henriette H. Swope '25

1981

• Robert L. Hoguet
• Elizabeth Janeway '35
• Beverly Sills

1982

• Carol Bellamy
• Raymond J. Saulnier
• Twyla Tharp '63

1983

• Mario Cuomo
• Vernon Jordan, Jr.
• Mirra Komarovsky '26

1984

• Arthur Altschul
• Annette Kar Baxter '47 (posthumous)
• Joseph G. Brennan
• Anna Hill Johnstone '34

1985

• Marian Wright Edelman
• Sidney Dillon Ripley
• Elizabeth Man Sarcka '17

1986

• A. Bartlett Giamatti
• Frances Lehman Loeb
• Helen M. Ranney '41

1987

• Judith Kaye '58
• Sally Falk Moore '43
• Rev. James Parks Morton
• Ellen Stewart

1988

• Augusta Souza Kappner '66
• Ntozake Shange '70
• Maxine Singer

1989

• Joan Kaplan Davidson
• Eugene Lang
• Bernice Segal (posthumous)
• Lottie L. Taylor-Jones

1990

• Jacqueline Barton '74
• Robert L. Bernstein
• Jean Blackwell Hutson '35
• Julie V. Marsteller '69

1991

• Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum '50
• Tisa Chang '63
• Mamphele Ramphele, delivered the 2002 Commencement address

1992

• Ingrith Deyrup-Olsen '40
• Fred W. Friendly
• Millicent McIntosh
• Frank Stella

1993

• Arthur Ashe (posthumous)
• Elizabeth B. Davis '41
• Helene Lois Kaplan '53
• Bette Bao Lord
• Cyrus Vance

1994

• Walter Cronkite
• Ellen V. Futter '71
• Barbara S. Miller '62 (posthumous)
• Arthur Mitchell
• Sheila E. Widnall

1995

• Madeleine Albright
• Rosemary Park Anastos
• Derek Bok
• Sissela Bok

1996

• Rita R. Colwell
• Kitty Carlisle Hart
• Maya Lin
• Dame Anne Warburton

1997

• Sarah Brady
• Merce Cunningham
• Charlayne Hunter-Gault
• Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

1998

• Mary L. Good
• Joan Ganz Cooney
• David Aaron Kessler

1999

• Zoe Caldwell
• Abby Joseph Cohen
• Esther Dyson
• William T. Golden

2000

• Doris Kearns Goodwin delivered the 2000 Commencement address
• Hanna Holborn Gray
• Annie Leibovitz
• Kathie L. Olson

2001

• Morris Dees
• Susan Hendrickson
• Maxine Greene '38
• Bernice Johnson Reagon, Ms. Reagon delivered the 2001 Commencement address

2002

• Barbara Novak '50
• Alice Rivlin
• Harold E. Varmus

2003

• Susan Band Horwitz
• Judith Miller (journalist) '69, delivered the Commencement address
• Martha Nussbaum

2004

• Sylvia Earle
• Louise Glück

2005

• Carla D. Hayden
• Amartya Sen

2006

• Linda Greenhouse
• Audra McDonald
• Francine du Plessix Gray '52

2007

• Joan Didion
• Nicholas D. Kristof
• Mary Patterson McPherson
• Muriel Petioni
• Anna Deavere Smith

2008

• Thelma C. Davidson Adair
• Michael Bloomberg delivered the 2008 Commencement address
• Billie Jean King
• David Remnick
• Judith Shapiro

2009

• Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered the 2009 Commencement address
• Kay Murray
• Indra Nooyi
• Irene J. Winter '60

2010

• Thelma Golden
• Olympia J. Snowe
• Meryl Streep delivered the 2010 Commencement address
• Shirley M. Tilghman

2011

• Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook
• Sylvia Rhone
• Roberta Guaspari
• Jenny Holzer

2012

• Barack Obama, President of the United States. Delivered the 2012 Commencement address
• Sally Chapman, Barnard Professor of Chemistry
• Helene D. Gayle '76, President and CEO of CARE, USA
• Evan Wolfson, Founder and President of Freedom to Marry

External links

• Barnard Medalists