Mark Shiffman was born in north Florida to the son of expatriated New York secular Jews and the daughter of small town, pillar of the community southern Presbyterians. After spending much of his childhood in Alaska and California, he discovered in his Tennessee adolescence, first reluctantly and then gratefully, that more than half his heart belonged to the South. He occasionally rediscovers this viscerally when his body descends below the Mason-Dixon line from his northern exile in Philadelphia, where he has also brought his wife into exile from her lifelong home of Chicago. They live in the Mount Airy section of Philadelphia with their two sons, having moved from one of the more successfully racially integrated neighborhoods in America (Hyde Park) to one of the most. Mark received his education from the McCallie School in Chattanooga and the surrounding mountains and trees, St. John’s College in Annapolis and the Santa Fe desert, Pendle Hill outside Philadelphia and the woods around Crum Creek, the University of Chicago and the icy prairie winds, and the Catholic Worker House and grimy streets of New York City. He is assistant professor in the Department of Humanities and Augustinian Traditions and affiliate faculty member in Classical Studies at Villanova University. He has also taught at Brooklyn College, Notre Dame, the University of Chicago and the University of Pennsylvania. His current projects include books on the political philosophy of Plutarch and on the meaning of modern individualism, as well as a translation of Aristotle’s On the Soul (Focus Press).
Mark Shiffman
Articles by Mark Shiffman
Love in the Void: A New Collection of Simone Weil’s Writings
This selection of writings aims to make manifest to the reader Simone Weil’s “intensity in the pursuit of truth” and the “sense of the eternal which Weil had to an…
The Paganization and Dehumanization of the University
Radnor Township, PA This past Friday, I led a lunch discussion with students at the University of Chicago who had read my First Things article “Majoring in Fear.” They verified that…
The Loss of a Culture of Personhood and the End of Limited Government
Philadelphia, PA The idea and practice of limited government begins with Christianity. Pagan antiquity could not imagine such a thing, because there was no distinction between religion and governance. …
What You Need to Know About Simone Weil
Born in 1909 to secular Jewish Parisians, at age 10 Simone Weil was memorizing Racine and marching in labor union protests. She attended the École Normale and then briefly taught…
Thoughts on Statesmanship in a Season of Dearth
One may notice in this election cycle a certain amount of talk about statesmanship – primarily because each of the candidates is thought to lack it. The latest issue of…
The Banks we Deserve, the Economy we can Sustain
If you didn't catch this panel put on by Marketplace and BBC, it's pretty exciting. It takes the expert panel only about 10 minutes (2:00 to 12:40) to get to…
Phillip Blond at Villanova
Video of Blond's March 22nd talk at Villanova is now available online.
9-11 and the Cloud of Overwhelming Force
Mt. Airy, Philadelphia, 9-11-09. Eight years ago today, and in the days immediately following, Americans found themselves bewildered. An unprecedented mood had fallen upon them, an unfamiliar atmosphere surrounded them.…
Dirty Hands, Clean Mind
Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. As I read Matt Crawford’s Shop Class as Soulcraft, I thought often of Simone Weil, that young champion of the workers of the world who took it…
Walkers of the World, Unite!
I've been accused (at least by association) by so many pomocon partisans of being pro-Obama, I'm almost starting to believe it myself. So here's great news. Obama's much-publicized concern about…
Descartes, Algebra, and Alienation
Democratizing eighth-grade algebra promotes social justice. (Brookings Institution) Money, mechanization, algebra. The three monsters of contemporary civilization. Complete analogy. (Simone Weil) Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. There are a lot of conspiracy…
Brave New World Reconsidered: A Tale of Two Gnosticisms
Many who are alarmed at the prospect of the “abolition of man” have found in Huxley’s Brave New World a dark and salutary warning – an imaginative rendering of our…
The Emperor’s Old Clothes
I wonder whether anyone else finds it, if not quite ominous, at least suggestive, that the National Constitution Center is now hosting a traveling show on the Emperor Napoleon. The…
Hope we can Believe in?
If you aren't already a fan of Rémi Brague, the most learned man alive, you will be after you read this interview with him about his new book of essays…
New Dishwasher?
Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. About a week ago our dishwasher started to issue a loud grinding sound from its hidden depths. After a few days I decided to call an appliance…
Why we do not own a Television
April was "Media Awareness Month" at our sons' school. I took a couple weeks off from the Porch, and I also published a first draft of this piece in the…
The Wise Old Œconomist
Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. Before it became a science of supply and demand and the circulation of commodities, economics was originally understood as the wisdom of household management. The Greek word…
Crunchy Pope, Part Two: Against Gnostic Economics
The obscuring of the faith in creation is a fundamental part of what constitutes modernity. As I survey all the perplexing shifts in the spiritual landscape of today, only these…
Crunchy Pope, Part 1: Body, Earth and Cosmos
Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. Pope Benedict has recently gained a bit of credit with world media for emphasizing the urgency of addressing the environmental devastation we have wrought. This (combined with…
From Confucians to Consumers?
In case you missed the story on NPR, the Chinese government has come up with its own stimulus package to make up for dwindling US purchasing. As Marx laughs in…
The (“Post-“) Modern Cave: An Allegory of the University
Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. Imagine human beings brought up from childhood in a cave, bound fast with their heads all facing one direction. On the wall before them they see only…
The Rationality of the Doctrine of Creation
Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. This is not an argument for intelligent design. It is, however, an argument that creation is the only scientifically acceptable explanation for the existence of the universe.…
The Human Meaning of Property
MT. AIRY, PHILADELPHIA. Before I say something rather abstract about concrete things, a few personal words about what (and who) lies behind these thoughts may be in order. The photo…