William James was an American philosopher and psychologist
William James
@Intellectuals & Academics, Career and Family
Jan 11, 1842
Biography
Personal Details
- Birthday: January 11, 1842
- Died on: August 26, 1910
- Nationality: American
- Famous: Harvard University, Intellectuals & Academics, Philosophers, Psychologists
- Spouses: Alice Gibbens
- Siblings: Henry James
- Known as: Father of American psychology
William James born at
New York City, New York
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Birth Place
William James was born on January 11, 1842 in Aston House, New York to Henry James, Sr., and Mary Walsh James as their first child.
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Childhood & Early Life
His father, Henry James Sr., was a Swedenborgian theologian. He was born in a wealthy educated family wherein his father focused on providing quality education to his children.
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Childhood & Early Life
William James’ early interests in drawing took him to study under an American portraitist, William Morris Hunt (1860) though his love for art did not last long due to his lack of contentment and indecisiveness.
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Childhood & Early Life
It was only in 1863 that he finally joined the Harvard’s Medical School, before which he studied chemistry and physiology at the Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard University.
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Childhood & Early Life
The James family made frequent trips to Europe wherein William James became fluent with German and French on account of his trans-Atlantic education.
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Childhood & Early Life
After a year of graduating, he was offered a job as an instructor which he accepted and continued to serve for 35 years. By mid 1870s he started teaching psychology.
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Career
He is known to have introduced psychology as a subject and also the first one to introduce psychology laboratories in the United States.
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Career
In 1872, he started with teaching physiology and continued to move to anatomy and philosophy.
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Career
During most part of 1882-1883 James was in Europe visiting laboratories and meeting psychologists to delve deeper in psychological studies and its procedures.
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Career
After his resignation from Harvard psychology lab, he drifted his focus towards philosophy.
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Career
William James has quite a few masterpieces to his name. They have had major influence on people’s attitude towards the society, mind and body. He wrote intensively in the field of psychology, philosophy and religion alike.
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Major Works
The article, “The Sentiment of Rationality,” was published as his first article in philosophy.
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Major Works
The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy: the first book on philosophy which is a dedication to Charles Sanders Peirce (1897).
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Major Works
Talks to Teachers on Psychology and to Students on Some of Life’s Ideals (1899).
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Major Works
The Principles of Psychology (1890), a book that took ten long years to complete but touched some great personalities like Bertrand Russell and John Dewey
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Major Works