Background
James Capshew was born on the 14th of October, 1954 in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States, son of Robert M. and Ruth E. (Sipes) Capshew.
James Capshew was born on the 14th of October, 1954 in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States, son of Robert M. and Ruth E. (Sipes) Capshew.
Capshew James attended Indiana University where he received a Bachelor's degree in Psychology in 1979. Later he studied at the University of Pennsylvania where he earned a Master's degree in History and Sociology of Science in 1982. He got a Mellon graduate fellowship from the University of Pennsylvania in 1985-86 and received a Doctor of Philosophy degree in History and Sociology of Science 1986.
Capshew worked as a research associate in history at the University of Maryland, College Park from 1986 to 1989. He then served as an assistant professor in 1990-96, being appointed an associate professor of history and philosophy of science and director of graduate studies in 1996 at Indiana University, Bloomington. James was in the Environmental Commission of Bloomington, Indiana in 1991.
Capshew has worked in the broad field of American science and learning with several foci of interest, including studies of academic psychology in social and institutional contexts and the history and culture of higher education, including university leadership. The environmental humanities, including environmental history, are increasingly the subjects of his research, teaching, and service. Capshew’s current Indiana University affiliations include the Office of the Bicentennial and the Integrated Program in the Environment.
He has served as editor of the international journal History of Psychology from 2004 to 2009 and as an editor for the psychology of the New Dictionary of Scientific Biography in 2007. In 2010 he gave the Herman B Wells Distinguished Lecture under the auspices of IU’s Society for Advanced Study.
James H. Capshew's “Psychologists on the March: Science, Practice, and Professional Identity in America, 1929-1969” was written in 1999. It is a study of that period when the American Psychological Association grew from about one thousand to thirty thousand members. His most recent books are “Herman B Wells: The Promise of the American University”, 2012 and “The Legacy of the Laboratory: Psychological and Brain Sciences at Indiana University, 1888-2013” was written in 2014.
Capshew was also a contributor to books, including "The American Psychological Association: A Historical Perspective" in 1992, "The Development of the Social Sciences in the United States and Canada: The Role of Philanthropy" in 1999, "Dictionary of American History, 3rd edition" in 2003. James served as a contributor to professional journals, as well, including American Psychologist, Osiris, Technology and Culture, Traces of Indiana and Midwestern History, and Journal of the History of Sexuality.
(Energetic, shrewd, and charming, Herman B Wells was the d...)
2012(Psychologists on the March argues that the Second World W...)
1999
Quotations:
"The university is a human institution, a collective that relies on individuals but for a bigger, greater cause".
"The university brings together many people, generation after generation, to share ideas, techniques and emotions toward the goal of education and learning," he said. "It's a monument to human curiosity".
James Capshew is a member of History of Science Society, Forum for History of Human Science (chair, 1988-90), Cheiron Society, Midwestern Psychological Association (historian, 1989), Indiana Historical Society, Phi Beta Kappa.
