Nancy K. Miller was born on February 21, 1941 to parents Louis Kipnis and Mollie (Miller) Kipnis. She was raised in New York City, attended Hunter College High School, and received her B.A from Barnard College in 1961. Leaving New York for Paris, she earned her M.A. from Middlebury Graduate School of French in France in 1962 and her Licence-ès-lettres in English Studies at the University of Paris in 1965. She lived in Paris from 1961 to 1967, years of ex-pat dreams chronicled in her memoir
From 1974 until 1981, Miller was an assistant professor of French at Columbia College. In 1981, she became the first full-time tenured member of the Women's Studies program at Barnard College; she was Director of the program until 1987. Miller began her appointment at CUNY in 1988 and held the position of Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the CUNY Graduate Center from 1999 onward.
During her professional career, Miller has been a visiting professor at Harvard University, Hebrew University, Tel Aviv University, as well as a Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar. She is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships, including from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the Bunting Institute at Radcliffe College, and the Bogliasco Study Center. She directed three NEH Summer Seminars, and with Carolyn Heilbrun co-founded the Gender and Culture series of books at Columbia University Press. From 2004-2007 she was co-editor of
Miller's research and teaching focus on contemporary memoir, autobiography theory, women's writing, 20th century cultural history (post 1945) and feminist theory. Her publications include:
Diagnosed with cancer in December 2011, Miller has been drawing and writing about the experience of living with the illness in an online diary.
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This collection contains the personal and professional papers of Nancy K. Miller, American literary scholar, feminist theorist, and memoirist, and Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the CUNY Graduate Center. Materials include photographs, notebooks, personal and professional correspondence, conference materials, syllabi and lecture notes, and drafts of books, articles, and lectures, and related research materials. This collection dates from 1957-2023 and is arranged into 8 series.
Series 1, PERSONAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL, 1957-2014, includes agenda books, calendars, notebooks, photographs, and Miller's own graduate student notes, papers, and other course materials. This series is arranged alphabetically by record type then by date or subject.
Series 2, CAREER DEVELOPMENT, 1971-2016, includes correspondence, fellowship and grant applications, and booklets and flyers related to Miller's awards and lectures, all documenting Miller's rise through her career. This series is arranged alphabetically by institution then by record type.
Series 3, CORRESPONDENCE, 1963-2023, includes general personal and professional correspondence as well as more specific correspondence related to events or institutions. Topics include committee work, meetings, and writings of other scholars, and come from Harvard University, Columbia University, Diane Middlebrook, and Jane Gallop. Additional correspondence can be found in Series 4, Conferences and Series 6, Writings. This series is arranged first chronologically by personal or professional content, then by correspondent and topic.
Series 4, CONFERENCES, 1977-2018, includes correspondence, invitations, notes, papers, programs, and flyers from various conferences attended by Miller. Conferences include Autobiography and the Social Self, Modern Language Association annual meetings, Out of the Frame and into the Gutter: Exploring Comics and Graphic Representations of Narrative, Health, and Social Justice, and The Scholar and the Feminist. This series is arranged alphabetically by conference title.
Series 5, TEACHING, 1972-2023, includes syllabi, lecture notes, and assignment prompts for courses taught by Miller. Courses include 17th Century Women's Writing, Feminism, Autobiography, Theory, Heroines of Disaster: The Novel and Feminist Literary Theory, and Postwar Women Writers and Intellectuals. This series is arranged alphabetically by course title.
Series 6, WRITINGS, 1961-2021, this series is arranged into 3 subseries.
Series 6, subseries 1, ARTICLES, 1981-2021, includes correspondence, drafts, and notes, related to articles written by Miller. Titles include "Childless Children: Bodies and Betrayal," "Portraits of Grief," and "Representing Others." This subseries is arranged alphabetically by article title.
Series 6, subseries 2, BOOKS, 1961-2020, includes correspondence, drafts, notes, research materials, and reviews, related to books written by Miller. Titles include
Series 6, subseries 3, OTHER WRITINGS, 1984-2021, includes correspondence, drafts, and research materials related to edited works, eulogies, lectures, reviews, and unpublished works by Miller. Titles include the edited piece,
Series 7, RESEARCH, 1978-2004, contains handwritten and typed notes and annotated readings regarding various topics. This series is arranged by record type.
Series 8, ELECTRONIC RECORDS, 1993-2012, contains a CD, a DVD, and floppy discs, related to Miller's talks and courses. This series is arranged alphabetically by record type.
All researchers seeking to publish materials from the collections of the John Hay Library are requested to complete a Notice of Intent to Publish, available on the John Hay Library website or by request, prior to reproducing, quoting, or otherwise publishing any portion or extract from this collection. Although Brown University has physical ownership of the collection and the materials contained therein, it does not claim literary rights. It is up to the researcher to determine the owners of the literary rights and to obtain any necessary permissions from them.
Nancy K. Miller papers, Ms.2015.002, Box [#], Folder [#], Pembroke Center Archives, John Hay Library, Brown University.
This collection is arranged into 8 series.
There are no restrictions on access for analog materials, except one folder that contains student work (Box 7, Folder 7.1). The collection can only be seen by prior appointment. Some materials may be stored off-site and cannot be produced on the same day on which they are requested.
Advance notice is required to view any audiovisual media or born-digital records that may exist in this collection. Audiovisual media and born-digital records in this collection may not have been reformatted yet. Researchers may request access to copies by contacting the John Hay Library with the collection name, collection number, and a description of the item(s) requested. For preservation reasons, original analog and digital media may not be read or played back in the reading room. Users may visually inspect physical media but may not remove it from its enclosure. Audiovisual digitization requests are processed by an approved third-party vendor. Please note, the transfer time required can be as little as several weeks to as long as several months and there may be financial costs associated with the process. Requests should be directed to hay@brown.edu.
Gift of Nancy K. Miller
This collection was processed by Laura Carter in 2015. Intellectual reordering of existing materials and processing of additional materials were done by Amanda Knox in 2020 and 2021. Knox processed and added additional materials in 2024. Martina Lancia added additional materials in 2026.