Esther Leslie

{{Infobox academic

| name = Esther Leslie

| honorific_suffix = FBA

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| birth_date = {{Birth year and age|1964}}

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| title = Professor of political aesthetics

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| website = {{URL|http://www.militantesthetix.co.uk/}}

| education = Free University of Berlin

| alma_mater = University of Sussex

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| influences = Walter Benjamin

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| discipline = Cultural studies

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| main_interests = Politics, art and technology

| notable_works = Walter Benjamin: Overpowering Conformism

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Esther Leslie {{post-nominals|country=UK|FBA}} (b. 1964) is a Professor of Political Aesthetics at Birkbeck, University of London.{{cite web |url=https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/fellows/esther-leslie-FBA/#:~:text=Esther%20Leslie's%20chair%2C%20'Professor%20of,teach%20within%20%E2%80%93%20Politics%20and%20Aesthetics |title=Professor Esther Leslie FBA |publisher=British Academy |accessdate=23 March 2022}}{{cite web |url=https://www.bbk.ac.uk/our-staff/profile/8008438/esther-leslie#publications |title=PROF ESTHER LESLIE |publisher=Birkbeck |accessdate=23 March 2022}} She has taught at Birkbeck since January 2000. She has written on Walter Benjamin, Adorno, Kracauer and the Frankfurt School, and explored themes such as animation, chemical industries, including IG Farben and Imperial Chemical Industries, liquid crystals, fascism and culture, Weimar radio, screen and digital cultures, Marxism and Anarchism, fashion, design and craft, Romanticism, and Black radicalism in Somers Town.

Early life

Leslie has identified her upbringing, within a political family from a mixed immigrant background, as forming her politics at an early age. Her parents were both avowed Trotskyists who were involved with the Revolutionary History journal, she had a grandfather who had participated in the hunger marches, another, Charles Lahr, who was a German anarchist, and a grandmother, Esther Argeband, who was an anarchist of Polish-Jewish heritage. As a teenager Leslie was drawn to the philosophy of Karl Marx and punk. In particular she liked bands such as Alternative TV, Buzzcocks, and The Nightingales for their musical repertoire, whilst being drawn to the political leanings of Crass and Poison Girls.{{cite journal |last1=Souvlis |first1=George |title=Interview with Esther Leslie: For a Marxist Poetics of Science |journal=Historical Materialism |date=4 November 2017 |url=https://www.historicalmaterialism.org/interview-with-esther-leslie-for-a-marxist-poetics-of-science/ |access-date=17 July 2024 |publisher=SOAS University of London |issn=1569-206X |oclc=39026496}}

Academic Career

Leslie was formerly a Lecturer in Cultural and Media Studies at the University of East London, she taught on the contextual studies programme of the Art School at Middlesex University, and in Communication Studies at London Guildhall University. Leslie oversaw the final period of the MRes/PhD programme of the London Consortium, on which she had taught a course on Cold with Steven Connor.

Leslie was elected as a Fellow of the British Academy in 2019.{{cite web |title=Fellows of the British Academy: Esther Leslie's page |url=https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/fellows/esther-leslie-FBA |website=British Academy |access-date=15 October 2022}} She is co-director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities.{{cite web |title=About Us: BIH |url=https://www.bbk.ac.uk/research/centres/institute-for-the-humanities/about-us#:~:text=The%20Birkbeck%20Institute%20for%20the,public%20issues%20of%20our%20time. |website=Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities |access-date=15 October 2022}} She is one of the developers of the Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded project Animate Assembly, which provides an expanded glossary of animation.{{cite web |title=Animate Assembly |url=https://www.animateassembly.org/ |website=animateassembly.org}}

Leslie is a co-director and academic lead at the People's Museum: Somers Town founded by Diana Foster.{{cite web |title=A Space For Us, a new museum for Somers Town |url=https://www.wemakecamden.org.uk/a-space-for-us-a-new-museum-for-somers-town |website=We Make Camden |publisher=Camden Council |access-date=15 October 2022}}{{cite web |title=A Space for Us: People's Museum Somers Town |url=https://aspaceforus.club/ |website=A Space for Us |access-date=15 October 2022}} She helped to curate the lead exhibition - Lost and Found: Somers Town, which opened in May 2022.{{cite web |title=Lost and Found: Somers Town |url=http://lostfound.aspaceforus.club/ |website=A Space for Us |access-date=15 October 2022}} She is a founding editor of the journal Historical Materialism.{{cite web |title=About Us |url=https://www.historicalmaterialism.org/about-us/ |website=Historical Materialism |access-date=18 July 2024}} For several years, she was on the editorial collective of Radical Philosophy. She was an editor of Revolutionary History, a journal of Trotskyist history, inter alia.

Personal life

Her partner is Ben Watson. She is the granddaughter of Charles Lahr.

Selected publications

Leslie, E. and Dolbear, S. 2023. Dissonant Waves: Ernst Schoen and Experimental Sound in the Twentieth Century. London, Goldsmiths Press.[https://www.gold.ac.uk/goldsmiths-press/publications/dissonant/]
Leslie, E. 2023. The Rise and Fall of Imperial Chemical Industries: Synthetics, Sensism and the Environment. London, Palgrave Macmillan.[https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-37432-6]
Leslie, E. and Juarez, G. (eds.) 2018. Flux until sunrise, a booklet for Geraldine Juarez. Sweden: Rojal Förlag.{{cite web |title=PDF of Flux Until Sunrise |url=https://monoskop.org/File:Juarez_Geraldine_Flux_until_Sunrise_2018.pdf |website=Monoskop |access-date=15 October 2022}}
Leslie, E. and Jackson, M. 2018 Deeper in the pyramid. London, UK: Banner Repeater.{{cite web |title=Deeper in The Pyramid page |url=https://www.bannerrepeater.org/deeper |website=Banner Repeater |access-date=15 October 2022}}
Lori, M., Chalmers, C., Evans, G. Mooney, S., Mudie, P., Taberham, P., Sheehan, R., Hamblyn, N., Leslie, E.and Lori, M. (eds). 2018. Stan Brakhage: the realm buster. London, UK: John Libbey.{{cite web |title=Catalogue page for Stan Brakhage: Realm Buster |url=https://iupress.org/9780861967285/stan-brakhage-the-realm-buster/ |website=Indiana Press |access-date=15 October 2022}}
Leslie, E. 2016. Liquid crystals: the art and science of a fluid form. London, UK: Reaktion.{{cite web |title=Catalogue page for Liquid Crystals |url=http://www.reaktionbooks.co.uk/display.asp?ISB=9781780236452 |website=Reaktion Books |access-date=15 October 2022}}
Leslie, E.,2017. Dolbear, S., and Truskolaski, S., (eds.) 2016. Walter Benjamin: the storyteller. London, UK: Verso.{{cite web |title=Page for the Storyteller collection |url=https://www.versobooks.com/books/2101-the-storyteller |website=Verso Books Catalogue |access-date=15 October 2022}}
Leslie, E. 2007. Synthetic Worlds: Nature, Art and the Chemical Industry. London, UK: Reaktion.{{cite web |title=Catalogue page for Synthetics World |url=http://www.reaktionbooks.co.uk/display.asp?K=9781861892485 |website=Reaktion Books |access-date=15 October 2022}}
Leslie, E. 2015. Derelicts: Thought Worms from the Wreckage<. London, UK: Unkant.{{cite web |title=Derelicts on Militant Esthetix |url=https://www.militantesthetix.co.uk/unkant/derelicts.html |website=Militant Esthetix |access-date=15 October 2022}}
Leslie, E. 2000. Hollywood Flatlands: Animation, Critical Theory and the Avant Garde. London, UK: Verso.{{cite web |title=Verso Catalogue |url=https://www.versobooks.com/books/84-hollywood-flatlands |website=Verso |access-date=15 October 2022}}

=Selected media work=

Thought Cloud, an essay for series Head in the Clouds, broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on 26 Feb 2009.{{cite web |title=Thought Cloud webpage |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00hr5ll |website=Radio 3 archive |access-date=15 October 2022}}

Walter Benjamin, an episode of In Our Time, BBC Radio 4, 10 Feb 2022.{{cite web |title=In Our Time episodes |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0014710 |website=In Our Time BBC R4 |access-date=15 October 2022}}

=External links=

A career-spanning interview is hosted on various sites, including the Verso blog.{{cite web |last1=Pal |first1=Maïa |last2=Souvlis |first2=George |title=For a Marxist Poetics of Science: An Interview with Esther Leslie |url=https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/news/3550-for-a-marxist-poetics-of-science-an-interview-with-esther-leslie |website=Verso |access-date=18 July 2024 |date=5 January 2018}}

References

Category:1964 births

Category:Fellows of the British Academy

Category:Academics of Birkbeck, University of London

Category:Living people