Emet Prize Laureates

Prof. Eva Illouz was born in Morocco, educated in France, and received her higher degrees from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. She is Rose Isaac Chair of Sociology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a member of the Center for the Study of Rationality, and holds a Chair of Excellence at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris.

She was among the first scholars who studied the effect of capitalism on emotional life. Her work has included broad and diverse empirical research on social sites, corporations, best sellers, higher literature, theatre, television, internet sites and actors of varying statures. She studied the historical and sociological mechanisms by which institutions, such as consumer markets or corporations, trickle down to the minute corners of the subjective mind. Romantic love, self-control, and emotional pain are prominent examples of inner processes she examines from the sociological perspective. Her work is applied in many research disciplines, including literature, sociology, anthropology, communications and the sociology of capitalism. In 2009 she was selected by the German weekly Die Zeit as one of twelve seminal thinkers who are shaping the way we think.

Over the years she has held a variety of positions in academic institutions in Israel and has published 12 books, translated into 17 languages.

Her academic work has earned her awards and citations from international professional associations, including being named as one of the leading female intellectuals. She received the Academic Leadership Award by the Ministry of Absorption and various prizes for her research and publications.