Search People Result | Academic Influence

Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines

Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.

Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.

We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.

To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).

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School

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Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Communications,

#6901

Luther Dixon

#98364

Overall Influence

1931 - 2009 (78 years)

Luther Dixon was an American songwriter, record producer, and singer. Dixon's songs achieved their greatest success in the 1950s and 1960s, and were recorded by Elvis Presley, the Beatles, the Jackson 5, B.B. King, Jerry Lee Lewis, Dusty Springfield, Jimmy Reed and others. As a producer, Dixon helped create the signature sound of the girl group the Shirelles.

#6902

Ian Wilson

#120481

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (60 years)

Ian Wilson is a Canadian linguist. Biography Wilson has a Bachelor of Mathematics from the University of Waterloo, he has an M.A. in Teaching English as a Foreign/Second Language from the University of Birmingham and a PhD in Linguistics from the University of British Columbia.

#6903

Wolfgang Rübsam

#126032

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (80 years)

Wolfgang Friedrich Rübsam is a German-American organist, pianist, composer and pedagogue. Biography After his musical training with Erich Ackermann in Fulda, Germany, Rübsam studied at the Musikhochschule in Frankfurt am Main with Helmut Walcha. Additional studies in organ followed with Marie-Claire Alain in France and with Robert T. Anderson at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. He won the first prize at the International Organ Competition in Fort Wayne, Indiana and the Grand Prix de Chartres for interpretation in 1973.

#6904

Katy Milkman

#10464

Overall Influence

Katherine L. Milkman is an American economist who is the James G. Dinan endowed Professor at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. She is the President of the Society for Judgment and Decision Making.

#6905

Joe Jones

#125007

Overall Influence

1926 - 2005 (79 years)

Joseph Charles Jones was an American R&B singer, songwriter and arranger, who was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Jones is also generally credited with discovering the Dixie Cups. He also worked with B.B. King. As a singer, Jones had his biggest hit in the form of the Top Five 1960 R&B hit "You Talk Too Much", which also reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

#6906

Thomas Troelsen

#87736

Overall Influence

1981 - Present (45 years)

Thomas Troelsen is a Danish singer, songwriter, and producer from Skive. Troelsen has written and produced songs for Pitbull, Flo Rida, Justin Bieber, David Guetta, Lil Wayne, Drengene fra Angora, Nile Rodgers, Jason Derulo, Charlie Puth, Chris Brown, Afrojack, Akon, Meghan Trainor, Girls' Generation, SHINee, EXO, NCT Dream and Junior Senior.

#6907

Nancy Condee

#101629

Overall Influence

Nancy Condee is a professor at the University of Pittsburgh in the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures and served as the head of the Cultural Studies department from 1995 to 2006. Her field is contemporary Russian cinema and cultural politics.

#6908

Charles Fox

#112852

Overall Influence

1921 - 1991 (70 years)

Charles Richard Jeremy Fox was an English writer and broadcaster who specialised in jazz. He left school at 14 and trained as a draughtsman. His career in journalism began in the 1940s via letters to Melody Maker and jazz magazines of the era such as Jazz Music , Jazz Forum and Jazz Journal. He settled in London in the early 1950s working as a sub-editor on the Recorder newspaper and edited a poetry magazine entitled Ninepence founded with the poets Patrick Brangwyn and Christopher Logue. Fox was part of the group around McCarthy who founded Jazz Monthly magazine in 1955; the magazine continued publication until 1972.

#6909

Brian Rudman

#70463

Overall Influence

1901 - Present (125 years)

Brian C. Rudman is a columnist and regular editorial contributor to The New Zealand Herald, New Zealand's largest daily newspaper. He has his own column, 'Rudman's City', where he mainly focuses on issues relating to Auckland , its growth, public projects, policies and politicians. He is also active in related events and public discussions.

#6910

Arturo Tamayo

#78474

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (80 years)

Arturo Tamayo Ballesteros is a Spanish conductor and music teacher. Life Tamayo studied music at the Real Conservatorio Superior de Música de Madrid, while studying Law at the Complutense University of Madrid. He finally opted for music and finished his studies with an honorary prize in composition. He completed his training outside Spain in Basel with Pierre Boulez and in Vienna with Witold Rowicki. He also studied composition with Klaus Huber and Wolfgang Fortner at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg .

#6911

Douglas Yeo

#130580

Overall Influence

1955 - Present (71 years)

Douglas Yeo is an American bass trombonist who played in the Boston Symphony Orchestra from 1985 to 2012, where he held the John Moors Cabot Bass Trombone Chair. He was also on the faculty of the New England Conservatory. In 2012 he retired from the BSO and accepted a position as professor of trombone at the Arizona State University School of Music, a position he held until 2016. In 2019, he was appointed to the faculty of Wheaton College .

#6912

Herbert Kubly

#110792

Overall Influence

1915 - 1996 (81 years)

Herbert Oswald Nicholas Kubly was an American author and playwright. For his first book, American in Italy, he won the 1956 U.S. National Book Award for Nonfiction. Biography Kubly was born and raised on a farm in the Swiss American community of New Glarus, Wisconsin. He received a bachelor's degree from the University of Wisconsin School of Journalism in 1937. His first professional work as a journalist was for the Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph. He later wrote for the New York Herald Tribune.

#6913

Gleb Panfilov

#88377

Overall Influence

1934 - Present (92 years)

Gleb Anatolyevich Panfilov was a Russian film director noted for a string of mostly historical films starring his wife, Inna Churikova. Biography In the 1980s Panfilov, a chemist by profession, moved to theatre directing, but also found time to adapt for the screen Alexander Vampilov's play Valentina , as well as Maxim Gorky's Vassa Zheleznova and Mother . Vassa won the Golden Prize at the 13th Moscow International Film Festival and Russia's State Prize. He won the Golden Bear at the 37th Berlin International Film Festival for the film The Theme.

#6914

Peter Patzak

#111097

Overall Influence

1945 - 2021 (76 years)

Peter Patzak was an Austrian film director and screenwriter. He directed 60 films from 1973 to 2021. His film Kassbach – Ein Porträt was entered into the 29th Berlin International Film Festival and his film Wahnfried was screened out of competition at the 1987 Cannes Film Festival. His 1997 film Shanghai 1937 was entered into the 20th Moscow International Film Festival.

#6915

Greg Elmer

#129069

Overall Influence

1967 - Present (59 years)

Greg Elmer is Bell Globemedia Research Chair, Professor of Professional Communication, and Director of the Infoscape Research Lab at Toronto Metropolitan University in Toronto, Canada. Elmer is an internet researcher and documentary film maker whose work focuses on theories of surveillance, social protest, political communication, and media financialization.

#6916

Randy Phillips

#81275

Overall Influence

1955 - Present (71 years)

Randy Phillips is an American music producer, former president of Anschutz Entertainment Group, and current president and CEO of LiveStyle . Biography Phillips was born to a Jewish family and graduated from Stanford University where he was the director of special events and was named Billboards college talent buyer of the year. At Stanford, he was responsible for all bookings including Crosby Stills & Nash, Boz Scaggs, Fleetwood Mac, and Rod Stewart. After graduating, he went to the Santa Clara University School of Law where he received a scholarship thanks to his booking prowess . He served a...

#6917

Sandrine Bony

#97233

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (76 years)

Sandrine Bony-Léna, née Bony, is a French-born climatologist who is currently Director of research at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique at Sorbonne University, Paris. Bony was notably a lead author of the Nobel Prize-winning Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

#6918

Christian Gerhaher

Christian Gerhaher

#128579

Overall Influence

1969 - Present (57 years)

Christian Gerhaher is a German baritone and bass singer in opera and concert, particularly known as a Lieder singer. Career Christian Gerhaher studied with Paul Kuën and Raimund Grumbach at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München, and Lied with Friedemann Berger, already together with his accompanist for decades to come, Gerold Huber. He took master classes with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau , Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Inge Borkh.

#6919

Václav Neumann

#108194

Overall Influence

1920 - 1995 (75 years)

Václav Neumann was a Czech conductor, violinist, violist, and opera director. Life and career Neumann was born in Prague, where he studied at the Prague Conservatory with Josef Micka , and Pavel Dědeček and Metod Doležil from 1940 through 1945. He co-founded the Smetana Quartet, playing 1st violin and then viola.

#6920

Petra Müllejans

#114475

Overall Influence

1959 - Present (67 years)

Petra Müllejans is a German violinist, conductor and pedagogue, known especially for her work in historical performance practice and as a co-founder and performer with the Freiburger Barockorchester.

#6921

Andrew Barton

#72709

Overall Influence

1901 - Present (125 years)

Andrew Barton is a lecturer in the School of Communication at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida. He teaches Advanced Broadcast Journalism and serves as faculty advisor to the student-produced newscast, “NewsVision.”

#6922

Stefan Kostka

#57522

Overall Influence

1939 - Present (87 years)

Stefan M. Kostka is an American music theorist, author, and Professor Emeritus of music theory at the University of Texas at Austin. Education Kostka graduated from the University of Colorado with a Bachelor's Degree, and then received a graduate degree at the University of Texas, studying under Kent Kennan before receiving a PhD in music theory from the University of Wisconsin.

#6923

Harvey Lichtenstein

#53334

Overall Influence

1929 - 2017 (88 years)

Harvey Lichtenstein was an American arts administrator. He is best known for his 32-year tenure as president and executive producer of the Brooklyn Academy of Music, or BAM, as it became known under his leadership. He led the institution to a renaissance, championing contemporary performance, establishing the Next Wave Festival, and providing a vital venue for dance, theater, music, and collaborations that bridged disciplines. The long list of artists who came to perform on BAM's stages under Lichtenstein's purview reads like a Who's Who of 20th-century performance, and includes Laurie Ander...

#6924

Giorgio Gaslini

#126246

Overall Influence

1929 - 2014 (85 years)

Giorgio Gaslini was an Italian jazz pianist, composer and conductor. He began performing aged 13 and recorded with his jazz trio at 16. In the 1950s and 1960s, Gaslini performed with his own quartet. He was the first Italian musician mentioned as a "new talent" in the Down Beat poll and the first Italian officially invited to a jazz festival in the USA . He collaborated with leading American soloists, such as Anthony Braxton, Steve Lacy, Don Cherry, Roswell Rudd, Max Roach, but also with the Argentinian Gato Barbieri and Frenchman Jean-Luc Ponty. He also adapted the compositions of Albert Ayler and Sun Ra for solo piano, which the Soul Note label issued.

#6925

Jörg-Peter Weigle

#91309

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

Jörg-Peter Weigle , is a German conductor and music professor. He is the uncle of the conductor Sebastian Weigle and the violist Friedemann Weigle. Weigle received his first musical training from 1963 to 1971 as a member of the Thomanerchor in Leipzig. From 1973 to 1978, he studied at the Hochschule für Musik "Hanns Eisler" in Berlin, where his teachers included Horst Förster , Dietrich Knothe and Ruth Zechlin . He later participated in master classes with Kurt Masur and Witold Rowicki.

#6926

Norman Wisdom

#116979

Overall Influence

1915 - 2010 (95 years)

Sir Norman Joseph Wisdom, was an English actor, comedian, musician and singer best known for a series of comedy films produced between 1953 and 1966 featuring a hapless character called Norman Pitkin. He was awarded the 1953 BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles following the release of Trouble in Store, his first film in a lead role.

#6927

Cristina Pumplun

#28092

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (61 years)

Cristina M. Pumplun is the missionary vicar of Westerkerk in Amsterdam. Until 2003 she was Secretary of Studies at the Thomas Institute of Tilburg University in Utrecht. Pumplun studied German language and literature at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, and then at Universität Passau, Germany. Her Ph.D. thesis investigated German devotional texts of the 17th century, specifically the work of Catharina Regina von Greiffenberg, and was published as Begriff des Unbegreiflichen: Funktion und Bedeutung der Metaphorik in den Geburtsbetrachtungen der Catharina Regina von Greiffenberg . She taught moder...

#6928

Benny Powell

#129614

Overall Influence

1930 - 2010 (80 years)

Benny Powell was an American jazz trombonist. He played both standard trombone and bass trombone. Biography Born Benjamin Gordon Powell Jr in New Orleans, Louisiana, he first played professionally at the age of 14, and at 18 began playing with Lionel Hampton. In 1951 he left Hampton's band and began playing with Count Basie, in whose orchestra he would remain until 1963. Powell takes the trombone solo in the bridge of Basie's 1955 recording of "April in Paris".

#6929

Akiva Schaffer

#80350

Overall Influence

1977 - Present (49 years)

Akiva Daniel Shebar Schaffer is an American actor, filmmaker, comedian, and musician. He is a member of the comedy group The Lonely Island along with childhood friends Andy Samberg and Jorma Taccone. Schaffer began his career with The Lonely Island making videos for Channel 101. In 2005, Saturday Night Live hired the trio, with Schaffer joining as a writer. In their time at SNL, The Lonely Island pioneered the digital short format, creating some of the most popular sketches of all time, including "Lazy Sunday", "I Just Had Sex", "I'm on a Boat", and "Dick in a Box". After SNL, Schaffer went o...

#6930

Henry Jackman

#99733

Overall Influence

1974 - Present (52 years)

Henry Pryce Jackman is an English composer. He composed music for films such as Kong: Skull Island, X-Men: First Class, Winnie the Pooh, Wreck-It Ralph, Ralph Breaks the Internet, Puss in Boots, Monsters vs. Aliens, Captain Phillips, Kick-Ass, Kick-Ass 2, Turbo, Big Hero 6, Ron's Gone Wrong, The Interview, Detective Pikachu and Strange World as well as the video games Uncharted 4: A Thief's End and Disney Infinity 2.0.

#6931

Shinji Orito

#92544

Overall Influence

1973 - Present (53 years)

is a Japanese musical composer originally from Hyōgo, Japan working for the visual novel brand Key under VisualArt's. Before forming Key, Orito worked for another software company named Leaf where he contributed to four games. After leaving Leaf, Orito transferred to another company named Tactics where he had a hand in the creation of three games for that company: Dōsei, Moon, and One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e. After forming Key, Orito has put much work into such famous titles as Kanon, Air and Clannad. Orito has been influenced by the famous Japanese composers Joe Hisaishi and Yuzo Koshiro.

#6932

Cynthia White

#141578

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (70 years)

Cynthia Joan White is a New Zealand applied linguistics academic. Academic career After an undergraduate at Victoria University of Wellington, White earned her PhD entitled 'Metacognitive, cognitive, social and affective strategy use in foreign language learning: a comparative study' from Massey University, while working there. She is also an adjunct faculty member at the University of New England in Australia.

#6933

Casey Jones

#106506

Overall Influence

1939 - 2017 (78 years)

Casey Jones was an American drummer who recorded with blues artists such as Albert Collins, appearing on his Frostbite and Ice Pickin' albums and Johnny Winter appearing on Winters Serious Business, Guitar Slinger, True to the Blues: The Johnny Winter Story albums. He is also a singer and record producer.

#6934

Wilbert Harrison

Wilbert Harrison

#110725

Overall Influence

1929 - 1994 (65 years)

Wilbert Huntington Harrison was an American rhythm and blues singer, pianist, guitarist and harmonica player. Biography Harrison was born in Charlotte, North Carolina. He had a Billboard #1 record in 1959 with the song "Kansas City". The song was written in 1952 and was one of the first credited collaborations by the team of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc. Harrison recorded "Kansas City" for the Harlem-based entrepreneur Bobby Robinson, who released it on his Fury record label.

#6935

Arno Mohr

#98029

Overall Influence

1910 - 2001 (91 years)

Arno Mohr was a German Painter and Graphic artist, primarily associated with the German Democratic Republic and, more particularly, with Berlin. Almost unknown in the west, his work was popular in East Germany, notably for his reductionist observational drawings of everyday life.

#6936

Galit Shmueli

#82221

Overall Influence

1971 - Present (55 years)

Galit Shmueli is a data scientist who works in Taiwan as Tsing Hua Distinguished Professor at the Institute of Service Science, National Tsing Hua University. She is the author of many textbooks in business statistics and is known for her work on information quality, and on clarifying the difference between explanations and predictions in statistical analyses.

#6937

Rich Moore

#72109

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (63 years)

Richard L. Moore is an American film and television animation director, screenwriter and voice actor. He is best known for serving as a director on primetime animated television series such as The Simpsons, The Critic and Futurama as well as directing the films Wreck-It Ralph , Zootopia and Ralph Breaks the Internet for Walt Disney Animation Studios. He is a two-time Emmy Award winner, a three-time Annie Award winner and an Academy Award winner.

#6938

Vicki Karaminas

Vicki Karaminas

#56270

Overall Influence

Vicki Karaminas is a New Zealand fashion academic, and a full professor at Massey University. Academic career After a 2002 PhD titled 'Interrupted journeys : travelling light : [soma]tographies of space' at the University of Technology, Sydney, Karaminas moved to Massey University, rising to full professor.

#6939

Gregory T.S. Walker

Gregory T.S. Walker

#134279

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (65 years)

Gregory T.S. Walker is an American composer, violinist, and guitarist. He was the recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters Charles Ives Fellowship in 2000, and has performed with major orchestras around the world.

#6940

Vijayalakshmi Bhatia

#159738

Overall Influence

#6941

Juliet McMains

#114240

Overall Influence

1972 - Present (54 years)

Juliet E. McMains is a United States dance scholar and instructor, the author of the Glamour Addiction, the first comprehensive study of the United States DanceSport. Juliet McMains started doing ballroom dancing as a teenager. Eventually she became professional ballroom dancer until she stopped competing in 2003. Her Senior thesis in the college was Tradition and Transgression: Gender Roles in Ballroom Dancing. She earned B.A. in Women's Studies from Harvard University and PhD in dance history and theory at the University of California, Riverside.

#6942

Michel Friedman

#66655

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (70 years)

Julien Michel Friedman is a German author, former CDU politician and talk show host. From 2000 to 2003 Friedman was vice president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, and president of the European Jewish Congress from 2001 to 2003. From 1998 to 2003 he had his own show on German television. Since 2004 he has been hosting a weekly talk show on N24 called Studio Friedman. Friedman is a lawyer by profession and studied law and philosophy.

#6943

Keng‐boon Ooi

#159789

Overall Influence

#6944

José Balmes

#40367

Overall Influence

1927 - 2016 (89 years)

José Balmes Parramón was a Spanish-born painter based in Chile. He received Chile's National Prize for Plastic Arts in 1999. Biography José Balmes was born in 1927 in the town of Montesquiu in Catalonia, where he spent his childhood until the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936. Three years later, after the Nationalist victory, Balmes with his family was forced to leave Spain due to the militancy of his father, Damià Balmes, who was mayor of the town for the Republican Left of Catalonia.

#6945

Harry Smith

#86189

Overall Influence

1951 - Present (75 years)

Harry Smith is an American television journalist working for NBC News, MSNBC, and CNBC as a senior correspondent. He hosted the CBS News morning programs, The Early Show and its predecessor, CBS This Morning, for seventeen years. In July 2011, Smith left CBS News to become a correspondent for NBC News and the newsmagazine Rock Center with Brian Williams. He has also served as an anchor for MSNBC, conducting daytime live coverage of breaking news and events since first appearing in November 2015.

#6946

John McCallum

#118223

Overall Influence

1918 - 2010 (92 years)

John Neil McCallum, was an Australian theatre and film actor, highly successful in the United Kingdom. He was also a television producer. Early life McCallum's father, John Neil McCallum Sr., was a theatre owner and entrepreneur, who built and for many years ran the 2,000 seat Cremorne Theatre on the banks of the Brisbane River. After emigrating from Scotland, McCallum Snr. became an accomplished musician and was soon heavily involved in Brisbane's entertainment scene. His mother was an accomplished amateur actress who was born in England.

#6947

Mike Stern

#71102

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

Mike Stern is an American jazz guitarist. After playing with Blood, Sweat & Tears, he worked with drummer Billy Cobham, then with trumpeter Miles Davis from 1981 to 1983 and again in 1985. He then began a solo career, releasing more than a dozen albums.

#6948

Henry Cosby

#87947

Overall Influence

1928 - 2002 (74 years)

Henry R. Cosby was an American songwriter, arranger, record producer and musician who worked for Motown Records from its formative years. Along with Sylvia Moy, Cosby was a key collaborator with Stevie Wonder from 1963 to 1970. Cosby co-wrote and/or co-produced three No. 1 US hits: Stevie Wonder's "Fingertips" , The Supremes' "Love Child" , and The Miracles' "The Tears of a Clown" .

#6949

B. Van Durme

#159938

Overall Influence

#6950

John Richardson

#67513

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (80 years)

John Richardson is a British special effects supervisor. He is best known for his work on the James Bond film series , all the Harry Potter film series , A Bridge Too Far and Aliens . For the latter, he won the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects at the 1987 ceremony. He won the BAFTA Award for Best Special Visual Effects for his work on the film Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 , for which he was also nominated for an Academy Award at the 2012 ceremony.

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