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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Person Name

School

Gender

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Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Communications,

#9251

Charles A. O'Reilly III

#56984

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (84 years)

Charles A. O'Reilly III is an American academic. He is the Frank E. Buck Professor of Management at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. He is the co-author of three books and a number of case studies as well as the co-editor of a fourth book.

#9252

Pat Thomas

#174423

Overall Influence

1960 - Present (66 years)

Pat Thomas is a jazz pianist from Oxford, England. Biography Thomas received a Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award for Artists in 2014. Several of his recordings were released in 2019: "from the ruminative post-bop piano trio heard on BleySchool, the free improv of the collective trio Shifa, an exploratory trio with reedist John Butcher and drummer Ståle Liavik Solberg on Fictional Souvenirs and a stunning live solo piano set of Duke Ellington music available digitally from London's Cafe Oto". Thomas is part of the band Ahmed, a quartet with Antonin Gerbal, Joel Grip and Seymour Wright inspired by t...

#9253

Hans-Jürgen von Bose

Hans-Jürgen von Bose

#114170

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

Hans-Jürgen von Bose is a German composer. Life After an unsettled adolescence, Bose entered the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt in 1969, where he received instruction in piano and music theory. Upon graduating from the conservatory, he studied composition , piano , and conducting at the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts. After attending the Darmstädter Ferienkurse in 1974 and the premiere of his First String Quartet, he was awarded several scholarships, among others from the Mozart Foundation and the German National Academic Foundation. In 1976, Bose dropped out of school in Frankfurt and settled in Munich as a freelance artist.

#9254

Graeme Danby

#174383

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (64 years)

Graeme Danby is an operatic bass who has performed at several of the world's leading opera houses, notably the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden and the English National Opera. He was educated at the Royal Academy of Music in London.

#9255

Michael Radu

#42188

Overall Influence

1947 - 2009 (62 years)

Mihai S. Radu was a Romanian American political scientist and journalist who grew up in Romania. He was Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Co-Chairman of FPRI's Center on Terrorism, Counter-Terrorism, and Homeland Security.

#9256

Martha Burns

#117415

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (69 years)

Martha Burns is a Canadian actress known for her stage work and youth outreach in Ontario and her leading role as Ellen Fanshaw in the TV dramedy series Slings and Arrows. Early life Burns was born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. She studied at the University of Alberta and the Vancouver Playhouse's Acting School.

#9257

Marc Bélanger

#172517

Overall Influence

1940 - Present (86 years)

Marc Bélanger is a Canadian violinist, violist, conductor, arranger, composer, and music educator. Life and career Born in Quebec City, Bélanger is the son of violinist and conductor Edwin Bélanger and the brother of musician Guy Bélanger. It is from his father that he received his initial musical training. At the age of eight he began studying the violin with Calvin Sieb and singing with Claude Létourneau at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Québec. He continued to study at the conservatoire through 1961, earning a diploma in 1960 with premier prizes in both harmony and chamber music.

#9258

Stefans Grové

#127901

Overall Influence

1922 - 2014 (92 years)

Stefans Grové was a South African composer. Before his death the following assessment was made of him: "He is regarded by many as Africa's greatest living composer, possesses one of the most distinctive compositional voices of our time".

#9259

Don Scardino

#96490

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (77 years)

Donald Joseph Scardino is an American television director and producer and a former actor. Career Acting Scardino was born in New York City, to jazz musician parents, Dorothy Denny Scardino and Charles Scardino. His first Broadway credit was as an understudy in The Playroom in 1965. Additional Broadway acting credits include Johnny No-Trump, Godspell, and King of Hearts. Off-Broadway he appeared in The Rimers of Eldritch, The Comedy of Errors, Moonchildren, and I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking It on the Road, he was also the lead in a B horror movie titled Squirm in 1976. He additionally starred in several episodes of the CBS Radio Mystery Theater, which ran from 1974 to 1982.

#9260

Kevin Sullivan

#148767

Overall Influence

1955 - Present (71 years)

Kevin Roderick Sullivan is a Canadian writer, director and producer of film and television programs. Kevin Sullivan is best known for detailed period movies such as the Anne of Green Gables series of films, his movie adaptation of Timothy Findley's novel The Piano Man's Daughter, feature films and TV-movies such as Under the Piano, Butterbox Babies, Sleeping Dogs Lie and the CBS mini-series Seasons of Love, as well as long-running television series such as Road to Avonlea and Wind at My Back. His films have been broadcast in over 150 countries. His production company Sullivan Entertainment ha...

#9261

Cornelius Carter

#116920

Overall Influence

Cornelius Carter is a dancer, choreographer, and professor emeritus of dance. He is the director of dance at the University of Alabama and also the artistic director of Transition into Performance and of the Alabama Repertory Dance Theatre.

#9262

Norman Connors

#96458

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (79 years)

Norman Connors is an American jazz drummer, composer, arranger, and producer who has led a number of influential jazz and R&B groups. He also achieved several big R&B hits of the day, especially with love ballads. He is possibly best known for the 1976 hit, "You Are My Starship" on which lead vocals were sung by Michael Henderson.

#9263

Andy Stein

#106870

Overall Influence

Andy Stein is an American saxophone and violin player. He is a member of The Guys All-Star Shoe Band on the radio show A Prairie Home Companion and the movie. He was a founding member of the country rock band Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen. Stein attended the University of Michigan as a contemporary of George Frayne .

#9264

Ben Davis

#108803

Overall Influence

Ben Davis is a cellist from the United Kingdom known for his improvisation. His group Basquiat Strings was nominated for the Mercury Prize in 2007. He is a member of the F-IRE Collective. His group, Basquiat Strings, originated as a standard string quartet . Only later did cellist Davis decide to add double bass and drums "to strengthen the rhythmic accompaniment". Basquiat Strings were nominated for the 2007 Mercury Prize. The band performed an Electric Prom in 2008 featuring NY sax player Elery Eskerlin.

#9265

Benny Green

#111852

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (63 years)

Benny Green is an American hard bop jazz pianist who was a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. He has been compared to Bud Powell and Oscar Peterson in style and counts them as influences. Biography Green was born in New York City. He grew up in Berkeley, California, and studied classical piano from the age of seven. He was also interested in jazz from an early point, as his father was a jazz tenor saxophone player. Benny Green was "discovered" by Faye Carroll, and while still in his teens worked in a quintet led by Eddie Henderson. Green attended Berkeley High School, and participated in the school's jazz ensemble.

#9266

Tison Street

#161804

Overall Influence

1943 - Present (83 years)

Tison C. Street aka Curry Tison Street is a graduate of Harvard College ‘65 and an American composer of contemporary classical music and violinist. He studied violin with Einar Hansen, of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, from 1951 to 1959. He later studied composition at Harvard University with Leon Kirchner and David Del Tredici, receiving B.A. and M.A. degrees. In 1973 he won the Rome Prize and spent a year at the American Academy in Rome.

#9267

Hirini Melbourne

#170760

Overall Influence

1949 - 2003 (54 years)

Hirini Melbourne was a Māori composer, singer, university lecturer, poet and author who was notable for his contribution to the development of Māori music and the revival of Māori culture. He played traditional instruments and his waiata have preserved traditions and used Māori proverbs. He received the New Zealand Order of Merit in recognition of his services to Māori music. He was from Ngāi Tūhoe and Ngāti Kahungunu Māori tribes.

#9268

Børge Obel

#51913

Overall Influence

1948 - Present (78 years)

Børge Obel is a Danish organizational theorist, Professor at European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management in Brussels, Belgium, and Professor at the Interdisciplinary Center for Organizational Architecture at Aarhus School of Business and Social Sciences, Aarhus University.

#9269

Jim Reardon

#97837

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (61 years)

Jim Reardon is an American animator, storyboard artist, screenwriter, and television director. He is best known for his work on the animated TV series The Simpsons. He has directed over 30 episodes of the series and was credited as a supervising director for seasons 9 through 15. He has been described by Ralph Bakshi as "one of the best cartoon writers in the business".

#9270

Chris Roberts

#117814

Overall Influence

1968 - Present (58 years)

Chris Roberts is a British-American video game designer, programmer, film producer and film director. He created the Wing Commander series while at Origin Systems and since 2010 has been working on the crowdfunded space simulator Star Citizen.

#9271

Barbara Albert

#154594

Overall Influence

1970 - Present (56 years)

Barbara Albert is an Austrian writer, film-producer and film-director. She studied filmmaking at the Wiener Filmakademie. Her first film to become known to a larger audience was Nordrand, which describes the reality of life of Yugoslavian children in Vienna.

#9272

Nemat Sadat

#110564

Overall Influence

Nemat Sadat is an Afghan-American journalist, novelist, human rights activist, and former professor of political science at the American University of Afghanistan. Known for his debut novel The Carpet Weaver and his campaigning for LGBTQIA+ rights, particularly in the context of societal and cultural Islamic attitudes towards homosexuality in the Muslim world. Sadat is one of the first Afghans to have openly come out as gay and to campaign for LGBTQIA+ rights, gender freedom, and sexual liberty in Afghanistan.

#9273

John Doyle

#122991

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

John Patrick Doyle AM is an Australian actor, writer, radio presenter and comedian best known for his character Rampaging Roy Slaven. Early life Doyle was born in Lithgow, New South Wales in 1953 into a music-loving, Catholic household with three sisters, Deanna, Cathy, and Jen, and a brother, Tony. His mother was a business woman and his father a railway fettler. He was an altar boy for a time but lost interest in Catholicism with the introduction of contemporary changes in the Mass among other things. He attended and was a prefect at De La Salle Academy in Lithgow before graduating from the then Newcastle Teachers' College in 1973 with a Diploma of Teaching .

#9274

Rodney Waschka II

#134910

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (68 years)

Rodney Waschka II is an American composer known for his algorithmic compositions and his theatrical works. Biography Waschka studied at Brooklyn College, at the Institute of Sonology, then newly part of the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, and earned his doctorate at the University of North Texas. His teachers include Larry Austin at the University of North Texas, Charles Dodge at Brooklyn College, and Paul Berg, Clarence Barlow, Joel Ryan and George Lewis at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague. He also studied with Robert Ashley.

#9275

Tom Buk-Swienty

Tom Buk-Swienty

#88492

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (60 years)

Tom Buk-Swienty is a Danish historian, journalist and author, known for his work on the Second Schleswig War. Buk-Swienty was raised in Sønderborg, Denmark. He holds degrees in history and American Studies from the University of Copenhagen and the University of California. During 1994–2005, he served as the American correspondent for the Danish periodical Weekendavisen and also as a lecturer at the University of Southern Denmark in Odense until 2010. He is now an independent author and since 2014 has been an adjunct professor in history at University of Southern Denmark.

#9276

Susan van den Heever

#169947

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (76 years)

Susan Claire van den Heever is a South African atmospheric scientist who is a professor at Colorado State University. Her research considers cloud physics and mesoscale modelling. She is a fellow of the American Meteorological Society and an editor of the Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences.

#9277

Chris Brown

#178230

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

Chris Brown is an American composer, pianist and electronic musician, who creates music for acoustic instruments with interactive electronics, for computer networks, and for improvising ensembles. He was active early in his career as an inventor and builder of electroacoustic instruments; he has also performed widely as an improviser and pianist with groups as "Room" and the "Glenn Spearman Double Trio." In 1986 he co-founded the pioneering computer network music ensemble "The Hub". He is also known for his recorded performances of music by Henry Cowell, Luc Ferrari, and John Zorn. He has rec...

#9278

Sean Durkin

#133794

Overall Influence

1981 - Present (45 years)

Timothy Sean Durkin is a Canadian-American film director, screenwriter and producer. He won the Dramatic Directing Award at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival for Martha Marcy May Marlene. His short film, Mary Last Seen, on the same theme as Martha, won the award for best short film at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival Directors' Fortnight. In 2013, Durkin directed the Channel 4 drama series Southcliffe, starring Sean Harris and Rory Kinnear. His second film, The Nest, premiered in 2020. His next film titled The Iron Claw, a biography based on the Von Erich family of wrestlers, will be released in...

#9279

Patu Hohepa

#144351

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (90 years)

Sir Patrick Wahanga Hohepa was a New Zealand Māori language academic. In the 2022 Queen's Birthday and Platinum Jubilee Honours, he was appointed a Knight Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to Māori culture and education.

#9280

Michael Smith

#149522

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (74 years)

Michael Smith is a British author who specializes in spies and espionage. He is also a former member of the board of the Bletchley Park Trust. Smith is a former soldier and journalist best known for obtaining and publishing the documents collectively known as The Downing Street Memos. The Downing Street memo itself was an official record of a meeting of the British war cabinet held in July 2002. It revealed the disclosure by Sir Richard Dearlove, then the head of the British Secret Intelligence Service , that the intelligence to justify an invasion was being "fixed around the policy". The Dow...

#9281

Eric Peterson

#106075

Overall Influence

1964 - Present (62 years)

Eric Stanley Peterson is an American musician, best known as the rhythm guitarist of the thrash metal band Testament and is the only remaining original member left in the band, which first started in 1983 under the name Legacy. He and lead vocalist Chuck Billy are the only members to appear on all of the band's studio albums.

#9282

Jan Meyerowitz

#170449

Overall Influence

1913 - 1998 (85 years)

Jan Meyerowitz was a German–American composer, conductor, pianist and writer. Life Meyerowitz was born Hans-Hermann Meyerowitz in Breslau , the son of a manufacturer. From 1927, he studied in Berlin with Walter Gmeindl and Alexander von Zemlinsky. In 1933, he was forced to leave Germany because he was Jewish and continue his education in Rome with Ottorino Respighi, Alfredo Casella and the conductor Bernardino Molinari. In 1938, he moved to Belgium and in 1939 to the South of France, where he made contact with the French Resistance. His future wife, the singer Marguerite Fricker, helped him i...

#9283

Ante Babaja

#152390

Overall Influence

1927 - 2010 (83 years)

Ante Babaja was a notable Croatian film director and screenwriter. Babaja finished high school in Zagreb before going on to enrol at the University of Zagreb where he studied law and economy. He started working in filmmaking in 1949, and his first job was as assistant director to Krešimir Golik on the making of Golik's 1950 feature film Blue 9 . Babaja's directorial debut was the 1955 documentary short Jedan dan u Rijeci. He went on to film several short films before directing is first feature film The King's New Clothes in 1961, a screen adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's short tale.

#9284

Margalit Oved

#127505

Overall Influence

1934 - Present (92 years)

Margalit Oved is an American-Israeli dancer and choreographer, who was born in the Aden Protectorate. After being airlifted to Israel in 1949 in Operation Magic Carpet, she became involved with the Inbal Dance Theater for the following 15 years. She then moved the United States, where she taught at University of California, Los Angeles. Oved later returned to the Inbal Dance Theatre, and also worked with her son's Barak Marshall Theaterdance. She also founded her own group, the Margalit Dance Theatre Company in Los Angeles.

#9285

Richard Graham

#176627

Overall Influence

1960 - Present (66 years)

Richard Graham is an English actor. He played George T. Rowe in the 1997 film Titanic. He has also appeared in In the Name of the Father , Gangs of New York and Vera Drake , as well as playing Trevor Clyner in football hooligan films ID and ID2: Shadwell Army . He appeared in all 12 episodes of Maisie Raine as Mickey Farrel, and in 16 episodes of Hollyoaks as William Alexander. He has also appeared in Inspector Morse and Pie in the Sky. In 2019, he appeared in the BBC soap opera EastEnders as Jonno Highway.

#9286

Robert Muczynski

#160554

Overall Influence

1929 - 2010 (81 years)

Robert Muczynski was a Polish-American composer. Muczynski studied piano with Walter Knupfer and composition with Alexander Tcherepnin at DePaul University in Chicago, where he received both his Bachelor of Music degree and his Master of Music degree in Piano Performance. Muczynski later taught at DePaul University, Loras College, and Roosevelt University, before settling in Tucson in the 1960s where he joined the faculty of the University of Arizona as a composer-in-residence and chairman of the composition department. He held both positions until his retirement in 1988.

#9287

John Doan

#122774

Overall Influence

1951 - Present (75 years)

John Doan is an American guitarist and composer. Background Doan grew up in Venice, California, and at the age of eleven began playing the guitar, first a 12-string, and later a double-neck electric in a rock band. Later, while studying music at California State University, Northridge he was introduced to classical guitar. He really enjoyed the music for the lute and was amazed at the sound of its many strings. Later when he found a century-old harp-guitar on the back wall of a music store, it called to him with its beautiful shape and unusual collection of extra strings. He relates: "I was achingly curious and wanted to transform its silence and neglect into something alive and vibrant.

#9288

Uwe Gronostay

#113841

Overall Influence

1939 - 2008 (69 years)

Uwe Gronostay was a German choral conductor and composer. Born in Hildesheim, he grew up in Braunschweig and was already organist of the Jakobikirche at age 15. He studied church music in Bremen and worked as church musician, organ teacher and freelance worker for Radio Bremen. In 1972 he was appointed director of the RIAS Kammerchor. He also conducted from 1982 to 2002 the , and from 1987 to 1998 the Nederlands Kamerkoor in Amsterdam.

#9289

Michael Lee Dean

#180010

Overall Influence

Michael Lee Dean is an American clarinetist and university professor. He studied at the University of Texas at Arlington, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and Texas Tech University. He teaches at the Earl and Margie Holland School of Visual and Performing Arts at Southeast Missouri State University. He has performed and taught at a number of institutions in the United States and England including the Royal Northern College of Music, the Eastman School of Music, California State University Northridge, California State University Long Beach, and the University of North Texas. Michael Dean...

#9290

Jacqueline Samuda

Jacqueline Samuda

#165606

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

Jacqueline Samuda is a Canadian actress, director and writer. Biography Samuda was born in Ottawa, Ontario, and grew up in both the United States and Canada. She received a B.F.A. Degree in Performance from York University in Toronto, and apprenticed at the prestigious Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the Lake, Ontario. An experienced film/TV/stage/voice actress, Jacqueline has appeared in recurring roles on TV's Spooksville, The L Word and the epic sci-fi series Stargate SG-1 and in many other feature film, TV episodic and animation projects. She is a busy voiceover performer who has voiced many i...

#9291

Richard T. Gill

#120657

Overall Influence

1927 - 2010 (83 years)

Richard Thomas Gill was an American economist and opera singer. He held several teaching and administrative positions at Harvard University over 22 years. He was Assistant Dean of Harvard College, Allston Burr Senior Tutor of Leverett House, and Teaching Fellow, Instructor, and Assistant Professor of Economics. In 1963, he received tenure as Lecturer on Economics and Master of Leverett House.

#9292

Kenneth Fuchs

#147021

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (70 years)

Kenneth Daniel Fuchs is a Grammy Award-winning American composer. He currently serves as Professor of Music Composition at the University of Connecticut in Storrs. Music Kenneth Fuchs is the first living American composer recorded by the Sinfonia of London and its conductor, John Wilson . In July 2023, Chandos Records released Cloud Slant, Orchestral Works, Volume 1, which includes two works for full orchestra, a composition for strings, and a concerto for C and alto flute, performed by Adam Walker .

#9293

Hwang Byungki

#101275

Overall Influence

1936 - 2018 (82 years)

Hwang Byungki was the foremost South Korean player of the gayageum, a 12-string zither with silk strings. He was also a composer and an authority on sanjo, a form of traditional Korean instrumental music.

#9294

Anna Moffo

#170304

Overall Influence

1932 - 2006 (74 years)

Anna Moffo was an American opera singer, television personality, and actress. One of the leading lyric-coloratura sopranos of her generation, she possessed a warm and radiant voice of considerable range and agility. Noted for her physical beauty, she was nicknamed "La Bellissima".

#9295

Anybody Killa

#90870

Overall Influence

1973 - Present (53 years)

James Clemmie Lowery , also known as Anybody Killa, or ABK, is an American rapper from Detroit, Michigan, United States, whose stage persona is that of a Native American warrior. He was signed to Psychopathic Records, but is now under his own label Native World Inc. Prior to performing as ABK he performed as Native Funk.

#9296

Alexander Bergs

#178245

Overall Influence

1974 - Present (52 years)

Alexander Thomas Bergs is a German linguist and professor of English linguistics at the University of Osnabrück. Career Alexander Bergs studied English, German, chemistry, education and philosophy at Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf and general linguistics, English language and Scots at Edinburgh University. This was followed by his doctorate in 2002 on the subject of “Social Networks and Historical Sociolinguistics: Studies in Morphosyntactic Variation in the Paston Letters ”, and four years later his habilitation in English linguistics with the title "The Expression of Futurity in C...

#9297

Paul Taylor

#153398

Overall Influence

1960 - Present (66 years)

Paul Taylor is an American smooth jazz alto and soprano saxophonist who has released twelve albums since his debut On the Horn in 1995. He is a graduate of University of Nevada, Las Vegas , where he attended with a full music scholarship. He is signed to Peak Records. Although originally from Denver, Colorado, he is based in Las Vegas, Nevada. He has worked extensively with Keiko Matsui and played as a special guest with the Rippingtons for a short time in 1999 and 2000, after Jeff Kashiwa left the group and before Eric Marienthal joined them.

#9298

Suman Kalyanpur

#117483

Overall Influence

1937 - Present (89 years)

Suman Kalyanpur is an Indian playback singer who is most notable for her work in Hindi cinema. She recorded songs for movies in several languages besides Hindi, Marathi, Assamese, Gujarati, Kannada, Maithili, Bhojpuri, Rajasthani, Bengali, Odia and Punjabi.

#9299

Buddy Baker

#129385

Overall Influence

1918 - 2002 (84 years)

Norman Dale "Buddy" Baker was an American composer who scored many Disney films, including The Apple Dumpling Gang in 1975, The Apple Dumpling Gang Rides Again in 1979, The Shaggy D.A. in 1976, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh in 1977, and The Fox and the Hound in 1981. He also composed scores for Disney theme park attractions, including Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln and The Haunted Mansion.

#9300

James Stephens

#139369

Overall Influence

1951 - Present (75 years)

James Stephens is an American actor best known for his starring role as James T. Hart in the television series The Paper Chase. He is also known for his role in Tom Bosley's ABC television series, Father Dowling Mysteries , in which Stephens was cast as Father Philip Prestwick.

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