The Most Influential People Across History
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).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
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List of the most influential people in Computer Science,
#13751
Annabeth Rosen
#94471
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
Annabeth Rosen is an American sculptor best known for abstract ceramic works, as well as drawings. She is considered part of a second generation of Bay Area ceramic artists after the California Clay Movement, who have challenged ceramic traditions involving expression, form and function and helped spur the medium's acceptance in mainstream contemporary sculpture. Rosen's sculptures range from monumental to tabletop-sized, and emerge out of an accumulative bricolage process combining dozens or hundreds of fabricated parts and clay fragments and discards. Reviewers characterize her art as delib...
Go to Profile#13752
Mildred C. Joyner
#192284
Overall Influence
Mildred C. Joyner is President of the National Association of Social Workers NASW and former president of the Council on Social Work Education CSWE. Joyner also serves as President of the North America Region of the International Federation of Social Workers IFSW, and remains a member of IFSW’s Executive Committee. She began teaching in in 1979 at West Chester University as professor and served as the director and chairperson of the undergraduate social work department. As a professor she contributed greatly to the university and the community and developed courses that dealt with critical issues in race relations.
Go to Profile#13753
Elena Gillespie
#192288
Overall Influence
#13754
Allan Barnes
#192290
Overall Influence
Dr. Carl A. Barnes is a Pathology Specialist in Florence, Alabama. He graduated with honors from University of Alabama School of Medicine in 1978. Having more than 43 years of diverse experiences, Dr. Carl A Barnes affiliates with Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital, cooperates with many other doctors and specialists in medical group Florence Pathology Services LLC. He is a resident at Alton Ochsner Medical Foundation, New Orleans, Louisiana [1]. 1 (https://www.healthcare4ppl.com/physician/alabama/florence/carl-a-barnes-1538134655.html)
Go to Profile#13755
Joel Cunningham
#104209
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (82 years)
Joel Cunningham was the fifteenth vice chancellor of the University of the South and the former president of Susquehanna University. He grew up in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and graduated summa cum laude from the University of Chattanooga in 1965 with majors in mathematics and psychology and completed his master's and doctoral degrees in mathematics from the University of Oregon. Cunningham is a member of the Sigma Chi Fraternity. He began his career in academe as a member of the faculty at the University of Kentucky, where he taught mathematics for five years. He made his first return to Tennesse...
Go to Profile#13756
Daniel S. Mast
#192292
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
#13757
Peter T. Poon
#36907
Overall Influence
Peter T Poon is a scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of the California Institute of Technology , operating for NASA. He had spent 35 plus years in science and space technology. A graduate of Hong Kong University majoring in Physics and Mathematics, in 1965, Poon completed his PhD degree at the University of Southern California. He subsequently also pursued advanced training in the Advanced Project Management Program at Stanford University.
Go to Profile#13758
Fu-Chang Chang
#133008
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (61 years)
Fu-chang Chang is an associate professor at the Graduate Institute of European Studies at Tamkang University in Taiwan. Early life and education Chang was born on April 25, 1965, in Taiwan and obtained his bachelor's degree at the German Department of Soochow University, Taiwan from 1984 to 1988. In 1991 he graduated with a Masters by the Graduate Institute of European Studies at Tamkang University, Taiwan and subsequently served in the army from 1991 to 1993. In 2006 he obtained his Dr. Rer. Pol. at the University of Cologne, Germany.
Go to Profile#13759
Ariana C Brice-Tutt
#192293
Overall Influence
#13760
Christine Reta Arkinstall
#189967
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Christine Reta Arkinstall is a New Zealand academic. She is currently professor of European languages and literature at the University of Auckland. Career After a BA from University of Auckland, Arkinstall obtained a Masters from University of Oviedo in Spain, before returning to Auckland for a PhD entitled 'El sujeto en el exilio: un estudio de la obra poética de Francisco Brines, José Angel Valente y José Manuel Caballero Bonald.' She joined the staff, researching nationhood and gender ideas in Spanish-speaking literatures. Rising to full professor in 2010.
Go to Profile#13761
Roland Reiss
#140772
Overall Influence
1929 - 2020 (91 years)
Roland Reiss was an American artist known for his miniature tableaux and paintings. Early life, education and military service Roland Reiss was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1929, during the Great Depression. He moved with his family at age 13 to Pomona, California. While he attended Pomona High School, he was inspired to become an artist after hearing Millard Sheets speak on art. He later studied art at Mt. San Antonio College and UCLA. He served in the US Army as a Sergeant First Class. After winning a national art price he managed forty artists working at Camp Roberts.
Go to Profile#13762
Sophie Charlotte Schmidt
#192295
Overall Influence
Sophia Schmidt is a prehistoric and computational archaeologist that has been a researcher for the University of Bonn and the University of Cologne. Schmidt also served as a research associate for a project with the German Archaeological Institute. Some of her research interests include statistics, using GIS methods to study settlement archaeology and archaeogaming.
Go to Profile#13763
Willie Birch
#170960
Overall Influence
1942 - Present (84 years)
Willie Birch is an American visual artist who works in a variety of mediums including drawing, painting, and sculpture. Birch was born in New Orleans, and currently lives and works in New Orleans. He completed his BA at Southern University in New Orleans, and received an MFA from Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland.
Go to Profile#13764
Wendy Coburn
#105013
Overall Influence
1963 - 2015 (52 years)
Wendy Coburn was a Canadian artist and professor at the Ontario College of Art and Design University. She is known for her sculptures and for her video-based show "Anatomy of a Protest" . Education Coburn studied at Dundas Valley School of Art and received an associate degree from the Ontario College of Art in 1985. In 1997, she completed her MFA at Concordia University.
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Prannoy Paul
#192297
Overall Influence
#13766
Eboni Edmonson Haynes
#192299
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
#13767
Virginia MacKenny
#138656
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (67 years)
Virginia MacKenny is a South African artist and writer. She is currently an Associate Professor of Painting at Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town in Cape Town, South Africa.
Go to Profile#13768
Phillip C Klahs
#192300
Overall Influence
#13769
Hikmet Vurgun
#188683
Overall Influence
Hikmet Vurgun is a Turkish handball coach, academic for physical education and sports and former handball player. Private life Hikmet Vurgun married Nilgün Akış, also a handball coach, academic and former handball player.
Go to Profile#13770
Sarah F Clatterbuck Soper
#192301
Overall Influence
#13771
Yasurō Abe
#190625
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
Yasurō Abe, is a Japanese academic. Career He is a professor at Nagoya University. He is known for scholarly work in ancient and medieval Japanese manuscripts. Selected works In a statistical overview derived from writings by and about Yasurō Abe, OCLC/WorldCat encompasses roughly 40+ works in 50+ publications in 2 languages and 200+ library holdings. 因緣抄 湯屋の皇后 : 中世の性と聖なるもの 守覚法親王と仁和寺御流の文献学的研究 聖者の推参: 中世の声とヲコなるもの by 阿部泰郎 伝記験記集 類聚神祇本源 by 村松家行 法儀表白集 伊勢神道集 中世先徳著作集 性霊集注 ArticlesChūsei Nanto no shūkyō to geinō: Shinnyoni to Wakamiya miko o megurite. Kokugo to kokubungaku 64.5: 72–85
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Lendley C. Black
#118367
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
Dr. Lendley C. Black is an American educator, author, and academic administrator, currently the Chancellor of the University of Minnesota Duluth. Education Born in Somerville, Tennessee and raised in Memphis, Tennessee, Black has a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of Tennessee at Martin and a Master of Arts degree in theatre from the University of Connecticut. He earned his Ph.D in theatre at the University of Kansas.
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Beth Lo
#78248
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
Beth Lo in Lafayette, Indiana is an American artist, ceramist and educator. Her parents emigrated from China. Lo received a Bachelor of General Studies from the University of Michigan in 1971, and then studied ceramics with Rudy Autio at the University of Montana, receiving her MFA in 1974. She assumed his job as professor of ceramics there when he retired in 1985, and was awarded the University of Montana Provost’s Distinguished Lecturer Award in 2006 and 2010.
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Kyari Mohammed
#114797
Overall Influence
Kyari Mohammed is a Nigerian academic, professor of History, and the Vice Chancellor of the Nigerian Army University Biu, Borno State and the former Vice Chancellor of Moddibo Adama University of Technology , , Adamawa State, and serves as Chair for Peace and Security Studies at the same institution. He began his position as a replacement for Prof. Bashir Usman Hanna. Mohammed is one of Nigeria's leading scholars on the ongoing Boko Haram insurgency and counter insurgency. Now on this day been 26 April 2019, a new Vice Chancellor has been announced in person of Professor Abdullahi Liman Tuku...
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Heather Ahtone
#176998
Overall Influence
heather ahtone, PhD , is director of Curatorial Affairs at the First Americans Museum. Background and education Heather Ahtone is enrolled in the Chickasaw Nation and a descendant of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. She received an associate's degree from the Institute of American Indian Arts in 1993 and her master's degree and doctoral degree from the University of Oklahoma .
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Penny Siopis
#91328
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
Penny Siopis is a South African artist from Cape Town. She was born in Vryburg in the North West province from Greek parents who had moved after inheriting a bakery from Siopis maternal grandfather. Siopis studied Fine Arts at Rhodes University in Makhanda, completing her master's degree in 1976, after which she pursued postgraduate studies at Portsmouth Polytechnic in the United Kingdom. She taught Fine Arts at the Technikon Natal in Durban from 1980 to 1983. In 1984 she took up a lectureship at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. During this time she was also visiting resea...
Go to Profile#13777
Ayodeji Babalola
#192310
Overall Influence
Ayodeji (Ayo) Babalola is a computational geophysicist, and machine learning and software engineer. Babalola received his master’s and PhD in Geophysics from the University of Houston and is currently working toward his MS in Computer Science at Georgia Tech. Babalola has worked as a research geophysicist and software engineer for FracGeo, EarthSystems Technologies, Inc., and is currently a machine learning software engineer for Hewlett Packard Enterprise.
Go to Profile#13778
Wojciech Browarny
#120575
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Wojciech Jan Browarny is a Polish literary scholar, literary critic, regionalist scholar and associate professor at Wrocław University. He works at the Institute of Polish Philology of the University of Wrocław, where he heads the Department of History of Polish Literature after 1918 and the Regional Research Unit.
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Hamid Afaq Qureshi
#139942
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (81 years)
Hamid Afaq Qureshi also known as Hamid Afaq Qureshi Al–Taimi–Al–Qureshi, is a historian Shaikh Siddiqi of Arabic, Persian and Urdu descent. He was born in 1945 in Bijnor, Uttar Pradesh, India. Qureshi studied science at the university level. He joined a scientific organisation in 1965 and retired as a gazetted officer in 2005. During his service, he graduated from Delhi University with an art degree. He received a postgraduate degree in history and political science from the University of Rajasthan, Jaipur. He earned his PhD in history from Lucknow University.
Go to Profile#13780
Dana Shugar
#158990
Overall Influence
1961 - 2000 (39 years)
Dana Renee Shugar was an associate professor of English and Women's Studies at the University of Rhode Island, while also contributing to issues in feminism during her lifetime. She died of cancer in January 2000 at age 38. Shugar received her bachelor's degree in biology and English in 1983 from Augustana College and then her master's degree in 1988 and her Ph.D. in English in 1991 from the University of Iowa. At the University of Rhode Island, Shugar became the first department head of the women's studies major.
Go to Profile#13781
Fran Reed
#142977
Overall Influence
1943 - 2008 (65 years)
Frances Ann Reed was an American fiber artist and teacher based in Alaska who specialized in a distinctive style of basketry made from dried fish skins and other natural materials found in the state.
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Nicole P. Washington
#192316
Overall Influence
Nicki Washington is currently a Professor of the practice of computer science with Duke University, Durham, NC, USA and the author of “Unapologetically Dope: Lessons for Black Women and Girls on Surviving and Thriving in the Tech.” She previously spent nine years with Howard University as the first Black female Faculty Member in the Department of Computer Science. Her professional experience also includes Winthrop University, The Aerospace Corporation, and IBM. Her research interests include cultural competence, computer science education, and broadening participation in computing. She was the first African American woman to receive the Ph.D.
Go to Profile#13783
Richard Wood
#192317
Overall Influence
#13784
Madhavi Sardesai
#82604
Overall Influence
1962 - 2014 (52 years)
Madhavi Sardesai was an Indian academic and the editor of the Konkani literary journal "Jaag". She was also a scholar, publisher and writer who worked mainly in the Konkani language in Goa. She headed the Goa University's Konkani Department. She died on 22 December 2014 after a battle with cancer.
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Norman Akers
#183525
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Norman Akers is a Native American artist known for his landscape works that incorporate cultural, historical and contemporary visuals of Native American life. He is a member of the Osage Nation and currently teaches painting in the Department of Visual Art at the University of Kansas.
Go to Profile#13786
Linzy K. Foster
#192321
Overall Influence
#13787
Emma Smith
#125318
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Emma Smith is Professor of Shakespeare Studies at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of Hertford College. She has published and lectured widely on William Shakespeare and on other early modern dramatists, and worked with numerous theatre companies. Her lectures are available as podcasts Not Shakespeare: Elizabethan and Jacobean Popular Theatre and Approaching Shakespeare.
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Américo Castilla
#159128
Overall Influence
Américo Castilla is an Argentinian artist who is the president and founder of Fundación TyPA. Castilla qualified as a lawyer. He was director of the cultural program of Fundación Antorchas from 1992 to 2003, national director of heritage and museums of Argentina from 2003 to 2007, and director of the National Museum of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires from 2005 to 2007. Castilla also teaches at the National University of La Plata.
Go to Profile#13789
Amanda G Riojas
#192327
Overall Influence
#13790
Reza Roosta Azad
#175002
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Reza Roosta Azad was an Iranian academic who was the chancellor of Sharif University of Technology, serving from 2010 until 2014. Roosta Azad held a BSc from Isfahan University of Technology, a MSc from Istanbul Technical University and a PhD from the University of Waterloo.
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Anatoly Rykov
#52001
Overall Influence
1978 - Present (48 years)
Anatoly Rykov is a Russian art and political theorist, art historian, and professor at Saint Petersburg State University. In his numerous writings, Professor Rykov argues that leftist projects in art and culture often employ repressive and totalitarian concepts and metaphors. He introduced the notion of “radical conservatism” in order to explain this phenomenon in the theoretical matrix of the avant-garde and its postmodern interpretation. He has written on a range of subjects in Renaissance, 18th, 19th and 20th century art.
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Margaret Wileman
#114441
Overall Influence
1908 - 2014 (106 years)
Margaret Annie Wileman was a British academic administrator, lecturer in education, and teacher. From 1953 to 1973, she was Principal of Hughes Hall, Cambridge, and a lecturer in education at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge. She had previously taught at The Abbey School, Reading, and at Queen's College, London; two all-girls private schools. She had also lectured at St Katherine's College, Warrington, and at Bedford College, University of London
Go to Profile#13793
Cacilda Jethá
#192332
Overall Influence
#13794
Iso Camartin
#190067
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (82 years)
Iso Camartin is a Swiss author, publicist and anchorman. Selected works Kants Schematismuslehre und ihre Transformation beim frühen Fichte. Zur Ausformung des Identitätsdenkens. Dissertation, Regensburg 1971Nichts als Worte? Ein Plädoyer für Kleinsprachen. Artemis, Zürich 1985Lob der Verführung. Essays über die Nachgiebigkeit. Artemis, Zürich 1987Karambolagen. Geschichten und Glossen. Artemis, Zürich 1990Von Sils-Maria aus betrachtet. Ausblicke vom Dach Europas. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main 1991Die Bibliothek von Pila. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main 1994Nelke und Caruso. Über Hunde. Eine Romanze .
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Kesler Woodward
#153560
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (75 years)
Kesler Edward "Kes" Woodward is an American artist, art historian and curator. Known for his colorful paintings of northern landscapes, he was awarded the first Alaska Governor's Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Arts in 2004. Woodward has also written extensively on the Art of the circumpolar North and has curated exhibitions which have toured Alaska, California, Oregon, Washington, and Georgia.
Go to Profile#13796
Luís Geraldes
#183169
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
Luís Pereira Geraldes is a contemporary metaphysical Portuguese artist. Though Geraldes is best known for his oil painting, he has also produced sculpture, drawings and large ceramic murals. His art has been labelled as metaphysical, mystic symbolism or spiritual. He has also produced many ceramic murals in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia, some of which are on public display at Trafalgar Street metro station in the suburb of Petersham, and Audley Street in Marrickville, Sydney.
Go to Profile#13797
Mensur Akgün
#113705
Overall Influence
Mensur Akgün is a Turkish professor at Istanbul Kültür University, political analyst, columnist in Turkish daily Star and civil society activist. Early life He finished his bachelor studies at the Middle East Technical University, Ankara in 1981 and received his master's degree from the University of Oslo, Norway in 1987. After finishing his doctoral studies at the Boğaziçi University, Istanbul in 1992, Mensur Akgün started publishing widely in national and international journals and newspapers. In addition to that, he has published a couple of own monographs and co-authored books. He has tra...
Go to Profile#13798
Judy Bolch
#95904
Overall Influence
1942 - Present (84 years)
Dorothy Judith Bolch is an American journalist and the first Houston Harte Chair in Journalism at the University of Missouri. Bolch has won awards for her writing and editing at The Raleigh Times and The News & Observer, both based in Raleigh, NC. She was managing editor/enterprise at The News & Observer in 1997, when she joined the faculty of the University of Missouri and became the first Houston Harte Chair. Until her retirement in September 2008, Bolch was Teaching Editor at the Columbia Missourian, which is staffed by Missouri School of Journalism students who work under the direction of...
Go to Profile#13799
Johan de Vree
#189479
Overall Influence
1938 - 2017 (79 years)
Johan Karel de Vree was a Dutch political scientist, and professor Theory of International Relations at Utrecht University, known for his "scientists" approach to political science. Biography De Vree started the Geodesy study in 1959 at the Delft University of Technology. The next year in 1960 he moved to University of Amsterdam, where he obtained his MA in political and social sciences in 1967. He continued his graduate study and obtained his PhD in 1972 under Hans Daudt with the thesis Political integration: the formation of theory and its problems.
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Megan Crowhurst
#87414
Overall Influence
Megan Jane Crowhurst is an Australian- and Canadian-raised linguist and Professor of Linguistics at the University of Texas at Austin in the United States. Career Crowhurst earned her BA in linguistics at the University of British Columbia and the MA and PhD at the University of Arizona . She has held academic positions at Yale University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and, since 1999, in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Texas at Austin.
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