LA JOLLA, California (SDJW)– Prof. Sanford “Sandy” Lakoff, the founding chairman of UC San Diego’s political science department and a $2 million benefactor of Brandeis University where he did his undergraduate work, has died at age 92, San Diego Jewish World has learned.
Death came Sept. 25 while surrounded by members of his family. Survivors include his wife Deborah Miller Lakoff, and these Lakoff-surnamed family members: his brother George, nephew Andrew, and grand-nieces Natalia and Paloma.
Born in 1931 in Bayonne, New Jersey, Lakoff was an outstanding student at Brandeis University, where he was a Phi Beta Kappa and a recipient of the Behr and Richter Prizes and later was named an outstanding alumnus.
Having been a member of Brandeis University’s second graduating class, Lakoff later said that he enjoyed “a very fulfilling, exciting college experience” while majoring in politics and serving as editor of The Justice, a campus publication named for Supreme Court Associate Justice Louis Brandeis. The school attracted other distinguished jurists as lecturers, including Supreme Court Associate Justices William O. Douglas and Felix Frankfurter. A treat for Lakoff, who would become an active participant in San Diego’s Jewish community, was attending a lecture by David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, on the founding of the Jewish state.
“Originally,” according to an article by Abigail Klingbeil at Brandeis University, Lakoff said he was “thinking about a career in journalism but the Brandeis faculty was so good they really opened my eyes, especially to the social sciences.” The arts also appealed to him. A poetry series introduced him to W. H. Auden and Dylan Thomas and interest in music brought him into contact with conductor/ composer Leonard Bernstein.
Later in life Lakoff served on Brandeis University’s Board of Fellows and when he gave the $2 million gift to Brandeis, it was without strings. “As an academic myself, I don’t like the idea of tying the university’s hands,” he explained.
Lakoff studied at Harvard University for his doctorate, winning the Bowdoun Prize and being accepted as a junior faculty member at that Ivy League institution. He subsequently served as a full professor at Stony Brook University and at the University of Toronto before migrating in 1974 to the then start-up University of California San Diego.
Under Lakoff’s leadership, the political science department established undergraduate and graduate degree program and recruited many faculty members.
Lakoff authored a number of books including Equality in Political Philosophy; Democracy: History, Theory and Practice; Max Lerner: Pilgrim in the Promised Land; Strategic Defense in the Nuclear Age and Ten Ideas that have Shaped the Modern World. He also coauthored other books and served as an editor of still more.
Lakoff served on the board of the World Affairs Council of San Diego for many years, and was a frequent lecturer on international relations at a variety of venues including numerous Jewish community organizations. He was a “go-to” source for reporters when international crises erupted, particularly in the Middle East.
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San Diego Jewish World staff report.
Upon retirement, Lakoff became the Edward A. Dickson Professor Emeritus of Political Science at UC San Diego.
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