Barbara Aronstein Black

Who is Barbara Aronstein Black?

Barbara Aronstein Black is an American legal scholar. She was the first woman to head an Ivy League law school. when she became Dean of Columbia Law School in 1986. Black is George Wellwood Murray Professor of Legal History at Columbia.

Black received her B.A. from Brooklyn College in 1953, her LL.B. from Columbia Law School in 1955, and a Ph.D. from Yale University in 1975. Black was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1989. She was also for two years president of the American Society for Legal History. Black's work has been concentrated in the area of contracts and legal history. She is a recipient of the Elizabeth Blackwell Award and of the Federal Bar Association Prize of Columbia Law School.

Barbara Black is the widow of constitutional scholar and civil rights pioneer Charles Black, with whom she had three children.