Professor Robert Stern - Former Member of Staff

Born in Norwich in 1962, Bob Stern completed his BA and PhD at St John’s College, Cambridge before joining the academic staff at Sheffield in 1989. He spent the subsequent 34 years of his career working in the University's School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities, retiring on grounds of ill health in 2023.

In that time, Bob played an enormous part in the life of the department. He was much loved and respected by colleagues, students and visitors, while sustaining an international reputation as a leading scholar in his field.

Bob was well known for his work in the history of philosophy in particular: 19th-century Kantian and post-Kantian German philosophy, and especially Hegel. More recently, he was instrumental in bringing the previously little-known Danish philosopher K. E. Løgstrup to wider prominence.

Aftr joining Sheffield, Bob published books on Hegel, Kant and the Structure of the Object (1990); Transcendental Arguments and Scepticism: Answering the Question of Justification (2000); The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Hegel and the Phenomenology of Spirit (2002/2013); Hegelian Metaphysics (2009); Understanding Moral Obligation: Kant, Hegel, Kierkegaard (2011); Kantian Ethics: Value, Agency, and Obligation (2015); and The Radical Demand in Løgstrup's Ethics (2019).

Alongside his many other collected volumes and articles, Bob's academic writing formed an influential and highly respected body of work spanning epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and political philosophy.

He is cited as 'one of the leading British philosophers of his generation' in an obituary written for The Guardian, and was recently remembered by a former student as 'the kindest soul I have encountered in my life...with Bob out of the room, the spark seemed to vanish together with his slightly mischievous smile.'

Bob is one of the main reasons I came to Sheffield, and it’s been a blast - so many fabulous memories, and professionally I really enjoyed taking part in a number of the God and the Good events that Bob organised in the Cathedral.

When I arrived in 2012 Bob was largely running philosophy in the UK (along with Sheffield colleagues Jenny Saul and Miranda Fricker), while also expanding his own expertise. At no point during his rise to power and eminence did he ever cease to be the cheerful, kind-hearted, witty, stimulating and loyal friend.

Bob, thank you for all you have done for philosophy in this Department, Faculty, University, country and world.  But, above all, thank you for being Bob the Man.

Angie Hobbs

Former colleague in the School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities

Bob served as Head of Department; editor of the European Journal of Philosophy; editor of the Bulletin of the Hegel Society of Great Britain; President of the Hegel Society of Great Britain; and President of the British Philosophical association. He was elected as a Fellow of the British Academy in 2019, and was also President of the Aristotelian Society, and Chair of the Philosophy section of the last REF panel.

Renowned as a huge Bob Dylan fan - and a driving force behind the Philosphy Rocks! concert series at Sheffield - Bob Stern has long been cherished by his department and wider University community as wonderful teacher, supervisor, mentor, colleague and friend. (You can read more from those who knew him at each of those links.)

He will be enormously missed, and our thoughts are with his family and many good friends - particularly his wife Crosby and their children, Adam and Lucy.