Joseph Robert Shoenfield

Joseph Robert Shoenfield (May 1, 1927, in Detroit, Michigan – November 15, 2000, in Durham, North Carolina) was an American mathematical logician.

Shoenfield obtained his PhD in 1953 with Raymond Louis Wilder at the University of Michigan (Models of formal systems).

From 1952, he lectured at Duke University, where he remained until becoming emeritus in 1992. From 1970 to 1973 he was president of the mathematics faculty. In 1956/57 he was at the Institute for Advanced Study. Shoenfield worked on recursion theory, model theory and axiomatic set theory. His textbook on mathematical logic has become a classic.

From 1972 to 1976 he was president of the Association for Symbolic Logic. He delivered the Gödel Lecture at the 1992 meeting of the ASL.

In his student days, Schoenfield was a contract bridge player. He was an early member of the American Go Association; the memorial tournament in North Carolina was founded in his memory.

• Mathematical Logic, Addison Wesley 1967, 2nd edition, Association for Symbolic Logic, 2001
• Degrees of unsolvability, North Holland Mathematical Studies 1971
• Recursion theory, Springer 1993