Jyrki Nummi
Humanist of the day

Jyrki Nummi

Professor Jyrki Nummi has always been drawn to intellectually independent and distinctive personalities at the University. In the 1970s, when stepping into the small smoking room in the canteen of the Main Building one could chance on the philosopher Pertti ‘Lande’ Lindfors having a beer and hear first-hand the famous ‘Lande paradox.’ This was the alternative teaching of the day, which surpassed drier and dustier courses.

Jyrki Nummi

Jyrki Tapio Nummi
Born February 9, 1953, Helsinki

Master of Arts 1980, Licentiate 1985, PhD 1993 (comparative literature and aesthetics), University of Helsinki

Professor of Finnish Literature 2003–, University of Helsinki
Research Fellow, 1999, 2000-03, Academy of Finland
Lecturer in Finnish Language 1989–2003, Helsinki Institute of Technology
Visiting professor of Finnish language and literature 1987–88, Indiana University

Research themes:
(Historical) poetics, the study of the canon, modernism and genre, research on the works of, inter alia, Väinö Linna, Aleksis Kivi and Juhani Aho

Publications, projects and other academic activity

Research and development projects:
Critical Editions of the Works of Aleksis Kivi (2010–)
Suomalainen klassikkokirjasto ( ‘Library of Finnish classics’) – electronic infrastructure (2010–)

Awards:
Annual award of students of Finnish literature: “Blunder of the year in a lecture,” 2011

Written by  Jyrki Nummi (Kaija Hartikainen, ed.)
Photo: Sasa Tkalcan
Translated by Matthew Billington

Additional roles

As a professor at the University of Helsinki, one is dragged, against one’s inclinations, into all kinds of administrative and expert roles and positions of responsibility, starting from that of teaboy at alumni events. The Suomalainen klassikkokirjasto (‘Library of Finnish Classics’) project, begun at the behest of the Rector, and…

Read more