Carol S. Pearson

Her most recent book, Persephone Rising: Awakening The Heroine Within, published in October 2015, bridges the genres of depth psychology, myth scholarship, and memoir. It draws on archetypal stories from an ancient Greek mystery religion as a guide to thriving today in a world in flux. It concludes with an analysis of narrative intelligence as an important aspect of emotional intelligence that also builds cognitive complexity. In April 2016, Persephone Rising received a gold medal from the Nautilus Book Awards in the category of books for women.

Pearson began her study of archetypal theory and narrative intelligence in the English Department at Rice University, which emphasized the myth/symbol school of literary studies. Later in her career, she earned a Doctor of Ministry degree from Wisdom University (2012), a graduate school originally called the University of Creation Spirituality and now part of Ubiquity University, that explores the progressive mystic traditions in religions throughout the world. She also holds an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Norwich University.

In 2009, Pearson left UMD to take a position as Executive Vice President and Provost at Pacifica Graduate Institute in Carpinteria, California, later becoming the school's President. Pacifica offers graduate degrees in Jungian and archetypal studies, psychology, mythology, and several other fields. Since leaving Pacifica in 2013, Pearson has continued to write, teach, consult, and lead workshops, but has retired from academic leadership.

Pearson's current interests have expanded from exploring archetypes in organizations and individuals to their role in social systems. In 2009, she wrote a monograph for the Fetzer Institute, called Maturing the American Dream, which identified archetypes in U.S. culture and their likely implications for the future. Most recently, Pearson’s blogs and other social media communications have explored the interface between archetypal patterns in individuals and larger social groups as well as more general philosophical and psycho-spiritual issues.

From 2005 to 2009, Pearson served as Director of the James MacGregor Burns Academy of Leadership in the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland. The academy incubated the International Leadership Association, of which she was a member of the board of directors. She also co-led a Leadership for Transformation project, out of which grew her edited volume The Transforming Leader, which was honored by the International Leadership Association at its 2014 global conference for making a significant contribution to the field.

As Pearson moved into leadership positions, she began to explore leadership studies scholarship. She worked at two women's colleges, serving first as Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Goucher College in Towson, MD, and later as Dean of the Mount Vernon Institute at Mount Vernon College in Washington, DC. From 1998 to 2005, Pearson was Senior Editor of The Inner Edge: A Resource for Enlightened Business Practice, published bi-monthly by InnoVision Communications, and then the Director of the Transformational Leadership Certificate Program at the Center for Professional Development at Georgetown University. During this period, she also was President of Meristem, a nonprofit education and training organization.

In addition to such books written for the general public, Pearson has made contributions to the fields of education, marketing and branding, organizational development, and leadership through publications such as Educating the Majority: Women Challenge Tradition in Higher Education, co-editors, Donna L. Shavlik and Judith G. Touchton (1989); The Hero and the Outlaw: Building Extraordinary Brands Through the Power of Archetypes, co-author, Margaret Mark (2001); Mapping the Organizational Psyche: A Jungian Theory of Organizational Dynamics and Change, co-author, John G. Corlett (2004); and The Transforming Leader: New Approaches to Leadership for the Twenty-First Century (2012).

Pearson is best known as the author of The Hero Within: Six Archetypes We Live By (1986, 1989, 1998), which was a HarperSanFrancisco best-seller, followed by the more expansive Awakening the Heroes Within: Twelve Archetypes to Help Us Find Ourselves and Transform Our World (1991). With the assistance of Hugh Marr, she co-created the Pearson-Marr Archetype Indicator (PMAI), published by the Center for Applications of Psychological Type (CAPT), to help people better understand their motivations, their unconscious assumptions, and the narratives they think, tell, and live.

Pearson's academic career began with a series of faculty positions in the 1970s. First hired as an assistant professor in the English Department at the University of Colorado, she was selected as the founding director of the CU Women Studies Program and was instrumental in developing Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, one of the earliest academic journals in the field. She subsequently was recruited to be the first director of the Women’s Studies Program at the University of Maryland, College Park, where she negotiated to bring the offices of the National Women's Studies Association and the journal Feminist Studies to the campus.

Pearson was born in Chicago in 1944, the eldest child of Thelma (Widman) and John A. Pearson. At the age of two, she moved with her family to Houston, Texas, where she attended public schools and later Rice University, from which she received a BA (1966), MA, (1968), and PhD (1970). She has one younger sibling, John Douglas Pearson. She is married to David R. Merkowitz, a political and public affairs consultant, and has two step-children, Jeffrey Merkowitz, who works at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and Stephen Merkowitz, a gravitational physicist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, and a daughter, Shanna Pearson-Merkowitz, a political science professor at the University of Rhode Island, as well as six grandchildren.