Joseph Wozniak
Fall 2026 John Jay Fellow
Hometown: Turnersville, NJ
College: M.A. Georgetown University; B.A. Stockton University
Major: Government; Political Science
Joe Wozniak was raised near the outskirts of the New Jersey Pine Barrens. Always captivated by its mystique, he remained close to his hometown and graduated from Stockton University, where he had formative experiences that broadened his intellectual horizons such as reading The Odyssey for a class for military-affiliated students and later visiting Homeric sights such as Ithaki.
During his time at Stockton, Joe also had the opportunity to travel to Germany for a Model United Nations trip. Afterwards, he spent two years living, working, and studying in Washington, D.C. while earning a M.A. in Government from Georgetown University. While in D.C., Joe interned for both the National Taxpayers Union and the Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for National Defense.
Joe’s intellectual interests center on the Catholic response to the dislocation brought about by modernity, particularly as it relates to the fields of politics and aesthetics. He is especially interested in Europe in the interwar period and the efforts of postwar statesmen such as Konrad Adenauer. Joe particularly admires Adenauer’s task of attempting to recover Germany upon the spiritual and moral foundations of Christianity while confronting the encroaching paradigm of mass society and its materialistic values. Among his intellectual lodestars include Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI, Hannah Arendt, Camille Paglia and Jacques Maritain.
Joe increasingly believes that his vocation lies within the Fine Arts. His plan after the John Jay Fellowship is to apply for an MFA in Painting at the New York Academy of Art, with the goal of influencing the cultural discourse through a wide range of mediums. His artistic interests range from artists in the Italo-Byzantine tradition to the baroque of Caravaggio and the 19th century academism of Ary Scheffer. For Joe, the recovery of artistic tradition is not merely an aesthetic project, but part of a broader effort to recover beauty, form, and meaning.
Joe’s work has appeared in publications such as The Federalist, The Daily Signal, and the Cracks in Postmodernity substack. In his free time, he likes to draw, workout, swim, read philosophy and listen to Eurodance music. An American patriot, he has six years of honorable service with the New Jersey Army National Guard, separating as part of the ‘E-4 Mafia’. As a John Jay Fellow, Joe hopes to mature spiritually, intellectually and morally while living together within a community devoted to merciful Christ.