YDN: Humanities Grant Winners Launch Projects

September 20, 2017

Rachel Treisman Sep 20, 2017

In its first year, the 320 York Humanities Programming Endowment is funding three interdisciplinary projects that aim to bring together students and faculty members from across the University to engage with various topics in the humanities.

The endowment, which was created in 2016 through an anonymous $50 million gift, is also funding the transformation of the Hall of Graduate Studies into a hub for the humanities at Yale. The three faculty-led projects are the Yale Environmental Humanities Initiative, “3000 Years of Mexican Feasting” and “Black Sound and the Archive.” The inaugural cohort of grant winners, who were selected from 12 proposals in the spring, have already begun working on their two-year projects.

Faculty members interviewed said the grant is an indication of the University’s continued focus on the humanities, even in the midst of institutional efforts to strengthen the sciences.

“[The grant] seeks to support ambitious collaborative projects in the humanities, ones that might not otherwise garner support from traditional campus funding sources,” said grant winner Paul Sabin ’92, a history professor and the director of undergraduate studies for Environmental Studies. “The 320 York Humanities Grant program particularly aims to support initiatives that bridge teaching and research, and that connect many members of the community from across different departments and programs.”

Sabin helped spearhead the Yale Environmental Humanities Initiative, which aims to advance teaching and research at the intersection of the environment and humanities.

Since receiving the grant in May, Sabin said the initiative has already hosted an interdisciplinary conference featuring doctoral student presentations, created a new website, launched a weekly newsletter to publicize the over 30 events planned for the fall semester, organized two fall panels on the environmental humanities and created both a new graduate course for the spring and a graduate student working group.

“By launching the Environmental Humanities Initiative, we are asserting the importance of humanities perspectives to interpreting and giving meaning to the rapidly changing world around us,” Sabin said.

Read the full article at Yale Daily News.