Approximately 30 faculty gathered in Fleming Museum’s Marble Court last Thursday to catch up on what’s new with the university’s reinvigorated Humanities Center and, very importantly, meet one another. It was somewhere between a mixer and academic speed dating when Professor Luis Vivanco, the program’s co-director together with Professor David Jenemann, asked the guests to find someone they didn’t know already and take three minutes (time signaled with a cow bell) to introduce themselves, their disciplines, and a sense of their research interests. 

Forging connections and collaborative relationships between art historians and philosophers, English professors and religion professors, and myriad other combinations within the core humanities disciplines and beyond those borders is a central goal for the Humanities Center. Toward that end, the directors announced a new program, Cultivating Multi-Disciplinary Collegial Networks. The program will offer financial support (up to $750) to facilitate collaboration among small groups of faculty interested in exploring central themes that connect their work.

Another new initiative, the Lattie F. Coor Collaborative Fellowships, “will support the formation of one multi-disciplinary cohort of up to five UVM faculty members to examine issues of pressing concern in the humanities and fine arts.” Each cohort will have one Organizing Fellow (funded with $2,500) and up to four Collaborative Fellows ($2,000 each). In addition, the group as a whole will be provided with $2,500 for collective activities.

Next on the Humanities Center's calendar is a Nov. 12 event held in partnership with Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger; together they invite Burlington residents, the UVM community, and all interested to join in the Mayor's Book Group discussion of An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties, and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by Todd S. Purdum. Mayor Weinberger will be joined by Professors Emily Bernard and Alec Ewald, Fletcher Free Library Director Rubi Fox, and other special guests for a city-wide discussion of this engaging account of a pivotal moment in American history. The event will take place at 5 p.m. in North Lounge, Billings, on the UVM campus.

The Humanities Center will purchase books for the first 200 participants. If you are interested in joining the discussion, contact David Jenemann, co-director of the Humanities Center at david.jenemann@uvm.edu.