INSTITUTE FOR THE HUMANITIES Annual Report
20 20
200 21
Photo: Alan Karchmer
DeVille Visual Artist New York City + New Jersey
“After the state-sanctioned murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, the art world was
"We don't need normal. We need to be thinking about what we've learned in the last 14 months."
TABLE OF CONTENTS Letter from the Director 2021 Poetry Blast
4
Art and Activism Inaugural Event In-Between the World and Dreams
9
6 10
History, Memory, Forgetting, and Social Justice 12 Faculty Fellows 13 The Connectivity of Connectedness 14 Graduate Student Fellows
15
Regaining a Sense of Academic Purpose 16 Summer Fellows 17 Gallery 18 Daisy Chain
20
Notes on an Exhibition in a Pandemic: Yasmine Nasser Diaz 23 Passionate About the Humanities 24 The Humanities at Work 25 Curating Scholarship Workshop 26 Support 28 Affiliates and Staff About the Institute
On the cover: In-Between the World and Dreams by Ibrahim Mahama
29 30
dear friends, What a strange year. At the Institute for the Humanities, we’ve been grateful for institutional security, but we’ve missed the vibrancy of our busy office, the presence of our fellows in their office and in our halls, and the in-person programs that draw people into our space.
LETTER
from the director
The Institute’s 2020-21 programs and exhibitions were organized under the rubric of “Shelter.” We wanted to explore the security of taking shelter and the precarity of losing it, recognizing that not all shelters are safe, and that the places that shelter us have complex histories. Our Gallery featured artists’ visions of structures, rooms, and shelters, and all of our exhibitions were either outside, like the stunning installation by Ibrahim Mahama on the exterior of the U-M Museum of Art, or visible from the sidewalk. Artist talks were virtual, and we created video introductions to the artists and their works that allowed classes to engage with the exhibitions from a distance. You can read more about the year’s exhibitions in the pages that follow. We normally begin each academic year by welcoming the Institute’s new cohort of faculty and graduate student fellows. This year we were all working remotely, of course, and our welcome was virtual. We all missed the informal interactions that enliven the fellowship year, but our weekly seminar was no less vibrant and engaging than in the past. Our eight faculty and eight graduate student fellows created a virtual space of exchange that was both rigorous and supportive, and they brought a wide range of research interests to our conversations. The 2020-21 fellowship group was highly interdisciplinary and included creative writers along with scholars from literature, history, anthropology, philosophy, architecture,
4
cultural studies, and critical science studies. The fellows studied acoustic environments, biomedical practices, queer modernist narratives, and forms of resistance and co-optation. They led us in explorations of the visual logics of slavery, Redface performances in American theatre, art and ethnicity in China, the politics of architecture in Pinochet’s Argentina, and the ways that voice makes meaning in lyric poetry. We learned about labor practices in archeological excavations, disease and waterways in Haiti, Kant’s thinking about prejudice, nineteenth-century men’s fashion, and the politics of mourning in Israel and Palestine. Fellows shared their work in a variety of forms: a short story set in the Arab community of Dearborn, a website that documents police murders in Detroit, a set of poems. Their diverse methods included ethnography, analyses of literature and performance, archival research, and even
the analysis of brainwaves. Shared questions and concerns emerged over the course of the year, but so did differences, and the mix of disciplinary and methodological positions in our group resulted in rich and productive discussions. I remain very grateful to our fellows for their patience with the online format and for their willingness to engage so generously and thoughtfully with online exchange.
stories, poems, musical compositions, websites, and exhibitions that result are an eloquent testimony to the value of this unique opportunity.
Our fellows are the intellectual heart of the Institute. We are able to fund eight faculty and eight graduate students every academic year, and for the past three years we have funded eight summer fellows in partnership with the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts. I am immensely grateful to the donors who make our fellowship programs possible. Their generosity offers Michigan faculty and graduate students dedicated time for research, a lively intellectual community, and a space for sustained interdisciplinary exchange. The dissertations, books, artworks, articles,
With very best wishes,
After more than a year of confinement in which many have experienced loss and pain, I dare to hope that our future holds resilience and renewed connection. I also hope that we might see many of you—in person!—in the coming year.
–Peggy McCracken, director, Mary Fair Croushore Professor of the Humanities
5
2021 POETRY BLAST
April is National Poetry Month, the largest literary celebration in the world. This year we joined the tens of millions of students, teachers, readers, librarians, booksellers, publishers, families, and, of course, poets, in marking poetry’s important place in our lives. Our goal was for everyone in our community to read a poem, write a poem, or listen to a poem in April. Why? As editor and teacher Alice Osborn said, “Poetry is like the Windex on a grubby car window—it bares open the vulnerabilities of human beings so we can all relate to each other a little better.” With “Poetry Blast” we wanted to saturate the campus and surrounding streets with poetry. Because of pandemic restrictions, we weren’t able to organize in-person events or even assume that people could enter campus buildings, so we focused on virtual and outdoor spaces (see p. 8), as well as outdoor advertising that included the marquee at the Big House (Go Blue!), street pole banners on campus, and advertisements on the outside of the buses that circulate through Washtenaw County. It was a huge success and plans are underway to repeat the event next year, and to include undergraduate students in the planning and execution of our celebration of National Poetry Month.
6
POETRY BLAST 2021 EVENTS NOON POEMS Every weekday at noon in April, our YouTube channel featured a U-M faculty poet reading one of their poems. A huge thank you goes to the 22 faculty who broke out their phones and recorded themselves reading one of their poems: Scott Beal, Ruth Behar, Darcy Brandel, Sumita Chakraborty, Hannah Ensor, Lorna Goodison, Laurence Goldstein, Linda Gregerson, Nick Harp, Tung Hui Hu, A. Van Jordan, Laura Kasischke, Petra Kuppers, Khaled Mattawa, Christopher Matthews, Raymond McDaniel, Sarah Messer, Benjamin Paloff, Molly Spencer, Keith Taylor, Cody Walker, and H.R. Webster. 8
PROMPT A POEM!—A DAILY APRIL POETRY CHALLENGE Creative expression through poetry for everyone! Every weekday in April, people from all walks of life united behind a common prompt by writing a poem. Many thanks to Laura Kasischke for creating the prompts. Prompt a Poem was inspired by the 2020 Life/Lines project at the Center for the Humanities at Washington University. POP-UP POEMS Stroll around campus and read a poem! We teamed up with Michigan Quarterly Review to make poetry part of the campus landscape. Poems were posted all over campus in windows and on the diag. For those wanting to make a night of it, we also created a Central Campus Poetry Blast Walking Tour, a poem-by-poem guide to the pop-up poems on central campus. Learn more and read the poems at lsa.umich.edu/humanities/programs/ 2021-poetry-blast-.html –Stephanie Harrell, marketing and communications manager
ART AND ACTIVISM INAUGURAL EVENT ABOUT THE PARTICIPANTS ERIC HÖWELER, AIA, LEED AP, is associate professor in architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and a co-founding principal of Höweler + Yoon Architecture LLP, a research-driven, multidisciplinary design studio working between architecture, art, and media. ETO OTITIGBE is a polymedia artist whose interdisciplinary practice investigates the intersections of race, power, and technology. He is the director of the Turnbull Townhouse Gallery in New York and assistant professor and head of sculpture at Brooklyn College.
“Designing the Memorial to Enslaved Laborers at the University of Virginia” The University of Virginia—designed by Thomas Jefferson and now recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site—was built and maintained by 4000 or more enslaved men, women, and children. UVA’s powerful new Memorial to Enslaved Laborers honors the lives, labors, and resistance of the enslaved people who lived and worked at UVA between 1817 and 1865. The Institute’s inaugual Art and Activism event was formatted as an interview with members of the memorial’s design team, explored the creation of the Memorial to Enslaved Laborers. “I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation,” reported Kristin Hass, associate professor of American culture who served as the interviewer. ”I was flooded
with emails—even stopped by people on the street—expressing excitement about the conversation and praise for the format and the framing of the event.” This virtual event took place in February. It is the first in a series of annual Art and Activism lectures as part of High Stakes Art, a multi-year project designed to enhance exhibitions and programming at the Institute for the Humanities Gallery and made possible by a generous grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. View the archived event here: https:// myumi.ch/QA93e
This project was supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. 9
MABEL O. WILSON is the Nancy and George Rupp Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, a professor in African American and African diasporic studies, director of the Institute for Research in African American Studies, and co-director of the Global Africa Lab at Columbia University. J. MEEJIN YOON, AIA FAAR, is dean of Architecture, Art, Planning at Cornell University and is co-founding principle of Höweler + Yoon Architecture. KRISTIN HASS is associate professor of American culture and faculty coordinator for the Humanities Collaboratory at the University of Michigan. Her fields of study include visual culture, material culture, museum studies, memory, and 20th-century cultural history.
Engaging with the Arts in a Public Space
IN-BETWEEN THE WORLD AND DREAMS For several weeks during the 2020 fall semester, staff at the Institute for the Humanities spent hours stitching together hundreds of large jute sacks under the direction of artist-in-residence Ibrahim Mahama. Installed in early September, the resulting massive, quilt-like panels were used to cover 4,452 square feet of the exterior of the U-M Museum of Art to create one of the spectacular architectural interventions Mahama is known for. It was an exhibition of firsts. It was the first time that the artist, who has been connecting with staff via Zoom appointments and phone calls from his home in Ghana, was not on site to install his exhibition or see it in person. He performed his traditional artist-in-residence duties from afar as well, which included teaching a virtual class and participating in virtual events.
In-Between the World and Dreamsat the U-M Museum of Art
10
Staff and volunteers transport the stitched sacks.
Staff stitch together jute sacks on Ingalls Mall.
The project also marked the first outdoor exhibition of Mahama’s work in the United States. It was part of a multi-venue presentation that also included an installation at the U-M Institute for the Humanities Gallery that could be viewed (and heard) from a sidewalk window, as well as an installation inside the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit. Amanda Krugliak, curator of the Institute for the Humanities Gallery, started planning for an exhibition with Mahama during his trip to Ann Arbor as a 2019 Penny Stamps Speaker series presenter. They pivoted planning for the project after Michigan’s stay-at-home orders were announced earlier that year. Due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, Mahama couldn’t be in Ann Arbor for the installation as originally planned, but decided to move forward with the help of Krugliak and other collaborators at the Institute. “When plans shifted in March, we did not know if he’d be able to be here, so this entire project involved a great deal of trust from the artist, and we’re grateful that he worked with all of us to make this happen,” Krugliak said. “It is really significant that we did this in a moment when everything seemed impossible—and when we were going through a series of crises. “I believe that this piece in particular acknowledges this in a very public way that the Institute, museum and university are committed to racial equity and the value of labor and what can be accomplished together, even with our challenges.”
Mahama’s artistic practice illustrates, as he explains, how art education, art and cultural opportunities “allow for people to find new ways to acquire knowledge, not only of themselves, but their histories and the places and spaces in which they find themselves.”
Mahama creates public art by repurposing materials to explore themes of commodity, migration, globalization and economic exchange. In-Between the World and Dreams, the title of the exhibition that was spelled out in neon lights as part of the exterior installation, incorporated jute sacks—synonymous with the trade markets of Ghana where he lives and works—as a raw material. For his U-M installations, which took six months to plan and dozens of hours of measuring and sewing on site, he incorporated materials from his prior seminal works over the last decade that served as a retrospective. They were shipped to Ann Arbor from Los Angeles, New York and Venice, Italy. Mahama generally works collaboratively with his community to complete the extensive sewing of the sacks required in preparation for his projects—a process he entrusted to Krugliak and her small team at the Institute who worked in observance of COVID-19 protocols and social distancing guidelines. 11
Enveloping the contours of a museum building or wall, the blankets of jute fibers are meant to contrast with the monumentality of the institutional buildings and spaces they cover, becoming remnants and traces that reference the hands of laborers, the imprints of colonialism and the interference of Britain and the U.S. in Ghanaian history. In-Between the World and Dreams was responsive to the moment and offered students and the broader community the opportunity to engage with the arts in a public space at a time when gatherings inside buildings and museums were limited. “In a pivotal year defined by COVID-19, worldwide protests in support of Black Lives Matter, climate change and our U.S. presidential election in the balance, Ibrahim Mahama’s work offered a visual opportunity to witness and reflect—it was both personal and universal, global and close to home,” Krugliak said. “The work exemplified our deep connections and responsibilities to one another, interwoven, and the potential for empowerment through the arts. It acknowledged troubling past histories while, at the same time, offering hopefulness towards building new futures together.” This exhibition was supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
JASON YOUNG
2020-21 RICHARD AND LILLIAN IVES FACULTY FELLOW
interview
history, memory, forgetting, and social justice This interview was part of “What I’m Reading This Week,” a series of fellows interviews conducted by 2020-21 marketing and media intern Nathaniel Liebetreau. See p. 24 for our interview with Nathaniel. Jason Young is a 2020-21 Richard and Lillian Ives Faculty Fellow at the Institute for the Humanities. He is the author of Rituals of Resistance: African Atlantic Religion in Kongo and the Lowcountry Region of Georgia and South Carolina in the Era of Slavery. He is also the co-editor, with Edward J. Blum, of The Souls of W.E.B. Du Bois: New Essays and Reflections. This collection addresses the much neglected soulful side of the man whose most famous work was about the souls of black folk. Young has published articles in The Journal of African American History, The Journal of Africana Religions, and The Journal of Southern Religion, among others. He is currently conducting research toward his next book project, “To Make the Slave Anew”: Art, History and the Politics of Authenticity.
N.L.: HELLO JASON, THANK YOU FOR DOING THIS INTERVIEW. TO START US OFF, WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN READING RECENTLY? AND HOW IS THIS RELEVANT TO YOUR PROJECT IF IT’S PROJECT RELATED? J.Y.: Thanks so much for reaching out to me on this. I have been reading two books recently, one that is informing my approach to teaching and another that is related to my research. In light of the changed and changing landscape of teaching, I have been reading Mary Cappello’s book Lecture, which reads both as a defense of the traditional academic lecture as well as an urgent call for change. Although the book was written before the pandemic, it was released shortly after COVID-19 necessitated a major overhaul in how we think about pedagogy. In this way, the book feels eerily timely and prescient. My time at the humanities Institute will be devoted to completing my book manuscript To Make the Slave Anew, a study of the varied and often controversial ways that powerful myth makers in the South memorialized the slave past some fifty years after the end of the Civil War. I have recently been drawn to Reiko Hillyer’s Designing Dixie, a fascinating study of how city Continued on page 27
12
faculty
FELLOWS
GHASSAN ABOUZEINEDDINE
LINDA GREGERSON
BETHANY HUGHES
MATTHEW LASSITER
ANA MARÍA LEÓN
JANUM SETHI
ANNA WATKINS FISHER
JASON YOUNG
NORMAN AND JANE KATZ FACULTY FELLOW, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, ENGLISH, U-M DEARBORN “Adventures in Dearborn”
CHARLES P. BRAUER FACULTY FELLOW; ASSISTANT PROFESSOR; HISTORY OF ART, ROMANCE LANGUAGES AND LITERATURES, ARCHITECTURE “NO SMALL ACTS: CounterInstitutions in Brazil, Chile, and Argentina, 1959-1983”
JOHN RICH FACULTY FELLOW, PROFESSOR, ENGLISH “’Saint Sorry’, a Collection of Poems”
HUNTING FAMILY FACULTY FELLOW, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, AMERICAN CULTURE “Redface: Race, Performance, and Indigeneity”
HELMUT F. STERN FACULTY FELLOW, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, AMERICAN CULTURE “Resistance in an Age of Inevitability”
STEELCASE FACULTY FELLOW, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, PHILOSOPHY “Kant on Prejudice and Communication”
13
HUNTING FAMILY FACULTY FELLOW; PROFESSOR; HISTORY, URBAN AND REGIONAL PLANNING “Deadly Force: Documenting and Mapping Police Violence and Misconduct in Detroit”
RICHARD AND LILLIAN IVES FACULTY FELLOW, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, HISTORY “‘To Make the Slave Anew’: Art, History and the Politics of Authenticity”
V KOSKI-KARRELL
2020-21 RICHARD AND LILLIAN IVES GRADUATE FELLOW
interview
the connectivity of connectedness This interview was part of “What I’m Reading This Week,” a series of fellows interviews conducted by 2020-21 marketing and media intern Nathaniel Liebetreau. See p. 24 for our interview with Nathaniel.
As a queer, nonbinary, Mexican/FinnishAmerican person, V Koski-Karell feels at home in the in-between. V is currently in their seventh year of the U-M Medical Scientist Training Program, where they are completing dual doctoral degrees in medicine and anthropology. During graduate school, they’ve also earned a certificate from the U-M Program in Science, Technology, and Society. Their dissertation project, Following Water: The Poetics of Osmosis in the Wake of Cholera in Haiti, fits within a larger interest into how changes unfold—or what recurs—along membranes marking such alleged binaries as the natural and cultural, human and nonhuman, past and future, ordinary and exceptional, bodies and technology, death and (forms of ) life. When not in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, V lives with their partner and dog in Ann Arbor. N.L.: GOOD MORNING V, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR DOING THIS INTERVIEW. TO START US OFF, WHAT ARE YOU READING THIS WEEK? V.K.K.: This week, I’m (re)reading In the Wake: 14
On Blackness and Being by Christina Sharpe; Arts of Living on a Damaged Planet edited by Anna Tsing, Heather Swanson, Elaine Gan, and Nils Bubandt; and Plastic Water: The Social and Material Life of Bottled Water by Gay Hawkins, Emily Potter, and Kane Race. The three books I’m reading this week in many ways jointly undergird the theoretical arguments of a dissertation chapter I’m writing at the moment. Between 2015-2019, I gathered ethnographic data on the cholera epidemic and burgeoning reverse osmosis water market in Haiti. My forthcoming chapter draws on the comments, reflections, and stories people shared with me to suggest that the outbreak of cholera constitutes and perpetuates in Black lives both an “abyssal beginning” of traumatic loss and an “unfolding event” still haunting the waters that people drink. N.L.: READING OVER PLASTIC WATER: THE SOCIAL AND MATERIAL LIFE OF BOTTLED WATER, IT WAS INFORMATIVE TO LEARN ABOUT HOW WATER BECAME A COMMERCIAL PRODUCT. I CAN SEE HOW YOUR READING CAN COMPLEMENT YOUR THEORETICAL ARGUMENTS FOR YOUR DISSERTATION. ARE TOPICS ON WATER AND Continued on page 27
graduate student
FELLOWS
ALAA ALGARGOOSH
CAITLIN CLERKIN
KATHERINE DIMMERY
JOHN FINKELBERG
YAEL KENAN
V KOSKI-KARELL
MEGH MARATHE
AARON STONE
MARY FAIR CROUSHORE GRADUATE FELLOW, ARCHITECTURE “Aural Architecture as Affect: Understanding the Impact of Mosques’ Acoustics on the Worshipper’s Experience”
SYLVIA ‘DUFFY’ ENGLE GRADUATE FELLOW, COMPARATIVE LITERATURE “States of Mourning: Nationalism and Mourning in Palestinian and Israeli Literatures After 1948”
DAVID AND MARY HUNTING DAVID AND MARY HUNTING GRADUATE FELLOW, CLASSICAL ART AND ARCHAEOLOGY “Hellenistic and Early Parthian Seleucia-on-the-Tigris Revisited”
A. BARTLETT GIAMATTI GRADUATE FELLOW; ASIAN LANGUAGES AND CULTURES, ANTHROPOLOGY “Heartache, and the Contested Ethics of Cultural Survival in Southwest China”
RICHARD & LILLIAN IVES GRADUATE FELLOW, ANTHROPOLOGY “Poetics of Water: DrinkingWater in the Wake of Cholera in Haiti”
RICHARD & LILLIAN IVES GRADUATE FELLOW, INFORMATION “Understanding the Seizure in the Time of Digital Brainwaves”
15
MARY FAIR CROUSHORE GRADUATE FELLOW, HISTORY “Becoming a Man in the Age of Fashion: Gender and Menswear in Nineteenth-Century France”
JAMES A. WINN GRADUATE FELLOW, ENGLISH “Desires for Form: Modernist Narrative and the Shape of Queer Life”
2020 SUMMER FACULTY FELLOW
CAROL TELL
reflection
regaining a sense of academic purpose When I was accepted to the Institute for the Humanities Summer Fellowship (in February 2020), few of us could have imagined what would transpire over the next months. The COVID pandemic sent us all into quarantine. I initially worried about our summer Institute. Rather than spending hours in our cozy Institute offices and meeting weekly over sandwiches around a conference room table, we now were consigned to working together over Zoom. How would we build an effective and supportive community of colleagues in this virtual space? How would we meet our individual work goals, given that our heads were often lost in this overwhelming global crisis? By the time our cohort met virtually for our first meeting, we were all fairly used to video conferencing, and while we missed the camaraderie that naturally forms during inperson interactions—it’s impossible to have side conversations on Zoom—it’s no exaggeration to say that the Institute was a savior, at least for me. It was a moment where we could focus on our academic pursuits, learn about the fascinating work of others, and regain our sense of intellectual purpose. Our cohort—such a marvelous, creative, and interdisciplinary group—was able to jump right into the work at hand. Each week we delved deeply into 16
one another’s projects, which were not just interdisciplinary but also multi-modal—from texts to websites and other digital platforms to film. Peggy McCracken expertly guided us each week, and by the end of the summer I found that this was one of my most meaningful and engaging experiences at the university (and I’ve been here since 2002)—despite the constraints of the pandemic. I learned so much from my colleagues, who quickly and perhaps surprisingly over Zoom, became friends. We all were grateful not just for one another but also for the weekly ritual that forced us out of our isolated selves and back to our collegial, academic selves. What a tremendous, necessary opportunity.
summer
FELLOWS
DAVID CARON
GEORGE HOFFMANN
PAUL JOHNSON
JANE LYNCH
MELANIE MANOS
KELLY MURDOCH-KITT
VEERENDRA PRASAD
CAROL TELL
PROFESSOR, FRENCH “Think Strange: Transnational Queer Cinema and the Poetics of Personhood”
LECTURER II, ART AND DESIGN “Visualizing Women’s Work”
PROFESSOR, HISTORY AND AFROAMERICAN AND AFRICAN STUDIES “Architectures of Presence”
PROFESSOR, FRENCH “What Westworld Tells Us about Being Human”
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, ART AND DESIGN “ORBIT: Designing Intercultural Collaborations”
LECTURER II; FILM, TELEVISION, AND MEDIA “Unscripted Films in Uncontrolled Environments”
17
LECTURER III, RESIDENTIAL COLLEGE “Keeping ‘Idle Hands’ Busy: Ethical Subjects in the History of India’s Craft Industries”
LECTURER II, ENGLISH, SWEETLAND WRITING PROGRAM, LLOYD HALL SCHOLARS PROGRAM “’I’ll Eat You Up, I Love You So’: Conflicting Renderings of Eating in Childhood”
IN-BETWEEN THE WORLD AND DREAMS Ibrahim Mahama
GALLERY
Innovative exhibitions and arts programming
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Ibrahim Mahama is an internationally known Ghanaian artist and director of the Savan nah Center for the Arts in Tamale, Ghana. Mahama uses the transformation of materials to explore themes of commodity, migration, globalisation and economic exchange. Often made in collaboration with others, his large-scale installations employ materials gathered from urban environments, such as remnants of wood, or jute sacks which are stitched together and draped over architectural structures. Mahama’s interest in material, process and audience first led him to focus on jute sacks that are synonymous with the trade markets of Ghana where he lives and works. Fabricated in South East Asia, the sacks are imported by the Ghana Cocoa Boards to transport cocoa beans and eventually end up as multi-functional objects, used for the transportation of food, charcoal and other commodities. “You find different points of aesthetics within the surface of the sacks’ fabric,” Mahama has said. “I am interested in how crisis
In-Between The World and Dreams by Ibrahim Mahama at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History.
18
Immigrant Song, 2020 a part of Results or Roses by Sarah Rose Sharp.
and failure are absorbed into this material with a strong reference to global transaction and how capitalist structures work.” ABOUT THE EXHIBITION: In this multi-venue project led by the Institute for the Humanities, in collaboration with UMMA and the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, and with funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama explored global exchange, commerce and the troubling histories of colonialism and slavery in the Western world. At the U-M Museum of Art, massive, quilt-like panels covered 4,452 square feet of the exterior of the building, creating one of the spectacular architectural interventions for which Mahama is known. A related installation at the Institute for the Humanities Gallery could be viewed (and heard) from a sidewalk window. At the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit, jute sacks blanketed a wall of the Community Gallery. RELATED EVENTS: Community Gallery installation, Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, Detroit Penny Stamps Speaker Series with Ibrahim Mahama, a conversation with Amanda Krugliak, arts curator at the Institute for the Humanities and lead curator; Ozi Uduma, assistant curator for global contemporary art at UMMA; Laura De Becker, curator of African art and interim chief curator at UMMA; Neil Barclay, president and CEO of the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History; and Ibrahim Mahama. This exhibition was supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
RESULTS OR ROSES: NEW AND ASSORTED WORKS Sarah Rose Sharp ABOUT THE ARTIST: Sarah Rose Sharp is a Detroit-based writer, activist, photographer, and multimedia artist. She writes about art and culture for Art in America, Hyperallergic, Flash Art, Sculpture Magazine, ArtSlant, and others. Sarah was named a 2015 Kresge Literary Arts Fellow for Art Criticism and is a 2018 recipient of the Rabkin Foundation Prize. She is a guest lecturer at several universities in Southeast Michigan and served as a mentor in the NYFA Immigrant Artist Mentorship Program in 2018. Sharp has served as guest curator and juror for institutions including Penn State University (State College, PA) and the Scarab Club (Detroit, MI). She has shown her own work in New York, Seattle, Columbus & Toledo, OH, Covington, KY, and Detroit—including at the Detroit Institute of Arts—with solo shows at 19
Simone De Sousa Gallery and Public Pool. ABOUT THE EXHIBITION: Results or Roses: New and Assorted Works is a virtual exhibition by artist and writer Sarah Rose Sharp and part of the Institute for the Humanities’ Andrew W. Mellon Foundationfunded “High Stakes Art” initiative. The exhibition of new and collected fiber-based art incorporates salvaged and found bits of cultural and fiber art that, as she explains, “forms a discourse that is physical rather than textual.” We supported Sharp’s work on Results or Roses during the summer of 2020, but due to COVID-19 were forced to postpone the pop-up exhibition also scheduled for summer 2020. This fall we installed Results or Roses as a pop-up exhibition in the Osterman Common Room and also as a virtual exhibition. This exhibition was supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
DAISY CHAIN
are emerging from the past year? What kind of world are you trying to build for the future? How are you thinking about responsiveness and responsibility? Are there any creative strategies you have identified moving forward? The artists’ answers—along with images of their work—have been strung together visually in one video, one artist connecting to another in sequence. The video was co-produced and edited by gallery project coordinator Juliet Hinely.
MAPPING CONNECTIONS BETWEEN ARTISTS, THEIR IDEAS AND CREATIVE WORK In this time of reentry, when we are cautiously emerging from a year in isolation and also merging back into action at breakneck speed, our new video zine offers the opportunity for contemplation in its assemblage of artists, art and ideas. “Daisy Chain” is a compilation of short vignettes documenting the candid and illuminating perspectives of nine national and regional artists as the world opens back up. The title refers to the traditional string of daisies threaded together by their stems, as well as the contemporary wiring scheme of the same name used in electronics and engineering.
It was released at noon June 30 via the Institute’s YouTube channel. “‘Daisy Chain’ explores the ties that bind us, the past and the future, and the loose ends,” said Amanda Krugliak, curator of the Institute for the Humanities. “Perhaps as important, it alludes to surprising and new combinations, and a renewed capacity to find joy.” For the project, which is 35 minutes long, the Institute’s curator interviews artists with diverse experiences, perspectives and practices. She asked each of them the same series of questions: How do you feel you 20
“This may be my favorite project of the year,” said Krugliak, who launched “House Calls” at the outset of the pandemic, a streaming series that offered virtual studio visits with artists. “So much has happened over the last year and their responses go against the rhetoric of the day, really getting at the heart of the matter from so many perspectives. The artists talk candidly about working through the past year, while also discussing the intersection of ideas surrounding systemic racism, health and our responsibilities to one another.” Participating artists include Ruth Leonela Buentello (San Antonio), Abigail DeVille (New York City), Hubert Massey (Detroit), Shanna Merola (Hamtramck, Michigan), Scott Northrup (Detroit/ Dearborn, Michigan) David Opdyke (New York City), Shani Peters (New Orleans), Sheida Soleimani (Providence, Rhode Island) and Jeffrey Augustine Songco (Grand Rapids, Michigan). This project was supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
WATCH ME WORK—PORTRAITS OF SELF Sydney G. James ABOUT THE ARTIST: Detroit-based visual artist Sydney G. James earned her BFA at the College for Creative Studies and began her career as an art director in advertising. In 2004 she moved to Los Angeles to work as a visual artist in the film and television industry and earned her master’s degree in secondary education. Since returning to Detroit in 2011, James has become a leading creative voice in Southeast Michigan. The gender positioning of the black woman in America as “last” or “least among others” in society has been the central theme in her work recently. James has displayed her art at MOCAD, the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, Inner State Gallery, and PLAYGROUND DETROIT, among others. She has completed public murals in Detroit, New Orleans, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Pow Wow Hawaii, Pow Wow Long Beach, Pow Wow Worcester, and Accra, Ghana. Her mural of Malice Green, The Malice Green Mural Monument, appears on the side of the Hamilton-Tucker Gallery on the border of Detroit and Hamtramck. Most recently, she completed The Girl with the D Earring, a mural on the Chroma Building in Detroit. James is the recipient of the 2017 Kresge Fellowship award. ABOUT THE INSTALLATION: Watch Me Work — Portraits of Self is an entirely new series of paintings by artist Sydney G. James, completed during her residency at the University of Michigan Institute for the Humanities. The paintings in this exhibition reposition the narrative of black women’s visibility and value, honoring the individual and collective contributions and labors of Black women, persistent through the pandemics, through police violence, and whether seen or unseen. As part of her artist residency, James completed a mural titled Sarah the Whatevershechoosestobe-(h)er on the first floor of the Modern Languages Building. She also led
Sydney G. James works on her mural Sarah the Whatevershechoosestobe-(h)er in the Modern Languages Building.
workshops with youth in Michigan juvenile justice facilities, in collaboration with the Youth Arts Alliance, and met with students from the Stamps School of Art & Design. RELATED EVENTS: Watch Me Work — Portraits of Self Virtual Reception & Film Premiere: Sydney James in conversation with writer Scheherazade Washington Parrish and the premiere of the short documentary The Girl With the D Earring. This project was supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. 21
DAISY CHAIN ABOUT THE PROJECT: A series of short vignettes in video form documenting the candid and illuminating perspectives of 9 national and regional artists. See page 20 for more information.
Torrance Art Museum. She is a recipient of the Harpo Visual Artists Grant and the California Community Foundation Visual Artist Fellowship and has works included in the collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The University of California Los Angeles, and the Arab American National Museum. Her work has been featured in HyperAllergic, Artillery Magazine, and Kolaj Magazine. She lives and works in Los Angeles.
Ava Ansari performs THE G—RAY AREA in the For Your Eyes Only exhibition space.
FOR YOUR EYES ONLY Yasmine Nasser Diaz ABOUT THE ARTIST: Yasmine Nasser Diaz is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice weaves between culture, class, gender, religion, and family. She uses mixed media collage, immersive installation, fiber etching, and video to juxtapose discordant cultural references and to explore the connections between personal experience and larger social and political structures. Diaz is interested in complicated narratives of thirdculture identity and the precarious spaces of invisibility and hyper-visibility where they often reside. Born and raised in Chicago to parents who immigrated from the rural highlands of southern Yemen, her work is often rooted in personal histories and competing cultural values. Diaz has exhibited and performed at spaces including the Brava Theater in San Francisco, the Albuquerque Museum of Art, and the 22
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION: For Your Eyes Only is the latest iteration of Yasmine Nasser Diaz’s bedroom installation. At first glance, the constructed space is a shimmering homage to the bedroom disco— a sanctuary for uninhibited dance and selfexpression. It has also become the setting from which many personal videos are made and shared widely on social media, where platforms such as Instagram and TikTok have blurred the boundary between public and private. Projected into the space is a montage of casual videos shared by female-identifying and non-binary persons of SWANA* origin dancing solo in their rooms. To some, the videos may seem innocent and innocuous, but they can also be seen as acts of defiance that assert the autonomy of bodies that have been surveilled, scrutinized, and censored throughout history. Alongside these intimate moments is a separate reel showing political figures and protest movements from the SWANA region. The images demonstrate the fluctuating attitudes and regulations impacting human rights and freedoms based on gender, and exemplify how—whether we are physically at a protest or sharing our physicality in virtual spaces—our bodies are engaged in some level of risk. *Southwest Asian/North African RELATED EVENTS: THE G—RAY AREA: performances by Ava Ansari intended to activate the space and bring to life the installation by further exploring the positioning of the body and the viewer.
Notes on an Exhibition in a Pandemic:
YASMINE NASSER DIAZ During what resulted in an all-virtual academic year, the Institute Gallery facilitated three virtual artist residencies and launched three prominent, public-facing exhibitions, responding successfully to the challenges of the pandemic restrictions. Thanks to the support of the Efroymson Family Fund, our project with Yasmine Nasser Diaz and her new exhibition For Your Eyes Only was completely re-designed by the artist specifically for sidewalk viewing, bringing us together in extraordinary ways under extraordinary circumstances. A continuation of her teenage bedroom series reflecting on her youth as a YemeniAmerican, For Your Eyes Only offered an intimate view into the gallery space from the gallery window on S. Thayer Street. The exhibition included video, neon, a disco ball, and sound. It completely transformed the corner of Washington and Thayer, basking the space in pink color and light, night and day. As part of the project, we commissioned a musical composition by Beirut artist Carol Abi Ghanem, which was used as the backdrop sound for the exhibition, and an essay by Iranian writer Lila
Nazemian was displayed on our front glass window and online. Additionally, Detroit performance artist Ava Ansari presented three performances live in the installation itself, with students and community members gathering around the gallery window. The enthusiastic audience populated the sidewalk and street in front of the gallery, all masked with social distancing protocols in place. Diaz also surprised us by flying in from Los Angeles to attend the event. These meaningful collaborations and cultural exchanges between Diaz and the other artists brought the world to the Institute and connected us to the outside despite our inability to gather everyone together in person. The Institute Gallery also produced a video newsreel about For Your Eyes Only, which was shared with nearly a dozen U-M classes. Diaz and curator Amanda Krugliak followed up with synchronous zoom Q & As, scheduled ongoing throughout the term. Diaz plans to utilize the video in her own teaching practice in California. For Your Eyes Only has already been reexhibited at the National Art Dealer’s Alliance as part of their yearly art fair. 23
Neon piece in the form of the “evil eye.” Part of For Your Eyes Only by Yasmine Nasser Diaz
In the year 2021, when social media such as Instagram and TikTok have blurred the boundary between public and private, For Your Eyes Only was, as Lila Nazemian wrote, an installation “imbued with the experiences of many, yet wholly encapsulating the personal.” –Amanda Krugliak, arts curator
NATHAN LIEBETREU
MARKETING AND MEDIA INTERN
interview
passionate for the humanities
This fall we welcomed Nathan Liebetreu to the Institute for the Humanities staff team as a marketing and media intern. Nathan provided support in crafting and implementing marketing strategies, increasing the online and offline footprint of the Institute, and creating content for our newsletter and social media. Nathan is a rising junior majoring in business with a concentration in marketing and strategy and a double minor in philosophy and entrepreneurship. He has a strong background in consumer-centric, direct-to-consumer marketing. As a first-year student in the Stephen M. Ross School of Business, he co-founded and ran an e-commerce site specializing in selling eco-friendly products and generating sales with Facebook and Google Ads. He also took three philosophy courses that year, leading him to choose that subject as a minor. Communicating and developing positive relationships with people of different backgrounds is one of Nathan’s strong suits. He also thrives when executing social media campaigns. “I have a passion for social media because it’s a useful tool for connecting people,” he explained, “and I’m inherently a social person.” 24
In a nod to Nathan’s outstanding work interviewing fellows for our “What I’m Reading This Week” series, we decided to ask him a few questions about his experience as an intern. YOU WERE THE FIRST ROSS STUDENT WE’VE HAD APPLY FOR AN INTERNSHIP AT THE INSTITUTE. AS A BUSINESS STUDENT, WHY WERE YOU INTERESTED IN WORKING AT THE INSTITUTE FOR THE HUMANITIES? That’s a great question, Stephanie. I have always been passionate about the humanities. The humanities teach us to think critically and ask important questions while giving us insights into the human experience. Learning history will help us understand the past to navigate the present better. Learning about the French philosopher Albert Camus’ exploration of life’s meaning can help us live a more fulfilling life. On the other hand, the study of commerce helps us become informed consumers, producers, and workers in this modern society. To be a great person of business, I knew I also had to immerse myself in the humanities somehow, and as such, I wanted to work for the Institute for the Humanities. I wanted to use the business skills I’ve acquired so far to help the humanities and the Institute have a broader reach and appeal to undergraduates pursuing different fields of interest.
THE HUMANITIES AT WORK
WHAT WAS ONE OF YOUR FAVORITE THINGS ABOUT WORKING HERE, AND WHY? I enjoyed interviewing the Institute’s fellows for a series called What I’m Reading This Week. During the interview process I had the opportunity to pick the brains of fellows involved in and pursuing amazing projects within the humanities. I learned a lot from the experience as I was exposed to different topics that I would have never discovered independently, from a project examining the expansion of a market of reverse osmosis drinking water after Haiti’s cholera epidemic, to one on southwest China and how specific individuals lives are articulated by the art they use.
The Humanities at Work is a new series that features the variety of careers pursued by Humanities PhDs. Organized as a series of conversations, these one-hour sessions included an informational interview in which the invited guest traced their trajectory, described the extent to which graduate education in the humanities prepared them for their current work, identified things they wish they’d known or explored as a graduate student, and explained the qualifications their organization would seek in an applicant. We also asked our guests to describe how the humanities matter in the work they do. The second half of the hour was devoted to questions from the audience.
NOW THAT THE SEMESTER, AND YOUR INTERNSHIP, HAVE WRAPPED UP, HOW DO YOU PLAN TO SPEND THE SUMMER BEFORE YOUR JUNIOR YEAR? I will be interning at Chewy, an online retail company of pet foods and other pet-related products, as a business analyst. Besides work, I hope to read, play a lot of tennis and soccer, and go camping. I’m looking forward to making the most of my summer, enjoying the outdoors as much as possible, and spending time with my family!
PARTICIPANTS: WHITNEY PEOPLES (PhD, women’s, gender, & sexuality studies, Emory University), director in educational development & assessment services and coordinator of DEI initiatives & critical race pedagogies at the U-M Center for Research on Learning and Teaching.
THANKS FOR TAKING THE TIME TO ANSWER MY QUESTIONS, NATE. TO END THE INTERVIEW, I’D LIKE TO ASK YOU THE SAME FINAL QUESTION YOU POSED TO THE FELLOWS YOU INTERVIEWED. IF YOU WERE STRANDED ON A DESERTED ISLAND, WHAT WOULD BE THE ONE BOOK YOU WOULD WANT TO HAVE WITH YOU AND WHY?
CASSIE MILLER (PhD, history, Carnegie Mellon University), senior research analyst at the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project.
The one book I would want to have with me is Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. The book is a series of personal writings by the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius written as a private note to himself examining the ideas on Stoic philosophy, which he used as a tool for self-improvement and guidance. It is written in a way that is very easy to read and digest but at the same time provides wisdom as old as time that is still applicable today.
ROBERT BLECHER (PhD, Middle East history, Stanford University), chief strategy officer at the International Crisis Group.
–Stephanie Harrell, marketing and communications manager 25
CURATING SCHOLARSHIP WORKSHOP: THE VISUAL PRESENTATION OF RESEARCH Visual strategies can potentially extend the reach of scholarship beyond the page. Exhibitions can become a conduit, transferring the research done within a university to diverse publics and providing means of addressing and thinking through social and cultural questions, rather than simply illustrating them. In a two-day intensive workshop held in May and led by Arts Curator Amanda Krugliak, graduate student and faculty scholars gained a deeper understanding of the requirements of curation as a practice, exploring relationships among curation and creation, narrative and visual representation, and the research potential of collaborative projects. Each participant also had the opportunity to meet with Krugliak after the workshop for a oneon-one session focused on their own projects. The workshop pondered conceptual questions of importance such as visual choices, context, display, and design, as well as practical considerations of planning, logistics, location, and support. Over the course of the two days, four guest presenters shared their unique practices representing the synergy between scholarship, art, and curation, inspiring participants to craft their own limitless vision of their research and themselves beyond boundaries. This project was supported by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
PRESENTERS:
State of Exception, 2014 by Jason De LeÓn, Richard Barnes, and Amanda Krugliak
JASON DE LEÓN Professor of Anthropology and Chicana/o Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Executive Director of the Undocumented Migration Project. MARK DION American Conceptual Artist whose practice examines the history of the museum and the presentation of knowledge
Waiting for the Extraordinary, 2017 by Mark Dion
MARTHA JONES Society of Black Alumni Presidential Professor, Professor of History, and a Professor at the SNF Agora Institute at The Johns Hopkins University. AMANDA KRUGLIAK Artist, Curator, and Arts Administrator
Race Card Project, 2013 by Míchele Norris, facilitated by Martha Jones
MARY MATTINGLY Brooklyn-based artist whose work explores issues of sustainability, climate change, and displacement-memory, and 20th-century cultural history. Sacred Objects, 2016 by Mary Mattingly
26
Continued from page 12
Continued from page 14
managers, mayors, and urban boosters crafted an imagined antebellum past as part of a larger effort to attract wealthy northern investors and tourists to the South.
ISSUES RELATED TO HUMANS AND THEIR INTERACTION WITH THEIR ENVIRONMENT AND EACH OTHER A MATTER OF INTEREST TO YOU? V.K.K.: I’m thrilled to know that you had a chance to look into these books—they’re all fascinating reads. Yes, you’re certainly right to pick up on that! I’ve long been fascinated by not only the relationship between humans and nonhumans, but also the webs of relationality that implicate us all: the connectivity of connectedness. A kind of physics of living. It’s quite clear that these meshworks, as Tim Ingold calls them, exist, but how are they made? What sustains them? How do they shift? When and how do they disintegrate? What do they demand? What differences emerge within and through them? What happens when new dynamics take shape? What is at stake in webs of relationality?
N.L.: CAN YOU TOUCH ON THE DEFENSE OF THE TRADITIONAL ACADEMIC LECTURE AND OR WHY THERE IS AN URGENT CALL FOR CHANGE IN THE METHOD OF INSTRUCTION IN HIGHER EDUCATION? J.Y.: I see this from both sides. On the one hand, virtual learning does have certain benefits. I have noticed, for example, that students who tend not to speak up in class have more opportunities to participate in class via the chat or Q&A functions in Zoom. At the same time, the creative use of screen sharing, breakout rooms, etc. can provide new and exciting models for instruction. On the other hand, I have missed the direct connection that is only possible in face-to-face instruction. I take many of my pedagogical clues from the reactions, postures and gestures of students. These context clues are much harder to decipher in a virtual environment. Many students have shared similar concerns with me, noting that a crucial part of their learning is rooted in direct human interaction. Read the entire interview at: https://myumi.ch/kx1xW
I ponder these questions often, especially as I move among different settings or think across different scales. Perhaps I became drawn to them out of a curiosity about how interactions among humans and non-humans manifest biologically, often disparately affecting some groups more than others; or out of grasping for an alternative narrative 27
to the brutal individualism underpinning economic and social logics prevalent in the United States; or out of a reassurance that none of us is ever alone. As a non substitutable substance essential for life on this planet, water is, therefore, a lifelong companion to each of us and elemental to a physics of living. But, while common properties cohere around what we call water, not all waters are the same. By paying attention to how water in various forms and compositions is used or consumed, how it moves or becomes contained, how it transforms or is transformed, how it carries the traces of history, I’ve found that we can learn a great deal about the ways people navigate their connectivity with one another and with their surroundings.
literature. Throughout the years after, I would think back to the story with surprising frequency—few works have haunted me quite as much. Partway through my first year of medical school at the University of Michigan, I was craving short fictional texts to balance the firehose of science I was studying. While perusing Literati Bookstore one day, I spotted this Borges collection as though re-encountering an old friend. It’s been a constant, nourishing companion ever since. On a practical level, it’s certainly long enough to occupy plenty of time while alone on an island! The stories themselves also provide such magnificent mazes, dreams, and metaphors that always amaze and astound me no matter how many times I’ve read and wandered through them.
N.L.: I’D LIKE TO ASK A QUESTION WE END OUR FELLOW INTERVIEWS WITH. IF YOU WERE STRANDED ON A DESERTED ISLAND, WHAT WOULD BE THE ONE BOOK YOU WOULD WANT TO HAVE WITH YOU AND WHY? V.K.K.: What a fun question! If I were stranded on a deserted island, I think I’d like to have with me Jorge Luis Borges’s Collected Fictions, translated by Andrew Hurley. I remember first reading The Library of Babel in high school and becoming enamored at once of Latin American surrealist
Read the entire interview at: https://myumi.ch/gj8jg
SUPPORT The Institute for the Humanities is a center for innovative, collaborative study in the humanities and arts.
Drawing on Michigan’s remarkable resources, we are a national leader in advocating for the humanities in higher education and serve as a national and international center for scholarly research in the humanities and creative work in the arts. By engaging with the Institute through your gifts, you directly support the university and the Institute in our mission to: • Engage and address the world as a premier Institute that boldly integrates the humanities with the arts • Stand at the forefront of public outreach and service through the humanities and arts • Maximize scholarly impact by funding time and opportunities for Michigan’s best emerging scholars • Encourage and promote cutting-edge research across the humanities and the arts Please support the Institute for the Humanities generously as together we make a profound and continuing difference in our university and the world. The Institute is currently focused on raising funds in support of the art gallery and its exhibitions. The Institute’s gallery has gained national attention for the high quality of its curated shows mounted annually. The Gallery and Arts Programming Fund, an expendable gift fund, was 28
established in 2019 for this very purpose. The Institute is also seeking to establish endowments to name the gallery and/or one of its three to five annual shows ensuring the Institute is able to continue its tradition of superb exhibitions that showcase the synergies between the work of humanities scholars and creative artists. It will also enable the Institute to expand outreach to undergraduate students and the general public through programming centered on gallery exhibitions and visiting artists. HOW TO GIVE One of the easiest ways to support the humanities is through an outright gift to the Institute for the Humanities. The University of Michigan makes giving such gifts very easy through its secure gift website (https://leadersandbest. umich.edu/find/#!/scu/ lsa), search on the term “humanities” and available funds will be listed. To discuss establishing an endowment or bequest in detail please contact us at humin@umich.edu or 734.936.3518 or contact the Institute’s advancement officer Jeff Jelinski, LSA Advancement, 734.615-6333 or jjelinsk@umich.edu.
AFFILIATES AND STAFF STAFF Stephanie Harrell, marketing communications manager Juliet Hinely, arts production coordinator Laura Koroncey, graphic designer Amanda Krugliak, arts curator/assistant director, creative programming Peggy McCracken, director Gretchen O’Hair, fellows coordinator Sheri Sytsema-Geiger, administrative manager
NONDISCRIMINATION POLICY STATEMENT The University of Michigan, as an equal opportunity/ affirmative action employer, complies with all applicable federal and state laws regarding nondiscrimination and affirmative action. The University of Michigan is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, disability, religion, height, weight, or veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions. Inquiries or complaints may be addressed to the Senior Director for Institutional Equity, and Title IX/Section 504/ADA Coordinator, Office of Institutional Equity, 2072 Administrative Services Building, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1432, 734-763-0235, TTY 734-647-1388. For other University of Michigan information call 734-764-1817.
Interns Lauren Benjamin, graduate public programming intern Madison K. Flood, undergraduate curatorial intern Grace Geiger, marketing and media intern Machal Gradoz, graduate public programming intern Nathan Liebetreu, undergraduate marketing and media intern Chao Ren, graduate public programming intern INSTITUTE FOR THE HUMANITIES EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE Stephen Berrey, American culture and history Benedicte Boisseron, Afroamerican and African studies Angela Dillard, Afroamerican and African studies; history; Residential College Caryl Flinn, film, television and media; women’s studies Peggy McCracken, ex officio; director, Institute for the Humanities Supriya Nair, English Alexandra Stern, ex officio; associate dean, humanities; American culture, history, women’s studies, obstetrics and gynecology Arthur Verhoogt, ex officio; associate dean, academic programs and initiatives; papyrology and Greek Yi-Li Wu, women’s studies and history
THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Jordan B. Acker, Southfield Michael J. Behm, Grand Blanc Mark J. Bernstein, Ann Arbor Paul W. Brown, Ann Arbor Sarah Hubbard, Lansing Denise Ilitch, Bingham Farms Mark S. Schlissel, ex officio Ron Weiser, Ann Arbor Katherine E. White, Ann Arbor WWW.LSA.UMICH.EDU/HUMANITIES 202 S. Thayer Street, Suite 1111 Ann Arbor, MI 48104-1608 734.936.3518
29
ABOUT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN INSTITUTE FOR THE HUMANITIES Research into the human condition—how we live in the world and how we live with each other—is vital to the cultivation of a just and equitable society. At the Institute for the Humanities, we facilitate work that examines humanities traditions broadly across space and time, deepens synergies among the humanities, the arts, and disciplines across the university, and brings the voices of the humanities to public life. Each year we provide fellowships for Michigan faculty, graduate students, and visiting scholars who work on scholarly and artistic projects. We also offer a wide array of public and scholarly events, including public lectures, workshops, discussions and art exhibitions. Since 1987, when Arthur Miller read from his memoir Timebends at our inauguration, the Institute has granted fellowships to over 500 Michigan faculty, Michigan graduate students, and visiting faculty and artist. The Institute for the Humanities: • Encourages fellows to talk and debate, informally and formally—all in an effort to reach beyond the assumptions of a given discipline • Promotes innovative teaching in the humanities, encouraging fellows to add perspectives from other disciplines to the courses they teach • Brings nationally known scholars, artists, and performers to Michigan to participate in programs, conferences, and fellowships • Offers programs reaching out to university and public audiences. Brings together those who create—artists, musicians, actors, writers—with those who analyze these art forms
The Institute for the Humanities acknowledges that the University of Michigan, named for Michigami, the world’s largest freshwater system, sits on land stewarded by Niswi Ishkodewan Anishinaabeg—the Three Fires People, who are the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi—along with their neighbors the Seneca, Delaware, Shawnee, and Wyandot nations.
