October 2, 2019

Georgetown Launches New Efforts in Humanities Education

Georgetown is building on its strengths in humanities education and scholarship with new initiatives and classroom opportunities focused on expanding faculty and student engagement with the humanities.

Books line the wall of a shelf.
Books line the wall of a shelf.

These efforts, which include a new university-wide initiative, a project based out of Oxford, U.K., and a new Master of Arts in the Engaged and Public Humanities (MAEPH), demonstrate the global, interdisciplinary, and multifaceted dimensions of Georgetown’s approach to humanities education.

“In the humanities we study the past in order to better understand our present condition and plan for the future,” says Kathryn Temple, a professor in the Department of English and director of the new MAEPH. “We can draw on humanities training and habits of mind to help solve global and local problems, to understand why we behave as we do and how we might do better.”

A University-wide Initiative

Launched in 2017, the Georgetown Humanities Initiative aims to fully nurture the strength of the humanities both at Georgetown and around the globe.

This university-wide initiative, led by the College, emphasizes global, interdisciplinary, public, and digital humanities to illustrate the wide-ranging applications of the humanities and build on Georgetown’s Jesuit and liberal arts traditions.

“The initiative is off to an exciting start with a number of projects already funded through an incubator grant program that we started last year,” said David Edelstein, vice dean of faculty in the College. “As those projects come on line and others follow, I expect this coming year to be one in which the initiative becomes increasingly visible and active on our campus and in our city.”

Nicoletta Pireddu, a professor in the Department of Italian and an expert in comparative literature, will be the inaugural director of the Georgetown Humanities Initiative starting January 2020.

The Future of the Humanities

To connect with other nations and work toward shared goals for the humanities, Georgetown launched the Future of the Humanities Project in 2018 under the direction of Michael Scott, a fellow of Blackfriars Hall at the University of Oxford.

“Not every culture defines the humanities the way we define the humanities, but I think every culture sees a need for approaches that help explain the human condition, and that can work with the sciences and social sciences to help us make better decisions,” says Temple, who serves as a senior fellow for the project.

The goal of Future of the Humanities project is to further integrate Georgetown’s humanities work with that of Oxford and other universities across the globe.

“We seek to foster collaborative outreach that foregrounds the humanities as offering ways to advance the common good and address problems of global importance,” explains Temple.

Author Nicola Gardini with Dean Christopher Celenza during a Future of the Humanities event in Riggs Library.
Author Nicola Gardini with Dean Christopher Celenza during a Future of the Humanities event in Riggs Library.

From the Classroom to the World

In order to give students the opportunity to put their humanities skills to use in the real world, the university will launch the MAEPH in fall 2020.

Students in the program will explore and combine their academic interests through interdisciplinary courses from across the university while building a foundation in the public and digital humanities. In addition to coursework, students will complete an internship at an academic, nonprofit, or corporate organization that fits their interests. Temple says,

The humanities has something to offer across different disciplines. There are many different ways humanities scholarship can contribute to political culture and national culture.

Temple will address these themes with undergraduate students in a new course she is teaching at Villa Le Balze, Georgetown’s study center in Fiesole, Italy, in fall 2019. “Humanities Encounters” will explore the value and future of the humanities, asking questions about their intrinsic value but also about their value when approaching global and local problems such as climate change and artificial intelligence. 

“Villa Le Balze is linked to a long tradition of learning and scholarship in the humanities, through its location in the hills above Florence, the birthplace of Renaissance humanism, and the legacy of its founder, the American philosopher and educator Charles Augustus Strong,” says Gregory Spear, assistant director of global living and learning programs in the Office of Global Education.

“The humanities must remain a critical part of higher education,” says Edelstein. “The humanities offer unique and provocative insight into the human condition, and for that reason, they are an essential part of the education our students receive.”

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Headshot of Nicoletta Pireddu in front of a river and trees

October 1, 2019

Nicoletta Pireddu, a professor in the Department of Italian and an expert in comparative literature, will be the inaugural director of the Georgetown Humanities Initiative starting January 2020.