March 9-11 Pre-Conference & Conference Events Draw Record Numbers of Participants
The National Humanities Alliance’s 2009 Conference, and pre-conference events, drew record numbers of participants this year, with more than 380 individuals taking part in activities over the three day period from March 9-11. “I am greatly heartened by the enthusiastic support for the humanities demonstrated by advocates and policymakers from around the country,” said NHA Executive Director Jessica Jones Irons. “What conference participants articulated is a clear demand for an enlarged role for the humanities in our nation’s educational, economic, scientific, and civic spheres”.
The Public Good
The opening event on Monday, March 9, a symposium on "The Public Good: The Humanities in a Civil Society" sponsored by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, drew a full and engaged crowd to the George Washington University’s Jack Morton Auditorium. Panelists included Don Michael Randel, President of the Mellon Foundation; Supreme Court Justice David Souter; Patty Stonesifer, Chair of the Board of Regents at the Smithsonian Institution and former CEO of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; and Edward L. Ayers, President of the University of Richmond. Steven Knapp, President of George Washington University, and Leslie Berlowitz, Chief Executive Officer of the American Academy, introduced the panel.
The symposium can viewed on C-Span, as well as the GWU web site, where a full report on the symposium, with a high-quality video stream, can be found, http://my.gwu.edu/mod/news/view.cfm?ANN_ID=30507.
NHA Annual Meeting
John Churchill, President of the National Humanities Alliance and Secretary of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, convened NHA's annual meeting at 9:00 a.m. on Tuesday, March 10. NHA member representatives heard reports on NHA’s 2008 advocacy activities, and elected directors and officers to the Alliance board. Newly- and re-elected members of the 2009-2010 board of directors include: William Davis, Executive Director, American Anthropological Association; Sally T. Hillsman, Executive Officer, American Sociological Association; Mary Ellen Lane, Executive Director, Council of American Overseas Research Centers; David Marshall, Professor of English and Comparative Literature and Dean of Humanities & Fine Arts, University of California, Santa Barbara; Gail Kern Paster (for the Independent Research Libraries Association), Director, The Folger Shakespeare Library; David E. Schrader, Executive Director, American Philosophical Association.
Highlights of the morning included two panel presentations attended by staff and officers from NHA member organizations and institutions, college/university faculty, state humanities council representatives, higher education leaders, museum and preservation specialists, federal agency staff, students and individual advocates.
Making the Case
Carol Schneider, President of the Association of American Colleges and Universities, moderated the morning’s first panel, “Making the Case for the Humanities”, in which panelists examined the role of humanities practitioners outside the academy, the value of humanistic learning to individuals, employers, and the larger society they serve. Panelists included Bob Weisbuch, President of Drew University, and Tony Carnevale, Director of the Georgetown Center on Education & the Workforce.
Measuring the Humanities
In conjunction with the recent release of the American Academy's Humanities Indicators prototype, American Academy CEO Leslie Berlowitz moderated a second discussion on “Measuring the Humanities”, that provided participants with a hands-on tour and user’s guide of the new policy and research tool. Panelists included Patricia Meyer Spacks, Co-chair of the American Academy Initiative for Humanities and Culture and Professor Emerita at the University of Virginia; Alice Noble, Program Officer, American Academy of Arts and Sciences; Arnita Jones, Executive Director of the American Historical Association; and Roger Geiger, Penn State University Professor & Senior Scientist at the Center for the Study of Higher Education.
Making the Case in a Time of Crisis
GWU President Dr. Steven Knapp delivered a keynote address at the National Humanities Alliance luncheon on March 10, titled “The Humanities: Making the Case in a Time of Crisis”. In his remarks, Dr. Knapp reviewed the current and historical gap in federal investment between the humanities and sciences and concluded that the "perceptual gap" faced by humanities scholars and other advocates could best be closed through “exemplification”.
“What we must bring to the table is not so much an argument as a certain kind of exemplification, a bringing to life and not just a description of the way advanced and organized curiosity revitalizes the past and makes it available to students and the public alike,” said Dr. Knapp. “We have to put the legislators and policymakers directly in touch with, immediately in the presence of, the persons who themselves most powerfully exemplify the role of advanced and organized curiosity in making and keeping the nation’s heritage alive. We could do far worse, I think, than simply taking our best graduate students with us to the halls of Congress… And if you don’t have graduate students, or don’t have any with you, then you could do far worse than to exemplify that excitement yourself, and to invite your Congressional interlocutors to share it.”
Afternoon Sessions
Afternoon sessions were led by NHA staff and Humanities Advocacy Day sponsors and included a Legislation and Policy Briefing, Advocacy Day Planning, and New Advocates Training. David Schrader, Executive Director of the American Philosophical Association, led a breakout session on “Science and the Humanities” that explored the relation of science and humanities disciplines, as well as funding sources for humanities research in traditional science agencies. Fellow panelists included Fred Kronz, Program Director, Science, Technology, & Society (STS), Division of Social & Economic Sciences, National Science Foundation; and James Herbert, Former Division Director, Research Programs, National Endowment for the Humanities.
Capitol Hill Reception
At the conclusion of the afternoon sessions at GWU, participants traveled to the Rayburn House Office Building for the evening’s reception on Capitol Hill sponsored by History (formerly The History Channel). NHA Conference participants joined Congressional and agency staff and listened to remarks from Bob Berdahl, President of the Association of American Universities; Carole Watson, Acting Chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities and Congressman David Price (D-NC), Co-Chair of the Congressional Humanities Caucus.
Humanities Advocacy Day
On Wednesday, March 11, 122 humanities advocates visited 158 House and Senate offices representing 34 states. Grassroots advocates distributed issue briefs, discussed humanities projects in their states and districts, and asked that Members of Congress support increased funding, including an increase of $75 million for the National Endowment for the Humanities and a doubling of funding for the National Historical Publications & Records Commission within the National Archives and Records Administration. The Humanities Advocacy Day Sourcebook, with all of the meeting materials, is online at the NHA web site. Event photos are posted and transcripts of the conference panels and speeches will be available soon.