History of the Public Humanities Program
The Program for Public Humanities began in 2017, expanding on the work of Tisch College’s Initiatives in the Public Humanities, which ran from 2014-2016 and organized a series of panels on various topics that brought together faculty members from across Tufts with colleagues from other universities. (Learn about the panels offered in Spring 2015 and Spring 2016.) The Program continued to organize such events, beginning with a series of presentations this past spring.
The Initiatives also inaugurated innovative projects with community partners. In the summer of 2016, we joined with the Chinese Historical Society of New England (CHSNE) to create “These Words,” an exhibition that celebrated a century of printing within Boston’s Chinese community.
The "These Words" project is the subject of a chapter included in the collection, Doing Public Humanities (ed. Susan Smulyan; Routledge, 2021). The cover of the book shows an image from our exhibition.
The connections to the Chinatown neighborhood continued with a second exhibition project, "Endurance Streets," installed in 2022 and remaining on view at 116 Harrison Avenue. In August of 2023, five addition panels were added to celebrate our partnership with the Expressive Arts Studio at St Francis House. This collaboration has now continued, extending the connection between Tisch College and St Francis House to the School of the Museum of Fine Arts.
