After launching a Humanities Initiative in 2024 alongside the existing Humanities Council, the University is aiming to establish the Humanities Institute in fall 2027 to synthesize things once and for all.
The Humanities Initiative is an effort to reimagine and expand the role of the humanities, described as an “incubator” and “onramp” to the future Humanities Institute by Christina Lee, Acting Chair of the Humanities Council.
The Humanities Council serves as Princeton’s central hub for supporting and coordinating humanistic teaching, research, and programming across departments, including journalism, medieval studies, and Humanistic Studies.
The Humanities Council will be incorporated into the new institute, while the Humanities Initiative will conclude once the institute is open
Rachael DeLue, Director of the Humanities Initiative and future Director of Humanities Institute, described her vision for the program in an interview with the Daily Princetonian as “global in scope,” aiming to make the Humanities Sequences and Humanistic Studies minor “even bigger and better.”
HUM courses are interdisciplinary courses that promote conversation between academic fields, from Medical Anthropology, to Introduction to Digital Humanities, to Thinking Translation: Language Transfer and Cultural Communication.
DeLue told the ‘Prince’ she hopes to broaden the study of humanities to encompass new regions, eras, and departments, including new intensive courses modeled after the Western Humanities Sequence, a double-credit survey course of the Western literary canon. The University has also offered a Near Eastern Humanities Sequence and East Asian Humanities Sequence, which traditionally have much lower enrollment.
DeLue hopes to introduce a Media Studies focused-Humanities Sequence exploring the evolution of new forms of media over time and shaping of “human culture, creativity and history.”
“Our use of media is a fundamental condition of being human,” she added. “Humans have been making different kinds of and using different forms of media since humans existed.”
An African humanities sequence is also potentially on the table.
“Bringing the extraordinarily rich literary tradition of Africa and its many countries and regions into the fold of humanistic studies would be a wonderful thing to do,” DeLue said.
The expansion of the humanities at Princeton grew out of a joint desire to do so on the part of both faculty and many students.
“There’s a real hunger on the part of students for humanities courses,” DeLue said, noting the growing demand and expanding waitlists for classes over recent years.
Federico Marcon, Chair of the Department of East Asian Studies and member of the Humanities Initiative, echoed DeLue’s sentiments. He explained to the ‘Prince’ that the goal of the consolidation under the Institute is to create a “more robust outreach to the larger community.”
Marcon said that consolidating resources and centralizing programs under the Institute will help protect humanistic studies amidst nationwide defunding and uncertainty surrounding the future of the humanities in higher education. The Institute “has the potential to defend the continuation of humanistic research and teaching in higher education in the United States,” he added.
“At a moment when higher education is somewhat embattled … Princeton has the opportunity to build and expand and be a model for other institutions,” DeLue said.
“Because Princeton has the faculty, the students, and the leadership to support this,” she added, “I feel like I have a responsibility to use the resources to change the narrative and enact some transformative change.”
Aitana Camponovo is a News writer for the ‘Prince.’ She is from Washington, D.C., and can be reached at ac9353[at]princeton.edu.
Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
Correction: This piece has been updated to clarify that the Humanities Initiative (2024–2027) is a temporary “incubator” for the Humanities Institute, not part of the Humanities Council. It also corrects the spelling of Director Rachael DeLue’s name. The Prince regrets these errors.
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