From the Chair

Our elevator in the Humanities Building stopped working last week, and while it may seem a minor inconvenience on the surface, I immediately felt a sense of shame for how it impacted our students with disabilities and any other community members who are affected. I...

From the Chair

Twenty-first century institutions of art are spaces in which compassion, empathy, and institutional responsibility must be carefully balanced. Those who choose a career in the arts must be particularly responsive to the changes in cultural expectations while still...

From the Chair

In a short book, The Gift, written in 1966 by the French sociologist Marcel Mauss, the author distinguishes the numerous differences between historically understood gift economies; in which interactions are almost always reciprocal and more often than not used to...

From the Chair

As the 21st century progresses, the narrative that we are telling in our teaching and mentoring gets more crowded. Movements come and go more quickly, the politics of the era become increasingly more complex, information flows more quickly (there is simply more of...

From the Chair

It is my duty to voice the sufferings of people, the sufferings that never end and are as big as mountains. Käthe Kollwitz (1867-1945) Can art really convey empathy? What can an image really do in the world to empower or encourage empathy? I pose those questions...