Humanities Week
The Humanities Research Center marked its 10th anniversary in 2024 by introducing the first annual Humanities Week, a week-long celebration of the humanities at VCU.
This year's Humanities Week aims to expand its original mission of celebrating the humanities at VCU while the HRC tailors its offerings to specific campus audiences.
Established in 2014 by now Dean of the College of Humanities and Sciences Catherine Ingrassia, the Humanities Research Center has served as a hub for humanities research at VCU and the greater Richmond area for over a decade.
Under the leadership of Dr. Cristina Stanciu over the past three years, the center achieved university-wide center status in 2022, launched 8 humanities labs for interdisciplinary research, hosted several national and international symposia, and awarded hundreds of research and travel grants, fellowships, and residential fellowships for both collaborative and individual research projects across campus. We also launched the On Native Ground initiative, a series of programs that works with local tribal nations and with the annual Pocahontas Reframed Film Festival in Richmond.
More events coming soon!
Upcoming Events
Applied Humanities: Solving Problems and Equipping for Careers
October 20, 2025
Scott Muir is the Director of Education Advocacy at the National Humanities Alliance. Scott Muir leads NHA’s efforts to forward innovation in humanities education to attract more students. He has authored three major reports documenting successful initiatives: Strategies – Recruiting Students to the Humanities: A Comprehensive Resource (2021), Expanding Access to Undergraduate Humanities Education: Models and Strategies (2024), and Attracting Students to the Liberal Arts Through Integrative Curricula (2024).
Public Humanities in Action: Project-Based Learning That Transforms Communities and Careers
October 21, 2025
Teresa Mangum is Professor Emerita at the University of Iowa, where she was Professor in the Departments of Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies and English, and served as Director of the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies for fourteen years.
Connecting Classroom to Career: An Applied Humanities Design Workshop
October 22, 2025
Teresa Mangum is Professor Emerita at the University of Iowa, where she was Professor in the Departments of Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies and English, and served as Director of the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies for fourteen years.
Humanities and AI: Large Language Models and the Returns of Critical Theory
October 23, 2025
Wendy Hui Kyong Chun is the Canada 150 Research Chair in New Media, Professor in the School of Communication, and Director of the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University. At the Institute, she leads the Mellon-funded Data Fluencies Project, which combines the interpretative traditions of the arts and humanities with critical work in the data sciences to express, imagine, and create innovative engagements with (and resistances to) our data-filled world.
Past Events
Humanities Week 2024
Ryan K. Smith, Brooke Newman
Humanities Research Roundtable: Residential Fellowships in Focus
The speakers for this event were Rohan Kalyan, Gabriella León-Pérez, Ryan K. Smith, and Brooke Newman.
Why Humanities? Why Now?
The Humanities Research Center's keynote event featured Paula Krebs, executive director of the Modern Language Association (MLA), delved into the critical role of the humanities in today’s rapidly changing world, and invited us to learn why the humanities are more vital than ever, shaping not just our understanding of the past, but our vision for the future.
UFO Studies in Realms of the Indigenous and the Aesthetic
This Work-in-Progress Seminar by J. Molina-Garcia, Assistant Professor of Photography and Digital Futures at VCU, discussed the emerging field of ufology in the context of discarded theories of animism and ancient cultural knowledge.
Career Pathways for Humanities Students [video]
This workshop with Scott Muir, director of undergraduate initiatives at the National Humanities Alliance, and Marcus Messner, associate dean for faculty and academic affairs (humanities and social sciences) in the College of Humanities and Sciences, provides an answer to that frequent question, "Why study the humanities?"
Lightning Talks with Humanities Labs
The HRC hosted short presentations by faculty and students in our labs, as they discuss their ongoing research and initiatives, and answering the following: what makes a humanities lab? Why should you get involved?
What Can You Do With a Humanities PhD? An MATX Alumni Roundtable Q&A [video]
The speakers for this event were Allison Bennett Dyche from the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt); Michael Means from Brightpoint Community College; Paul Robertson from Marshall University; and Tracy Stonestreet, Director of UMW Galleries at University of Mary Washington.
How the Humanities and STEM Can Find Common Ground in the History of Computing [video]
This presentation by Mar Hicks, Associate Professor at The University of Virginia's School of Data Science, explores how the history of technology can unite STEM and humanities scholars alike.
The HRC at 10: Reception and Roundtable
This celebration included a Director's Roundtable to discuss the state of the humanities, featuring Matthew Gibson, Virginia Humanities, in conversation with Catherine Ingrassia and Ana Edwards.