​​​​​​Call for Presenters

HumanitiesX, DePaul University's Experiential Humanities Collaborative, and the University of Arizona's Department of Public and Applied Humanities are delighted to request proposals from faculty to present at our annual summer professional development workshop series, “Teaching the Publicly-Engaged Humanities to Undergraduates."

The aim of these workshops is to connect faculty across disciplines and institutions to each other and with community practitioners, to share and discuss approaches to teaching project-based, applied, public, or community-engaged humanities assignments and courses. Presenters may teach in any discipline that engages humanities methods. 

Each workshop will feature three invited presenters, grouped thematically, who will give short (15-minute) presentations on either an assignment or a course. After Q & A and a short break, a community practitioner or working professional in the HumanitiesX network—such as a museum director, an archivist, or a program director at a cultural heritage organization—will share their insights on and tactics for successful public humanities projects and engage in a conversation and guided activity with workshop attendees. 

We anticipate running two workshop sessions this summer, the first between July 14-23, the second between August 4-13. To support access and audience engagement, all workshops will be held as 2-hour Zoom meetings. 

Given their small size, the workshops are a great opportunity to ask questions and make connections with colleagues at other institutions. 

The Focus: An Assignment or Course Design

We seek faculty to present either an assignment or a course-design overview from a project-based, applied, public, or community-engaged humanities course that they have recently taught to undergraduates. 

Potential assignments or courses might include those in which students build public or digital exhibits, host public events, do oral history interviews, publish community anthologies, translate ideas into action or performance, collaborate with partner organizations to do work grounded in humanities methodologies, or work towards any of the goals of the publicly engaged humanities. 

We're curious to hear not just what you did, but also about the student populations enrolled in the course, how you framed the work and learning outcomes for students, how the work enabled students to apply humanities methods and/or share humanities knowledge, how community partners or publics were involved, and what challenges arose and how you navigated them.

Finally, we ask that each presenter contribute a “leave behind" to be shared with all presenters and registered workshop participants, accompanied, if the item is not self-explanatory, by a brief contextualizing explanation (<1-page). This could be anything that was important to the success of your assignment or course, such as an assignment sheet, a description of an exercise, a reflection task, a short summary of how you used tools to coordinate group work, etc. 

Honoraria for Invited Presenters

With generous support from our HumanitiesX funder, the Mellon Foundation, presenters will receive an honorarium of $400. 

Learn More or Participate

For information on last summer's workshop, read our article summarizing the discussions and insights shared. 

If you're interested in presenting, please submit the interest form before 11:59 pm CST on Friday, 05/23. Feel free to forward the form to others that may wish to present. 

We will select the final slate of invited presenters based on the quality of the presentation descriptions submitted, with consideration given to the balance of fields and institutions represented across the workshops. If invited, you will present at ONE 2-hour workshop session.

We will respond to interest forms within one week of the deadline and plan to have the series dates and times finalized by early June. 

If you have questions, please contact Amanda Lautermilch, the HumanitiesX Coordinator, at alauterm@depaul.edu or Lisa Dush, the HumanitiesX Faculty Director, at ldush@depaul.edu.