Note from the Director, 2025-2026
Greetings!
As I write this note of welcome in September 2025, I worry that it may be both a truism and a cliché to say that the humanities are more important than ever before. And yet, nothing could be more accurate. As we launch into another year of uncertainty—for human rights around the world, for our environment, for public health, and for the fate of the American university itself—the scholarly depth, critical nuance, and compassionate ethics of humanistic inquiry will be what centers us, sustains us, and sees us through. I hope that you will see—and use—the Kaplan Institute for the Humanities as a crucial resource for support in your manifold pursuits of capacious scholarship, meaningful pedagogy, and building a strong community.Here at Kaplan our doors are open for everyone. We hope all of you will find a level of engagement with us that is enriching and supportive. Perhaps we will see you at one of our two amazing Kaplan Keynotes this Fall. On September 25th Souleymane Bachir Diagne, renowned scholar of French and Philosophy, will discuss translation as humanism in a talk about his new book, From Language to Language: The Hospitality of Translation. On November 10th one of the founding scholars of Trans Studies, Susan Stryker, will engage our faculty and students in a critical conversation about visibility at a time of attempted silencing and erasure
Perhaps you’ll visit the Block Museum on November 5th to listen to Brooklyn-based artist Chitra Ganesh discuss her aesthetic take on gender, sexuality, and power in two new works recently acquired by student curators. Or perhaps we will see you at one of the presentations of works in progress by our faculty fellows, research that ranges from the history and aesthetics of the corset in Latin America to the global flows of knowledge and politics that emerged from cultural and religious pluralism in 17th-century India
Perhaps we will see you at a Third Thursday (we kick off September 18th!) where you can chat, commiserate, and unwind with colleagues old and new. Or again on Friday mornings at our weekly writing retreat, where you can find coffee, nibbles, and friendly solidarity in quiet company while you give yourself the gift of time to write. Or maybe you’ll gather a few colleagues and students into a Kaplan Scholarly Collective, where you can engage together with a series of books or films or discuss nascent ideas for research and teaching.
Perhaps you will apply for co-sponsorship funds to bring a guest speaker or host a conference, join one of our four Kaplan Research Workshops, or seek support for the book you’re about to publish. You may discover a new writer when we announce the latest winner of the Humanities in Translation (HiT) Prize or attend one of the Translation in Theory and Practice Series talks Kaplan presents in conjunction with the Program in Comparative Literary Studies. Perhaps you’ll challenge yourself—and your students—to explore the public humanities beyond the confines of campus.
Perhaps you’ll find here an opportunity to teach a course you’ve been dreaming about, either in the Kaplan Scholars Program or as one of our Global Humanities Lab courses. And finally, perhaps you'll envision a new opportunity for humanistic inquiry and community building… bring it to us and let’s see what we can do together.
Whatever your capacity for engagement this year, we’re here.
Director, Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities
Professor of South Asian and Comparative Literature
Department of Asian Languages and Cultures and Program in Comparative Literary Studies
Professor of South Asian and Comparative Literature
Department of Asian Languages and Cultures and Program in Comparative Literary Studies