Public Humanities Award
2025 Kaplan Institute Public Humanities Award
Dorothy Burge
The Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities at Northwestern is pleased to announce the recipient of the 2025 Kaplan Public Humanities Award, Dorothy Burge!
The annual Kaplan Public Humanities Award recognizes an individual whose humanistic work has had a significant, positive, and lasting impact beyond the university. This year we honor Dorothy Burge for her work as an artist, activist, and an advocate for survivors of police torture in Chicago. Her ability to bridge these realms through the medium of quilting exemplifies the type of transformative humanistic work the Public Humanities Award aims to support. Burge was nominated for this award by Asha Iman Veal, Associate Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Photography and Associate Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Dorothy Burge (she/her) is a multimedia artist and community activist inspired by history and current issues of social justice. Dorothy is a native of Chicago, and a descendent from a long line of quilters from 
Mississippi who created beautiful quilts from recycled clothing. Her realization that the history and culture of her people were being passed through generations of quilters inspired her to use the medium as a tool to teach history, raise cultural awareness, and inspire action. Dorothy received her Master of Arts in Urban Planning and Policy and her Bachelor of Arts in Art Design from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She is a member of Blacks Against Police Torture and Chicago Torture Justice Memorials, cultural collectives seeking justice for police torture survivors.
This year’s Award will be presented at the Kaplan Institute’s Public Humanities Symposium in a ceremony immediately following the Keynote on Thursday, April 17 (5:30pm, Harris Hall #108, with reception to follow in the Kresge Hall 2nd floor atrium). Burge will further discuss her work in a lunchtime event on Friday, April 18 (1:00pm, Kaplan Institute Seminar Room, Kresge Hall #2350). Both events are free and open to the public. Click here to view the full Symposium schedule.
Past Awardees
Past Public Humanities Award recipients have included Ashley Cheyemi McNeil, for uplifting marginalized voices through work in the independent film community, the TEAACH Act, and with Northwestern undergraduates, and Morris (Dino) Robinson, Jr., for his many years of substantial contributions to the humanities through the Shorefront Legacy Center.