Scholarly research in the humanities sits at the intersection of the past and the future. We work in the present, to be sure; its immediacy is inescapable. But we also work against the present – in order to remember that it was not always so and to imagine what could or should be different. We live at the sharp edges of debate and we compel attention to things that are difficult to look at, let alone see. In word and song and image we stand up in hard times and good to ask inconvenient questions. We must upend easy assumptions in the process, especially our own.

This week at IPRH we rededicate ourselves to the principle that the university is a place where the most urgent contemporary questions are met with intellectual rigor, moral courage and civic responsibility. As it did a week ago, our responsibility extends to every member of the Illinois community, regardless of status or race or politics or religion or appearance or orientation or gender identity. Whatever is to be done, these obligations are clear and unambiguous.

In exceptional as in ordinary times, IPRH affirms its commitment to creative, critical inquiry and to following its pathways wherever they lead. In so doing we refuse despair or silence, even when we are sorely tested and the future is uncertain. Join us in solidarity with students, teachers and scholars near and far as we continue to do the complex, indispensable work of the humanities in this changing world.

Plans are in the works for an IPRH Now event after Thanksgiving break. We will share more details as they become available.

Be well and be safe.

Antoinette Burton
Director, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities