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Public Humanities

Engaging the humanities with the offcampus community is an equally important mission of the Institute, and it is currently reflected in these projects:

The American Midwest: an Interpretive Encyclopedia
Encyclopedias synthesize expert knowledge for a general audience, and so are natural instruments of public education. The American Midwest: An Interpretive Encyclopedia (Indiana University Press, 2007)—was managed by an editorial staff housed at the Institute and led by the editorial team of Richard Sisson, Christian Zacher, and Andrew Cayton. The two and a half million dollar project was generously supported by the University, the National Endowment for the Humanities, special funding from the State of Ohio, and private donations. Exploring a broad range of social, political, economic, and cultural phenomena relevant to the Midwest, the Encyclopedia contains 1900 pages and 24 topical sections including overview essays and nearly 1500 articles prepared by some 1100 authorities and accompanied by 400 illustrations. It assesses images of the Midwest, its geography, people, language, folklore, literature, arts, cultural institutions, religion, education, sports and recreation, media and entertainment, rural life, small-town life, urban and suburban life, labor movements and working-class culture, transportation, science and technology, health and medicine, constitutional and legal culture, politics and civic culture, and military affairs. An eventual on-line edition will extend the educational value of the Encyclopedia through multimedia versions and customized instructional publications designed for a host of specific users and audiences.

American Midwest Encyclopedia cover.

Arts and Humanities Salons
A series of Arts and Humanities salons was launched this past year to bring faculty from the two recently conjoined Colleges together to explore possibilities for collaborative exchange. The first salon featured fifteen faculty members and administrators meeting at the Urban Arts Space downtown; the second convened a dozen former chairs at the Institute to gather wisdom about overcoming obstacles to collaboration. More salons are planned for 09-10.

The Big Picture
Since 2003, the Institute has partnered with the Columbus Museum of Art to present "The Big Picture," a series of lectures and panel discussions by scholars from OSU and elsewhere, held at the Museum in conjunction with its exhibitions. The talks are meant to illuminate the Museum's exhibitions by framing them in significant intellectual, social, and aesthetic contexts. Last year's speakers included: (These three events were held in conjunction with the Objects of Wonder from The Ohio State University exhibition.) The series has been supported by major funding from the Fifth Third Bank Foundation, and by the Ohio Humanities Council, a state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. For further information, please contact Elizabeth Lantz (lantz.38@osu.edu).

Creative Campus
17th Avenue line.
Working with the OSU Arts Initiative, the Institute has begun examining models for a Creative Campus/One Creative University project at OSU. Supported by a Critical Exchange grant from Imagining America ($1,000), two faculty, one staff and one graduate student traveled to the University of Alabama in April 2008 to study the Creative Campus program there; in November 2008, a delegation from Tuscaloosa studying arts and economic development initiatives was hosted in Columbus. A follow-up discussion on creativity at OSU in January 2009 drew in twenty participants from across the campus. In May 2009, Creative Campus sponsored Walkscape OSU, a month-long collaborative exploration of the art of walking at OSU, including a mini-exhibit at Hopkins Hall Gallery and a participatory "Scroll on the Oval." For more information, contact Associate Director Rick Livingston (livingston.28@osu.edu).

Cultural Stimulus
An open forum on Cultural Stimulus in March sponsored by the Institute and the OSU Arts Initiative focused on how the university could respond to the current economic crisis. Under the heading of "One Creative University," a series of "Walkscape" events took place in spring 2009 to re-discover and re-imagine the OSU campus. For more information, contact Associate Director Rick Livingston (livingston.28@osu.edu).

Digging Deeper
Beginning in the summer of 2009, OSU scholars will give public lectures on topics that bring new or unexpected perspectives to Franklin Park Conservatory exhibitions. This lecture series is funded by Ohio State's Community Partnerships in the Arts and Sciences and the Institute for Collaborative Research and Public Humanities. For more information, contact Associate Director Rick Livingston (livingston.28@osu.edu).

Environmental Citizenship
In response to President Gee's signing of the University President's Climate Commitment last April, the Institute initiated a campus-wide conversation about environmental citizenship, drawing together faculty, staff and students interested in advancing the discussion of sustainability and environmental values at the university. The initiative seeks broad-based involvement aimed at raising environmental awareness and embedding concepts and practices more deeply in the fabric of university life. For more information, contact Associate Director Rick Livingston (livingston.28@osu.edu).

Ohioana Book Festival
Ohioana Invitees.
Ohioana collects, promotes, and preserves the work of Ohio writers, musicians, and other artists. The 2009 Book Festival took place on May 9 and highlighted the following Ohio authors: Jaime Adoff, Phil Brade, Margaret Peterson Haddix, Ann Hagedorn, Peter Mansoor, Erin McCarthy, John Scalzi, Jeff Smith, R.L. Stine, Thrity Umrigar. A reception for these authors was held May 8 at The Faculty Club. See the Ohioana Book Festival Web site.

Ohio Chautauqua
Inventors-Innovators Troupe.
A chautauqua offers living history presented by scholar-actors who assume the role of historical characters. The Ohio Chautauqua troupe of re-enactors (some of them student performers from the OSU Department of Theatre) travels to five communities across Ohio each summer to give a series of evening performances under bigtop tents as well as workshops for both children and adults during the day.

Past Ohio Chautauqua themes have been American Humorists, Ohio 20th-Century Voices, Civil War Buckeyes, the Ohio Frontier, the Roaring Twenties, and War and Peace. The OSU Lima, Columbus, Mansfield, Marion, and Newark campuses have been hosts of the Chautauqua. Inventors and Innovators featured characters Thomas Edison, Mary McLeod Bethune, Andrew Carnegie, George Washington Carver, and Alexander Graham Bell this past summer. The Institute contributes support to this program, which is sponsored by the Ohio Humanities Council. See the Ohio Chautauqua Web site.

Public Space
In an effort to link the Institute with the Arts Alliance and area cultural agencies, a collaboration involving them and other groups to host lectures/presentations by eminent thinkers on public space is being developed. Going Public would offer a series of lectures, colloquia and workshops aimed at enhancing the public dimensions of graduate education at OSU. Raising questions about what it means to work in a public university/sphere/sector today, this series will expose graduate students to skills, strategies and opportunities for engaging with constituencies and institutions beyond the academic environment. Partnerships have been dveloped or are being sought with the OSU Graduate School, collaboration with John Glenn School and the College of Arts, building connections with OHS, OHC, national networks like Imagining America and PAGE (Publicly Active Graduate Education). For more information, contact Associate Director Rick Livingston (livingston.28@osu.edu).

Ways of Knowing Water
Ways of Knowing Water is an ongoing collaboration between the Institute, the Colleges of Arts and Humanities and OSU Extension. The project draws on the arts and humanities to connect residents of central Ohio more closely to their local watersheds, and to develop innovative modes of enhancing environmental awareness. Ways of Knowing Water aims to engage the broader OSU community in a conversation about environmental citizenship, at the university and at large: what are we doing to address global climate change and other environmental challenges? This initiative has led to an ongoing partnership with COSI around a project to tell the story of the Scioto River, as well as discussions with the Dublin Arts Council, the Friends of Alum Creek and Tributaries (FACT) and FLOW (Friends of the Lower Olentangy Watershed) about opportunities for extending and developing Ways of Knowing Water locally and statewide. For more information, contact Associate Director Rick Livingston (livingston.28@osu.edu).