Division of the Humanities | Interdisciplinary

Interdisciplinary Centers

 
 

Center for Cultural Policy | Center for Disciplinary Innovation | Center for Gender Studies | Center for Human Rights | Center for International Studies | Center for Italian Opera Studies | Center for the Art of East Asia | Center for the Study of Language | Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture | France Chicago Center | Katz Center for Mexican Studies | Nicholson Center for British Studies | University of Chicago Center in Paris

Center for Cultural Policy 

Founded in 1999 as a joint initiative of the Harris School of Public Policy Studies and the Division of the Humanities, the Cultural Policy Center is an interdisciplinary center and nationally recognized leader in the emerging field of cultural policy research and education.  Its mission is to provide research and inform policy that affects the arts, humanities, and cultural heritage. Drawing in expertise from across the disciplines, the center's collaborations result in groundbreaking work on state cultural policy, the arts workforce, arts censorship, cultural amenities, and economic impact analyses.

In the News

Center for Disciplinary Innovation

In the 2007–8 academic year the University of Chicago and the Franke Institute for the Humanities will open the Center for Disciplinary Innovation. This new center is a direct result of work begun during the Franke Institute's three–year Mellon Project, "New Perspectives on the Disciplines: Comparative Studies in Higher Education." The center will be a place for pedagogical collaboration and innovation, complementing the established disciplines and departments. The center will offer graduate team–taught courses that will keep the disciplinary questions continually in focus while bringing attention to issues of broad concern, particularly those of method and epistemology. Unlike other programs in team teaching, this one will constitute the faculty participants as a fellowship, a group whose aim is to reflect on their disciplinary practices in this experimental setting.

In the News

  • "The Fate of Disciplines: Dialogue on Disciplines Continues with Franke Institute Conference, while Critical Reflection Begins at New Center for Disciplinary Innovation," by Jennifer Carnig, The University of Chicago Chronicle, 27 April 2006

Center for Gender Studies

The Center for Gender Studies was established in 1996 by Leora Auslander and a core group of faculty from across the University to consolidate work on gender and sexuality, as well as feminist, gay, lesbian, and queer studies. Along with fostering teaching, research, and discussion at the University, the center seeks to reach out into public areas where gender and sexuality come together with political, artistic, and intellectual concerns. The center's interdisciplinary approach draws faculty from departments as diverse yet interconnected as literature, history, sociology, anthropology, cinema and media studies, law, and medicine.

In the News

Center for Human Rights 

Chicago's Human Rights Program provides a forum for the exploration of the core questions of human dignity and critical examination of the institutions designed to promote and protect human rights in the contemporary world. Drawing its faculty from across the University, the center is concerned with integrating disciplinary, thematic, and regional perspectives and aspires to educate its students as citizens as well as teachers, business people, or scientists. To this end, the center offers internships at various organizations in the United States and abroad and hosts a number of conferences, workshops, and lecture and film series throughout the year.

Center for International Studies

The Center for International Studies, which coordinates and supervises the University of Chicago's international programs, has grown out of the University's seven-decade-long involvement in the study of international phenomena. In the 1930s the first Committee on International Relations in the United States was founded at Chicago and since then the University has remained a key innovator in the study of other cultures, launching area studies centers, various interdisciplinary and collaborative projects and committees, and educational outreach programs. The center is committed to fostering multidisciplinary and interregional discussions in the work of developing new tools to deal with emergent international situations.

Center for Italian Opera Studies

The Center for Italian Opera Studies is the home of the Chicago critical editions of the works of Verdi and Rossini.

Center for the Art of East Asia

CAEA draws inspiration from trends in traditional art history and in contemporary culture in its studies of East Asian art. As the societies of Korea, Japan, and China are interacting to an ever-greater extent with other nations and are playing larger roles in contemporary culture and international affairs, so too is there an increasing concentration of interest in Asian art and visual culture as well as cross-fertilization of traditions through cultural interactions. The center looks to encourage new perspectives on East Asian art to provide an arena for greater understanding for both academic and public audiences.

In the News

  • "Center for Art of East Asia Leads Project to Create 3-D Digital Renderings of Scrolls," by Jennifer Carnig, University of Chicago Chronicle, 31 March 2005
  • "Digital Reconstruction Could Resurrect Original Vision of Many Ancient Artists and Craftsmen," by Jennifer Carnig, University of Chicago Chronicle, 31 March 2005

Center for the Study of Language

In response to a 2004 faculty committee report on language teaching and learning, the College and the Division of the Humanities took the initiative to create a University-wide center for the study of languages. The new language center will consolidate and significantly enhance the support for language learning across an array of academic disciplines, especially in the language, linguistics, literature, and civilization programs of the Division of Humanities and the growing number of Title VI area studies centers. The center has four goals: 1) to provide modern classroom facilities and multimedia resources in support of language teaching and learning for students, faculty and instructors; 2) to provide a state-of-the-art research and development center with appropriate staffing and equipment for the development of teaching materials and in support of research in second-language acquisition, language pedagogy, and linguistics; 3) to provide professional development in language pedagogy and the use of technology in language instruction; and 4) to provide for the daily business center and office needs of language faculty, lecturers, and graduate student instructors.

In the News

Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture

The Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture is dedicated to promoting engaged scholarship and debate around the topics of race and ethnicity, how these ideas and their structures effect and shape people's lives, and how they intersect with other primary identities such as gender, class, sexuality, and nationality. Uniquely situated both geographically and historically on the South Side of Chicago and within the University of Chicago's tradition of excellence in sociological and humanistic studies, the center maintains close links with local communities, working in partnership with community groups and activists to produce research that is theoretically innovative but also useful and empowering to those communities.

In the News

France Chicago Center

The France Chicago Center is dedicated to facilitating, promoting, and fostering stronger ties between University of Chicago students and researchers and their colleagues in France. The center sponsors conferences, workshops, public lectures, visiting professors, fellowships, travel grants, exchange programs, and various cultural, scientific, and community activities.

Katz Center for Mexican Studies

Few other universities in the United States have forged as strong and useful an intellectual link with Mexico as has the University of Chicago. Named in 2004 for professor emeritus Friedrich Katz, perhaps the most distinguished historian of modern Mexico in the United States, the center is home to scholars of Mexico's government, economic and environmental issues, as well as its history, emigration, and relationships with the United States.

In the News

Nicholson Center for British Studies

The Nicholson Center for British Studies opened in 2003 with a generous bequest from the estate of Robert Nicholson. The center hosts and sponsors lectures and conferences in addition to providing funding to graduate students for research in the United Kingdom.

University of Chicago Center in Paris

Historically the University of Chicago has had strong ties to European thought and culture. With the advent of the European Union and the reconsideration in the twenty-first century of what defines "Europe," it is an auspicious time to open the Chicago Center in Paris. The facility provides for undergraduate teaching in the core and languages, advanced research, conferences and colloquia, and alumni gatherings.

In the News

  • "L'université de Chicago offre une luxueuse antenne parisienne à ses élèves," Le Monde, 12 May 2004
  • "Des étudiantes américains s'initient à la France," Le Figaro, 17 May 2004
  • "French Government Gives $1 Million to Establish New Center," by William Harms, University of Chicago Chronicle, 13 April 2000