Emory Initiative for Arts and Humanistic Inquiry

Dan Sinykin, associate professor of English

Off the Wall @ 725 Ponce illuminated the Eastside BeltLine Trail by projecting film and video art on the side of an eight-story building, creating the largest movie screen in the Southeast. As part of its slate of programming for the 2024 season, Off the Wall hosted guest curators and artists, including Maori Holmes, Sandra Gibson + Luis Recoder and Miranda Kyle, arts and culture program manager for the BeltLine. They participated in programming at Emory in collaboration with faculty in the Departments of Film and Media Studies at Emory and Oxford College, the Art History Department, Visual Arts and Emory Arts. Programming included screenings along the BeltLine as well as workshops, artist talks and a public lecture.

Dan Sinykin, associate professor of English

A one-and-a-half-day symposium, Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century will bring leading humanities scholars to Emory to discuss the research, pedagogy and curricula of close reading — the core methodology of literary studies. The event will correspond with the November 2025 launch of “Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century,” a pedagogical handbook for the humanities that bridges professional and classroom practice, co-edited by Sinykin. During the symposium, one workshop will be held for undergraduate students, and several panels will feature handbook contributors and scholars from institutions including Princeton University, the University of Chicago and Texas A&M University, as well as the University of Bristol and University of Exeter in the United Kingdom. The symposium and handbook aim to provide common terminology and methodological clarity to students and scholars, in order to promote curricular reform and revitalize humanities education.

Gary Motley, professor of practice and founding director of jazz studies, Department of Music

Grammy Award-nominated jazz vocalist and recording artist Jazzmeia Horn had a residency at Emory in March 2024. Horn, who describes her teaching style as “a cultured perspective that balances jazz’s rich history in the African American experience and the spirituality of its essence,” presented a jazz lecture demo, taught a masterclass and participated in a panel discussion. The interdisciplinary residency sought to integrate jazz music into new learning methods in conjunction with the Institute for Liberal Arts’ sidecar course, Performance on Demand: How Our Brains and Bodies Learn to Improvise, the Department of Neuroscience and Biology’s Music and the Brain course and various courses in the Department of Music. In collaboration with the Robert W. Woodruff Library and public radio station WABE, Horn also participated in a panel discussion about jazz music pedagogy and preserving and expanding the genre.

Maho Ishiguro, assistant professor, Department of Music; Harshita Mruthinti Kamath, associate professor, Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies; Scott Kugle, professor, Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies; and Shiv Subramaniam, assistant professor, Department of Religion

Asian Arts at Emory is a collaborative project intended to enhance the arts at Emory by showcasing diverse Asian performance forms, from theater to music to dance. The interdisciplinary series will bring together several academic departments, undergraduate student groups, undergraduate courses, the Michael C. Carlos Museum and the Office of Spiritual and Religious Life. The program spans three semesters through spring 2025, with events including include a Carnatic music concert by renowned vocalist Kiranavali Vidyasankar; a Javanese shadow puppetry performance with the Emory Javanese Gamelan Ensemble; and “Songs For Many Lives,” a Carnatic music concert featuring new compositions of South Asian American diasporic music.

Laura Asherman, director, Ethics and the Arts, and instructor, Film and Media

This project brings students and filmmakers together to address the ethical challenges in the documentary genre, recognizing its increasing popularity and educational significance. In one workshop, held in spring 2024, attendees utilized comprehensive frameworks by the Markkula Center for Ethics and the Documentary Accountability Working Group to explore the complexities surrounding portraying marginalized stories, the imperative of documentary participant care and the ethical considerations of integrating AI in nonfiction media. Four documentarians — Daresha Kyi, Bo McGuire, Andy Sarjahani and Matthew Hashuguschi — presented case studies on ethical dilemmas they encountered while creating their recent films. In small breakout sessions, attendees shared their challenges in their work and brainstormed solutions with their peers. Additionally, Ethics and the Arts is hosting a documentary screening series in which established filmmakers visit Emory to show their work and critique works-in-progress by Emory and Spelman College student filmmakers.

Dana Haugaard, director of visual arts and associate teaching professor in the Department of Film and Media

The Emory Visual Arts Gallery aims to foster creativity, enhance curricular enrichment and promote collaboration within and beyond the Emory community. The visual arts program, under the Department of Film and Media, plans to launch new exhibitions and programming, serving as a bridge between Emory’s arts community and the wider Atlanta community. The gallery prioritizes interdisciplinary engagement, involving faculty from various disciplines as active partners in curating and leading discussions. The gallery's programming will feature workshops and educational sessions for students and the broader community, leveraging the expertise of Emory faculty and visiting artists. Collaborating with distinguished curator Daniel Fuller, the gallery aims to become a self-sustaining space, enriching the student experience and fostering interdisciplinary dialogue and community engagement.

Christine Ristano, director of the Emory College Language Center and professor of practice, and Hong Li, professor of pedagogy in the Department of Russian and East Asian Languages and Cultures

ARRIVALS will document and amplify diaspora experiences through photography and storytelling, responding to the global displacement crisis, which has reached a record 108.4 million people worldwide according to the UN Refugee Agency. In spring 2025, renowned photographers Andy Bale and Jon Cox will lead a three-day workshop at Emory, guiding students through participatory mapping and photovoice techniques to capture powerful narratives from diaspora communities both on campus and in Clarkston, Georgia, a community that has welcomed more than 60,000 refugees since 1980. The project will engage four classes of undergraduate and graduate students, connecting them with refugees, immigrants, international students and Indigenous populations. The students will collaborate with numerous campus and community partners, including the Refugee Women's Network, Emory's Mariposa Scholars Program and the Native American and Indigenous Studies Program. Through exhibitions, panels and community events, participants will share compelling stories of displacement, challenges, resilience and hope in the hopes of creating a deeper understanding while providing diaspora communities a platform to make their experiences visible. The initiative aims to foster global competencies and compassion among students while contributing to a more informed discourse on migration and displacement.

Tiphanie Yanique, professor of English and creative writing

The dECOlonial Feelin symposium, hosted by Emory and Clark Atlanta University, raises awareness of lingering coloniality in the Virgin Islands and explores ecological thought and anticolonial practice through art, poetry, archives, philosophy, storytelling, anthropology and spiritual practice. Members of the Virgin Islands Studies Collective (VISCO) will each lead lectures on the role of the natural environment — fire, water, air and land — in significant revolutionary movements of the Virgin Islands. The program includes two art exhibitions at Emory’s Michael C. Carlos Museum and Clark Atlanta’s Art Museum as well as readings, lectures and workshops, and a cultural performance by the Virgin Island Majorettes of Atlanta and the Virgin Islands Heritage Dancers of Atlanta. The program will culminate with the launch of the Virgin Islands Virtual Museum and Archive of Decolonial Thought, Practice and Pedagogy (The MAPP), designed and hosted by Emory's Center for Digital Scholarship to serve as a permanent repository for decolonial art, scholarship and pedagogical resources from the Virgin Islands and other colonized spaces.

Matthew Bernstein, Goodrich C. White Professor of Film and Media, and Caroline Schaumann, professor of German studies

Acclaimed German filmmaker Ilker Çatak and screenwriter Johannes Duncker will visit Emory for a week-long artistic residency. The duo gained international recognition for their classroom drama "The Teachers' Lounge," which was nominated for Best International Feature Film at the 2024 Academy Awards. During their residency at Emory, Çatak and Duncker will introduce and lead discussions at public screenings of two of their films, "The Teachers' Lounge" and "I Was, I Am, I Will Be." They will also visit cinematography, scriptwriting, video editing, German literature and German history classes, with these sessions open to all interested students, not just those enrolled in the courses. The residency will also feature a student roundtable discussion and several faculty dinners, creating multiple opportunities for meaningful engagement with the internationally recognized filmmakers.

Miriam Udel, associate professor of Yiddish language, literature and culture

The Tam Institute for Jewish Studies (TIJS) will launch a "Jews and Race" working group, focused on connecting the field of Jewish Studies with critical contemporary scholarship and social issues. The semester-long initiative will unfold in three integrated parts: a three-day in-person conference, an eight-session online seminar series and a keynote lecture by Laura Leibman, Leonard J. Milberg ’53 Professor of American Jewish Studies at Princeton University. The lecture delivered by Leibman, author of "Once We Were Slaves: The Extraordinary Journey of a Multiracial Jewish Family," will examine the fluidity of race in early America and religion's role in shifting racial identities. She will also conduct an online seminar session and lead a discussion with students. At the center of this project is a cohort of 10 faculty presenters — five Emory faculty and five from other institutions — who will each lead seminars on works-in-progress.

Harshita Kamath, Visweswara Rao and Sita Koppaka Associate Professor in Telugu Culture, Literature and History

Vernacular Foundations, a one-day symposium in April 2025, explores the Telugu language's role in shaping critical discourse and political community in South Asia. Building on previous symposiums, this event will envision a long-term approach to the foundations of Telugu cultural politics in South Asia by proposing fundamental questions and themes to guide research in the field of Telugu and South Indian Studies for the next decade. Scholars will examine the social, cultural and political formations of Telugu over the second millennium, highlighting new textual and theoretical foundations for understanding language, identity and politics in southern India. The symposium will feature presentations, discussions and engagement with Emory faculty and students, showcasing the Woodruff Library's extensive Telugu collection.