Essays explore how technological innovations and political shifts are changing the nature of warfare.

On October 7, 2017, the American Academy inducted its 237th class of Members at a ceremony held in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The ceremony included presentations by five new Members: Ursula Burns, James P. Allison, Heather K. Gerken, Jane Mayer, and Gerald Chan.

The Academy's Commission on Reimagining Our Economy (CORE) is rethinking the values, policies, narratives, and metrics that shape the nation’s political economy. Rather than focus on how the economy is doing, the Commission seeks to direct a focus onto how Americans are doing. As part of this work, the Academy hosted a conversation with U.S. Representative Jim Himes, Chair of the House Select Committee on Economic Disparity and Fairness in Growth and U.S. Representative Bryan Steil, the Ranking Member of the Committee.

In collaboration with the Ash Center at the Harvard Kennedy School, the Academy hosted a discussion on “Redistricting and Representation,” which included presentations by Gary King, Jamal Greene, and Moon Duchin. Chief Judge Patti Saris moderated the program.

Randy W. Schekman moderated a panel discussion on consensus and controversy in science with Jennifer Doudna, Richard A. Muller, and Pamela Ronald.

On October 6, 2018, the American Academy inducted its 238th class of Members at a ceremony held in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The ceremony featured readings from the letters of John and Abigail Adams by Katherine Farley and Jerry Speyer, a performance by André Watts, and presentations by Linda T. Elkins-Tanton, Huda Y. Zoghbi, Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar, Robert Gooding-Williams, and David Miliband.

2106th Stated Meeting | April 20, 2022 | Virtual Event
Jonathan F. Fanton Lecture

On March 30, 2025, the Academy’s Chicago Committee hosted an event for members and guests that explored the role of cultural organizations and the communities they serve. The program featured Leah A. Dickerman (The Museum of Modern Art) and Oskar Eustis (The Public Theater) in conversation with Academy President Laurie L. Patton. An edited transcript of the program follows.

The Academy’s New Haven Program Committee, in partnership with Yale University’s MacMillan Center, hosted a conversation on national and international policies for slowing global warming that featured William Nordhaus (Yale University), recipient of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. The program included remarks from Pinelopi Goldberg (Yale University; formerly, The World Bank Group) and Scott Barrett (Columbia University) as well as introductions from Steven Wilkinson (Yale University) and David Oxtoby (American Academy of Arts & Sciences).

Essays offer insight about the Internet of the (near) future- and its implications

Political scientists, historians, lawyers, policy-makers, anthropologists, and aca­demics as well as retired U.S. military personnel and a Washington, D.C., reserve police officer shared their expertise in militarization, civil-military relations, democratic erosion, gender and security issues, White supremacy movements, and budgeting and public finance to explore the relationships between long-term militarization, extremism, and democracy, both within the United States and abroad.

A decade has passed since the publication of The Heart of the Matter, the influential report on the value of the humanities by the Academy’s Commission on the Humanities and Social Sciences. What has happened to the humanities over the past ten years, and what might we do to better support the humanities in the future?

The 2111th Stated Meeting featured remarks from Danielle Allen, a member of the Commission that authored The Heart of the Matter, who reflected on the humanities as a historical and contemporary practice in an age of digital superabundance. The meeting also included a conversation between Allen and arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown about the practical applications for the humanities, what works and what doesn’t for asserting their value, and their role in contemporary political debates and culture wars. Academy President David W. Oxtoby offered introductory remarks. An edited version of the presentations and discussion follows.

Richard Saller, Elaine Treharne, Franco Moretti, Joshua Cohen, and Michael A. Keller discussed the humanities in the context of rapidly developing new technologies.

A dinner discussion on DNA and Art: In Search of the Genome of Leonardo da Vinci, featuring Jesse H. Ausubel, director of the Program for the Human Environment at The Rockefeller University and introductory remarks from Kenneth Wallach (Central National Gottesman Inc.) who cochairs the New York Program Committee.

Select Prizes and Awards to Members

Citing Academy report "America's Languages," Kathleen Stein-Smith explores the increasing scarcity of foreign language classes and teachers.

Select Prizes and Awards to Members, New Appointments, and Publications

The 2015 Induction Ceremony included presentations by five new members: Phil S. Baran, Patricia Smith Churchland, Roland G. Fryer, Jr., Sally Haslanger, and Darren Walker.

On February 13, 2019, Anthony Abraham Jack (Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows, Assistant Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and the Shutzer Assistant Professor at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study) spoke at a gathering of Academy Members and guests about his new book, The Privileged Poor: How Elite Colleges are Failing Disadvantaged Students. The program, which served as the 2078th Stated Meeting of the Academy, included a welcome from David W. Oxtoby (President of the Academy) and an introduction from Bridget Terry Long (Dean of the Faculty of Education and Saris Professor of Education and Economics at the Harvard Graduate School of Education). Danielle Allen (James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University and Director of Harvard’s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics) participated in a conversation with Anthony Jack following his opening remarks. An edited version of his remarks and of his conversation with Danielle Allen appears below.