On March 30–31, 2023, the Academy gathered humanities scholars and leaders at the House of the Academy in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to mark the tenth anniversary of the release of The Heart of the Matter, the final report of the Academy’s Commission on the Humanities and Social Sciences. The goal of the meeting was to reflect on what has happened to the humanities over the past decade and to consider future directions for the field. To provide context for the conversation, Richard H. Brodhead (who cochaired the Commission with the late John Rowe) offered the following reflections, describing what shaped their thinking a decade ago and what has changed in the years since.

The Academy’s record of distinction in Science, Engineering, and Technology dates to its founding mission “to cultivate every art and science which may tend to advance the interest, honor, dignity, and happiness of a free, independent, and virtuous people.” Rather than generate new scientific research, the role of the Academy has been uniquely interdisciplinary, bridging the social sciences and arts with the physical sciences to support a national understanding, belief, and trust in science and discovery. Perhaps no better example of this can be found than in the mid-1800s when the Academy hosted hotly contested debates about a new scientific theory – the theory of evolution.

The new issue of Dædalus features 18 “emerging voices” – essays on a variety of topics as well as poems by five winners of the Academy’s Poetry Prize in Honor of May Sarton. The essays draw from anthropology, philosophy, political science, and history, and take up both theoretical and practical issues.

American Academy of Arts and Sciences Sponsors International Conference to Prepare for “A More Nuclear World”

The Academy and the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine cohosted a webinar focused on environmental justice and its central role in two recently released reports: the Academy’s Forging Climate Solutions: How to Accelerate Action Across America and the National Academies’ Accelerating Decarbonization in the United States: Technology, Policy, and Societal Dimensions. 

The Summer 2021 issue of Dædalus on “The Administrative State in the Twenty-First Century: Deconstruction and/or Reconstruction,” guest-edited by Mark Tushnet, features fourteen essays by scholars in the fields of law, political science, public policy, public administration, governance, and ethics on the future of the modern administrative state—the more than two million civilian employees working largely in government agencies and institutions.

Experts in nuclear materials security gathered for a workshop on Jan. 8 and 9, 2009.

Members Elected in 2021, by Class & Section

On October 25, 2011, the Academy convened a panel of global experts at Stanford University. Scott D. Sagan, Harald Müller, Noramly bin Muslim, Olli Heinonen, and Jayantha Dhanapala considered the global nuclear future in light of the accident at Fukushima.

The crafters of the Constitution expected the size of the House to grow as the U.S. population increased. Citing the American Academy report on “The Case for Expanding the House of Representatives,” Kevin Kosar calls for Capitol Hill to consider the proposition.

In 1860, zoologist-geologist Louis Agassiz and botanist Asa Gray, both members of the Harvard faculty, took part in a debate held at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences on the recently published Origin of Species.

Free speech makes no distinction about quality; academic freedom does. Are all opinions equally valid in a university classroom? Joan Wallach Scott speaks about academic freedom after accepting the Talcott Parsons Prize.

New Data Available on College and University Humanities Departments

Three of the country’s leading philanthropic organizations are supporting the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in its goal to ensure safety and security amid the anticipated expansion of nuclear energy around the world.

Francis Amory Prize Symposium: Advances in Reproductive Biology and Medicine

The Summer 2019 issue of Daedalus, “Inequality as a Multidimensional Process,” guest edited by Michèle Lamont and Paul Pierson, draws on a wide range of expertise to better understand and examine how economic conditions are linked to other social, psychological, political, and cultural processes that can either counteract or reinforce durable inequalities.

Global challenges, like the COVID-19 pandemic, underscore the value of international coordination and collaboration. In the case of pandemics, this need comes into play not only in managing and mitigating the spread of the disease, but also in the development of treatment therapies and vaccines. Indeed, the first COVID-19 vaccine approved by the U.S. Federal Drug Administration in December 2020 arose from an international collaboration between U.S. and German-based biotech companies, each led by immigrants from Greece and Turkey, respectively.

On February 4, 2015, Andrea Roth and Franklin Zimring participated in a conversation at the University of California, Berkeley, on police use of lethal force against civilians.