Institutions are critical to our personal and societal well-being. They facilitate relationships; they regulate behavior. They develop and disseminate knowledge, enforce the law, keep us healthy, and uphold social and religious norms.

Miranda Restovic and Sarah DeBacher of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities describes their organization’s efforts to bring rich, humanities-focused educational experiences to preschoolers, thereby expanding the traditional understanding of what a humanities organization does—and for whom.

Today the Academy’s Humanities Indicators launches its latest informational resource, the National Inventory of Humanities Organizations (NIHO).

Local Program Committees and Representatives bring members together to connect with the Academy and each other in the communities where they live.

Local Program Committees and Representatives bring members together to connect with the Academy and each other in the communities where they live.

From the Archives

Audrey Williams June explores key findings from a recent Humanities Indicators report, which shows that college graduates who major in humanities outearn people with no degree and earn similar median salaries as those who major in behavioral or social sciences, arts, or education.

The humanities are anomalous in their focus on academe as being “the one true career path” for students, Robert Townsend said, which is why he feels he has to defend the importance of career diversity.

Anna Deavere Smith is many things: an actress, playwright, author, and founding director of the Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue at New York University, where she is also University Professor at Tisch School of the Arts. In 2019, she became a member of the Academy and was a featured speaker at the Annual David M. Rubenstein Lecture held during the Induction weekend. After performing two original pieces that combine art, commentary, and journalism, she joined David M. Rubenstein in conversation. Their discussion explored a wide range of topics, from auditions and growing up in Baltimore to memorization and the school-to-prison pipeline.

Mark S. Schlissel, Mary Sue Coleman, Patrick Doyle, M. Roy Wilson, and Lou Anna K. Simon participated in a discussion at the University of Michigan about public research universities and their role in serving the public interest in Michigan.

Dee Davis, president of the Center for Rural Strategies, writes about what democracy looks like in rural America - “a mess” - and how to fix it with ideas from the report he worked on as a member of the Academy's project on American democracy.

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.

Academy Staff

List of Staff at the Academy

Academy Staff

List of Staff at the American Academy

The Academy holds virtual events as well as in-person events around the country and the world that bring members, representatives of the Affiliates, and others together to explore topics of national and global concern.

The American Academy of Arts and Sciences was founded by visionaries who foresaw that the nascent republic would benefit from the expertise of learned citizens to guide its development, health, and integrity through whatever challenges may arise.

List of Staff at the Academy