Skip to main content
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
Health & Society
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • |
  • Alumni
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
Sections
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • |
  • Alumni
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
Health & Society

Glimmers of Possibility for a More Just World

Wednesday, September 30, 2020, By Dan Bernardi
Share
College of Arts and SciencesHumanities CenterSyracuse Symposium

graphic of binoculars with the word "FUTURES" (logo for Syracuse Symposium)As we collectively navigate through a global pandemic, pursue social justice on multiple fronts and seek answers to the global warming crisis, “Futures,” the theme of this year’s Syracuse Symposium hosted by the Syracuse University Humanities Center (SUHC), offers a series of events to broaden people’s perspectives, inspire change and encourage ethically based action.

“Futures,” which launched at the start of the semester and runs throughout the academic year, features a diverse collection of events tackling existential questions like, why are we here, what are we called to do and to whom/what are we accountable or responsible? Many Symposium events address social, cultural and environmental shortcomings, past and present, and offer ways we can improve the outlook for our shared future.

Some of this year’s Symposium events include a conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and creator of The 1619 Project, Nikole Hannah-Jones (The New York Times) (Oct. 8); a poetry reading and workshop with Philip Metres, whose work illustrates the possibility of moving toward a peaceful future (Oct. 29); a discussion with Haitian-American artist Fabiola Jean-Louis addressing race and roles of women while engaging with a just vision of the future (Nov. 12) (Jean-Louis’ exhibit “Rewriting History” is currently on display at Point of Contact); and an interactive multimedia symposium, linking Syracuse and South African communities to investigate the impacts of climate change on marginalized and racialized populations (March 26). All Symposium events this year take place virtually, allowing for unprecedented national and international participation.

A Q&A with Vivian May, director of the Humanities Center, principal investigator of the Central New York Humanities Corridor and professor of women’s and gender studies, provides further insight into this year’s Symposium.

How does this year’s Symposium address some of the current challenges facing society?

VM: This year is full of uncertainty and ambiguity—because of the pandemic and novel coronavirus, but also because many forms of injustice and inequality are being laid bare, from state violence against Black and Brown communities to the ways that climate change is wreaking havoc on our environment.

In response, “Futures” has many different kinds of offerings. We hope this multifaceted approach provides different portals for people to experience how the humanities matter, how we must not take them for granted and how they provide us with much-needed tools to navigate so much uncertainty.

How do the humanities help us in times like these and what are the benefits of attending symposium events?

VM: Art, music, history, drama, literature, philosophy, languages, religion—they pull us into different worlds, expand our imaginations and provide us with tools to deal, at our innermost levels, with our fears, hopes and disappointments. The humanities lead us to, and through, hard questions about inequality, love, memory, justice and the role of the state. The nature of existence, and definitions of what we mean by personhood, or what a world is, cannot be addressed without the humanities.

So, we hope people find ways to connect with each other, think proactively about the future and to try to ensure, even if we also feel some despair right now, that collectively, we can and should pursue glimmers of possibility for a transformed and more just world.

portrait of Nikole Hannah-Jones, journalist and creator of The 1619 Project

Nikole Hannah-Jones, creator of The 1619 Project, will participate in a virtual conversation on Oct. 8. (Photo by James Estrin)

On Oct. 8, in partnership with University Lectures, Nikole Hannah-Jones (The New York Times), a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and creator of The 1619 Project, will engage in a virtual conversation with Rawiya Kameir, a new faculty member in the Newhouse School. What can people look forward to that evening?

VM: Hannah-Jones’ work, particularly in The 1619 Project, excavates the past, starting with the first ship of enslaved people arriving at Jamestown, as a means to carve out our future differently as a nation. It is well beyond time to collectively confront how systemic racism, structural inequality and violence are woven into the very fabric of our democracy, in contradiction with our stated aims and goals. Hannah-Jones’ work underscores how the future we say we want is not possible without a return to our nation’s roots, meaningfully reflecting on (and acting from) how our past continues to shape our present structures, practices, laws and our very sense of self as individuals and as a nation. As James Baldwin wrote in 1965, “History…is not merely something to be read. And it does not refer merely, or even principally, to the past. On the contrary, the great force of history comes from the fact that we carry it within us.”

With symposium events going virtual, how does that impact programming as well as potential audiences?

VM: We made the decision to hold all of our offerings in a virtual format early on, when not much was known about how COVID-19 might unfold and what impact that might have on this academic year’s activities. Holding remote-format events, workshops and dialogues is different—we lose the intimacy of being together, exploring ideas. On the other hand, virtual events have invited broad engagement in new ways. First, our students can participate, no matter where they are in the world. Faculty, staff, students and community members can easily join activities and, in addition, we have seen quite a lot of national and international participation already in this year’s earliest Symposium events.

Describe your vision for the Humanities Center and its role in larger cultural conversations.

VM: At the SUHC, we showcase how the humanities are needed to address today’s most pressing problems and can help us all explore some of life’s most enduring questions—questions that have no easy answers or quick solutions, but that we are compelled to answer as a broader society and individually. Through our diverse events, research supports and fellowships for faculty and students, we break divides, facilitate new knowledge and bring people together in ways that build community. The SUHC’s impact can be felt well beyond the University’s boundaries—thanks to our many community partnerships, but also because we are home to the CNY Humanities Corridor, an 11-institution consortium supporting humanities collaborations in Central New York, as well as national and international partnerships.

Since 2004, Syracuse Symposium has engaged wider publics with innovative, interdisciplinary work in the humanities by renowned scholars, artists, authors and performers. The Symposium’s annual theme is chosen by the Humanities Center advisory board, which also helps review proposals and select each year’s final line-up of events and activities.

For more information about the Humanities Center or any of this year’s Symposium events, email humcenter@syr.edu.

  • Author

Dan Bernardi

  • Recent
  • Chancellor Syverud Addresses Athletics, Benefits, Sustainability at University Senate
    Wednesday, September 27, 2023, By News Staff
  • Setting the Agenda in Biology Research: 2 Professors Join NIH Peer Review Committees
    Wednesday, September 27, 2023, By News Staff
  • iSchool Student Selected for Highly Competitive Data Librarianship Internship
    Wednesday, September 27, 2023, By Anya Woods
  • Exploring the Existence of Life at 125 Degrees Fahrenheit
    Tuesday, September 26, 2023, By Dan Bernardi
  • How Climate Warming Could Disrupt a Deep-Rooted Relationship
    Tuesday, September 26, 2023, By Dan Bernardi

More In Health & Society

School of Education Faculty Publish ‘Lesson Study With Mathematics and Science Preservice Teachers’

“Lesson Study with Mathematics and Science Preservice Teachers: Finding the Form” (Routledge, 2023) is a new overview of the fundamentals of lesson study edited by School of Education Dean Kelly Chandler-Olcott, Professor Sharon Dotger and Jen Heckathorn G’22, director for…

International Drug Policy Academy Offers a Unique Opportunity for Students Interested in Addiction Studies

Needing one more class or an independent study to complete a master’s degree in public health, Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics student Emily Graham turned to Public Health Professor Dessa Bergen-Cico for advice and Bergen-Cico offered the opportunity…

Hendricks Chapel Dean, Chaplains and Students Attend Parliament of the World’s Religions

Representatives from Hendricks Chapel recently attended the Parliament of the World’s Religions, held in August in Chicago. This year’s theme was “A Call to Conscience: Defending Freedom and Human Rights.” More than 7,000 participants from more than 95 countries, representing…

Roundtable: 3 School of Education Alumni Define ‘Human Thriving’ in the Context of Global Diversity

“Human thriving” is among the areas of distinctive excellence enumerated in the University’s 2023 Academic Strategic Plan. This concept is inspired by the words of Chancellor Erastus Haven. In 1871, he charged Syracuse students “to thrive here, to learn here,…

Lerner Center and Maxwell X Lab Join Sheriff’s Office to Reduce Illicit Drugs’ Impact

The Lerner Center for Public Health Promotion and Population Health and Maxwell X Lab have partnered with the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office on an initiative aimed at reducing the impact of opioids and other illicit drugs. The two centers, both…

Subscribe to SU Today

If you need help with your subscription, contact sunews@syr.edu.

Connect With Us

  • X
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
Social Media Directory

For the Media

Find an Expert Follow @SyracuseUNews
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
  • @SyracuseU
  • @SyracuseUNews
  • @SUCampus
  • Social Media Directory
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy
  • Campus Status
  • Syracuse.edu
© 2023 Syracuse University News. All Rights Reserved.