Campus Humanities Calendar
Thursday, November 12, 2026
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The Center for Children's Books invites you to a Zoom Panel featuring Gregory M. Pfitzer, PhD; Ivy Linton Stabell PhD; and Kate Quealy-Gainer, MIS. Theyl will discuss how founder biographies have impacted how the nation's founding have been told to youth.
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Emblematica (Illinois) and Compositor (U. of Birmingham) are databases that use digital technologies to explore the early modern text-image interface. Join Dr. Hazel Wilkinson (Birmingham) to learn how historical readers used “emblem-literacy” to engage with ornamented books in ways previously unaccounted for in scholarship.
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SPEAK stands for Song, Poetry, Art, and Knowledge. It is an open-mic public performance space at Krannert Art Museum curated by local artist, Shaya Robinson, featuring guest performers and welcoming all to the mic. *Parking nearby is free after 5 pm and on weekends.*
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Join MACS 395: Documentary & Music Culture to watch Moonage Daydream (2022), featuring never-before-seen footage and performances by David Bowie. Filmmaker Brett Morgen examines Bowie’s creative, musical, and spiritual side. The documentary short Lil Rooms by media and cinema studies student Miles Lewin will kick off the screening. Free snacks and drinks provided.
Friday, November 13, 2026
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Join us for the final symposium of the Chancellor’s Research Program. Since 2020, the program has provided support for academic research and the expansion of community-based knowledge that advances the understanding of systemic bias and structural disparities – some of the greatest challenges facing our society.
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Stop by on Fridays for our monthly Talk & Tour! Gain insights about the artwork on view in both special exhibitions and the collection galleries. We offer a variety of accessibility supports to help ensure visitors can participate. Contact us at kam-accessibility@illinois.edu for questions or to request accommodation.
Saturday, November 14, 2026
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Come experience immersive sound as you view artworks at Krannert Art Museum! Members of Improvisers Exchange Ensemble will create soundscapes within Krannert Art Museum’s galleries through site-specific solo performance and collective improvisation in reflection and response to artwork on display.
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Drop in for a tour given by our student gallery guides! Topics vary weekly. Free admission and all ages welcome. No reservation required. Meet at the Information Desk.
Sunday, November 15, 2026
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Join us in art making to reflect on the various mythologies that feature serpents, as well as their personal meaning to you. Please come design and paint your own movable wooden snake or paper puppet!
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Professor Olha Khometa and MFA Candidate Malina Infante will be leading a joint lecture on Ukrainian Modernists Pavlo Tychyna, Lesya Ukraïnka, and Olha Kobylianska. Malina will finish the lecture with a reading of her poetry inspired by the Ukrainian modernist movement. A reception will follow after the event.
Monday, November 16, 2026
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"Elizabeth Vartkessian works with criminal defense teams as a mitigation specialist. She isn't part of the Innocence Project; her clients are often legally guilty, and often of terrible crimes. Rather, her job is to spend hundreds of hours per case talking to the parents, siblings, teachers, and neighbors of a defendant, situating their crimes in context.
Tuesday, November 17, 2026
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Drawing on more than a decade of Truth Hounds' Work in Ukraine, Dr. Dmytro Koval of Kyiv Mohyla Academy will examine how documentation can be transformed into investigations, legal analysis, case-building, and engagement with national and international justice mechanisms.
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Please join the Unit for Criticism for a Modern Critical Theory lecture by Thomas Davis (English, Ohio State) on Environmental Humanities.
Thursday, November 19, 2026
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This Faculty-Graduate seminar, hosted by Prof. Melamed, will explore the idea that to truly and effectively call capital into question, we need approaches outside the liberal epistemologies that dominate Western and scholarly modes of understanding and analysis. Register now (required) to gain access to the texts.
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The 2026 Stewart Young Humanitarian Speaker Series features esteemed guest is Luis Jaimes-Illanes, co-founder of Conecta Mentora, a program that brings together youth from urban, rural, and Indigenous communities with world-class mentors and institutions, and a Senior Network Engineer at Altaeros. In his fireside chat, he will share how his involvement on campus helped pre
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Please join us for a talk by Prof. Melamed. The talk will argue that the repressive strategies used by Marc Rowan and others against Palestine on the UPenn campus serve to institute pro-power pedagogies at U.S. universities and beyond.
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Join the Department of Philosophy for a lecture in the Illinois Forum on Human Flourishing in a Digital Age Speaker Series with Agnes Callard. Her talk, titled "Welcome to the Unicontext" explores how we increasingly expect one set of norms to govern all situations and all people.
Wednesday, December 2, 2026
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Join us as we highlight the incredible work of each of Humanities Without Walls' Reciprocity and Redistribution Grand Research Challenge projects in four virtual showcases over the 2026-27 academic year. During each event, 2-3 teams will present their projects and share a bit about the centrality of reciprocal and redistributive methods to their work.
Thursday, December 3, 2026
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Please join us for talks by recent CAS Associates. At 11am Kimberly Mack (English) draws from her critical memoir Brown Sugar Blues to consider the reasons and costs of Black women's erasure from rock, and at noon, Laura Hetrick (Art + Design) asks: What happens when neurodivergent people become the authors of their own stories?
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Join us for our December Town Hall with special Guest Speaker Shad Bradbury, Animator with Pixar Animations Studios. Shad Bradbury has worked in animation for over 20 years at studios like Pixar, Sony, Tippet, and Rhythm and Hues. His credits include, "Elio", "Coco", "Finding Dory", "Inside Out", "Hotel Transylvania", and "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2".
Friday, December 4, 2026
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The Fall 2026 Game Studies and Design Showcase is a day for student gamers to share their new games, designs, and game components. Join us for a day of play-testing and fun!
Tuesday, December 8, 2026
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For the final Food For Thought presentation of the semester, we're pleased to offer an English double-header! At 11am, Tess McNulty considers the cultural history of viral content from an aesthetic perspective, and at noon, Alex Shakar reads from and discusses his forthcoming novel, Play the Void.
Wednesday, January 20, 2027
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Join us as we highlight the incredible work of each of Humanities Without Walls' Reciprocity and Redistribution Grand Research Challenge projects in four virtual showcases over the 2026-27 academic year. During each event, 2-3 teams will present their projects and share a bit about the centrality of reciprocal and redistributive methods to their work.
Thursday, February 11, 2027
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Justice in the Balance: Democracy, Rule of Law, and the European Court of Human Rights
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Join us for a reading by author Carmen Maria Machado! Carmen Maria Machado is the author of the bestselling memoir In the Dream House, the graphic novel The Low, Low Woods, and the award-winning short story collection Her Body and Other Parties.
Tuesday, February 16, 2027
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At the February Town Hall we will speak with VFX Artist Lisa Starc, Principal VFX Artist, at Monumental. Lisa Starc is a highly technical real time VFX artist with 20+ years of experience in the video game industry. She has worked as a VFX artist at Netflix Games, Boss Fight Entertainment, Amazon Games, and High Voltage Software.
Friday, February 19, 2027
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Following an introduction to the book proposal and publishing process, this presentation and panel will also cover recent experiences by faculty and editors in this important component of humanistic scholarship. Co-organized by the Humanities Research Institute and OVCRI’s Office of Research Advising and Project Development.
Thursday, February 25, 2027
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Film screening, respondent discussion, and audience Q and A.
Wednesday, March 3, 2027
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More information is coming.
Thursday, March 4, 2027
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Patricia Owens Book Talk: Erased: A History of International Thought Without Men.
Wednesday, March 10, 2027
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Join us as we highlight the incredible work of each of Humanities Without Walls' Reciprocity and Redistribution Grand Research Challenge projects in four virtual showcases over the 2026-27 academic year. During each event, 2-3 teams will present their projects and share a bit about the centrality of reciprocal and redistributive methods to their work.
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Please join us for a presentation and discussion with Mitch Cronin, Senior Tech Producer, Santa Monica Studio. Mitch Cronin is a Senior Producer and Release Manager with nearly 19 years of game development experience. He's worked on the development side as well as publishing. Over his long career he has worked on many AAA titles as well as indie titles.
Thursday, March 25, 2027
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March 25-26, more information is coming soon. Part of the Up Against Erasure event series.
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Join us for a reading by author Brandon Hobson! Dr. Brandon Hobson is a 2022 Guggenheim Foundation Fellow. His novel, Where the Dead Sit Talking, was a finalist for the National Book Award.
Friday, March 26, 2027
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March 25-26, more information is coming soon. Part of the Up Against Erasure event series.
Thursday, April 1, 2027
Thursday, April 15, 2027
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Please join us for a four-day Yiddish arts and culture festival held April 15-18 across Champaign-Urbana. This regional celebration features live music, cooking and art workshops, Yiddish 101, children’s story time, scholarly lectures, and more. The Midwest Yiddishfest is an intergenerational, all-ages festival, and is open to everyone, including those new to Yiddish lang
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More info is coming.
Monday, April 26, 2027
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“Once Upon a Time in the Jazira: Archaeology and the Mass Graves of the Armenian Genocide”. Professor Lori Khatchadourian, Departments of Near Eastern Studies & Anthropology, Cornell University. Director, Cornell Institute of Archaeology & Material Studies.
Friday, April 30, 2027
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The Spring 2027 Game Studies and Design Showcase is a day for student gamers to share their new games, designs, and game components. Join us for a day of play-testing and fun!
Thursday, May 6, 2027
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Gather with us in community to celebrate this year's HRI research prize recipients and to mark the close of another academic year!