Teams including Ober, Ceserani receive Cultivating Humanities Grants

Classics faculty Josiah Ober and Giovanna Ceserani are members of research teams which have been awarded Stanford's first Cultivating Humanities Grants.

The Changing Human Experience (CHE), part of Stanford’s Long-Range Planning, seeks to advance innovative faculty research in the humanities and affiliated social sciences that is critical to the understanding of our rapidly changing human experience.  CHE seeks to catalyze innovative research in the humanities through its Cultivating Humanities Grants. The goal is to ensure that humanities research at Stanford continues to flourish, by supporting new ways of thinking about and engaging the transformations that are upending our world, and to translate the exciting research to the broader public.

The first round of Cultivating Humanities Grants brings together collaborative teams from the Schools of Humanities and Sciences, Education, and Law, and many include roles for undergraduate and graduate students in addition to faculty and research assistants. The projects address a variety of changes in the human experience, from events of the past, conditions of the present or promises of the future, and focus on areas of contemporary public concern.  Although teams submitted their project proposals well before the COVID-19 outbreak, the co-directors of the program, Gavin Jones (English) and Anna Grzymala-Busse (Political Science), believe the funded projects will "investigate issues of urgent public concern."

Professor Ober joins five other professors on the "History of democracy" project, while Professor Ceserani will contribute to the "African women writers" team.

Find out more about these exciting projects here.